The Zen of CSS Design: Visual Enlightenment for the Web

Hello - As a college web graphics, HTML, and CSS instructor with a history in graphic design, there is not greater book (especially combined with a careful review of the actual website the book is based upon) written on CSS that brings out its strength in design. How ironic that the critics here are upset that it spends so much time on design. That's the point. Most web developers DO NOT study carefully the principles of graphic design and how to apply them, so they miss its power (not just Beauty... but the power to persuade, among other things). I disagree that there is not enough CSS explanation in the book, though it is probably not the book for a total beginner. If you have written a bit of CSS code in your pages, AND what to learn what design is all about then you will understand it, and this is an invaluable book. Be sure to take the time to visit the CSSZenGarden.com site and chew on the concepts with the real examples.

Good book. My only recommendation for the authors would be to NOT encourage CSS hacks within a CSS document as this can only lead to future trouble. I would recommend using IE conditional statements as a method to point IE hacks to a different style sheet that can be easily altered when IE someday gets something right. In fact IE 7 beta version fixes a lot of these issues addressed in the book. The idea of the Zen Garden is genius. I recommend the book only to those who want inspiration and to learn the history of the CSS Zen Garden. NOT to those wanting to learn much about CSS. You can learn more by just viewing the designs and downloading the CSS from ZEN Gardens site. It is allowed. -MAK

(...) The Zen of CSS Design is divided into seven chapters. The first is a brief but informed review of the development of web standards, leading to the idea of the Zen Garden site. The book then moves into Laying the Foundation, an outline of the Zen Garden HTML source. There are some honest critiques of Shea's own HTML, proving that even the best can find ways to improve. This section is valuable in itself to understanding that a good CSS page starts with solid HTML, a point that is often lost on new designers. The next five chapters cover design, layout, imagery, typography, and special effects. Each chapter takes six submissions to Zen Garden and analyzes the techniques each designer used to create the styles, in the process expounding on different web design issues. The commentaries vary in detail. The review of Night Drive (#064) was particularly informative as a step by step analysis, and that makes sense as it is one of author Dave Shea's contribution. Other reviews are more general, but for most of us, they are all are more instructional than just reviewing the source would be. Throughout the book the authors give their insights into issues that challenge web designers all the time, such as font sizing (they suggest that three methods are reliable, each with pros and cons), web-safe colors (generally not important any more) and fixed versus elastic design (your call, but they give you some good advice). An unexpected bonus is a section on Photoshop techniques that Dave Shea used in Coastal Breeze (#013). Most important for getting to this level of web design are image replacement techniques, and the authors give a nice rundown of the current methods. I knew about this idea and had actually wondered how to do it. This book is a very good starting point. The final chapter is called Reconstruction. Again, it uses six sites as examples, but this time goes step by step through the development of the style sheets. It can be difficult to see how effects were created just by looking at the source, and this section shows how the code was brought along from start to finish. The individual images used by each designer are shown by themselves so that readers can see the raw graphic material that was then incorporated into the design. This touch is particularly helpful, and the chapter gives a good picture of how image replacement techniques work. There are insights that one might not pick up from just looking through the Zen Garden website. I did not realize, for instance, that some of the submissions render differently in different browsers, usually as a result of designers having to deal with the peculiarities of Internet Explorer. It was remarkable to discover that Egor Kloos' Gemination site (#062) has two completely different renderings. Open it in Firefox and then in Explorer to see the difference. Easier yet, open it in Netscape 8 and use that browser's dual-engine design to switch between IE and Mozilla. One style sheet, two differen

If you've already picked up the basics of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and want to see what is *really* possible, check out The Zen of CSS Design by Dave Shea and Molly E. Holzschlag (New Riders). This is a unique book... Chapter List: View Source; Design; Layout; Imagery; Typography; Special Effects; Reconstruction; Closing Thoughts; Index This book covers the topic of CSS in an unusual fashion. Dave Shea came up with the idea for a web site called csszengarden.com. The basic premise is to have a standard HTML file, complete with class and id tags that can not be changed. The goal is to then use a CSS style sheet to apply unique styles and graphics to the page, resulting in some stunning visual displays of web design. But the basic thing to remember is that the page content doesn't change, just the CSS design file that's applied to it. Shea and Holzschlag take some of the more unique designs that have been submitted and use them to explain various CSS concepts and techniques that can be used to push your design efforts beyond the ordinary. The techniques are very well documented, as well as giving explanations on what will and will not work in the major browsers due to differences in CSS rendering. Since so much of the design is driven by choices in graphics and typeface, you'll also be exposed to quite a bit in the way of design concepts, how to choose and render text, different graphic formats, and so on. While none of the information would be considered a complete reference work on any given subject, you do have enough information to apply the technique and continue on from there if necessary. In addition to being a book to teach technique, it also does a wonderful job in providing inspiration. If you're looking for ideas to create a site that stands out, a leisurely perusal of the pages (or of the website) will offer up endless ways to reach that goal. "You can do that?" will be a phrase that escapes from your lips on a number of occasions. Beautiful, instructional, and inspirational... This should probably be the second or third CSS book you buy once you buy a tutorial and/or a reference guide. A recommended read...

I've been using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) for a little over a year on my personal website. Like many CSS beginners, my original site design was boxy and unappealing. Unhappy with the way my site looked, I soon stumbled upon the "CSS Zen Garden" website which showcased professional CSS web design. I was blown away by the possibilities, but I had difficulty bridging the gap between what I saw on screen and my reference-like CSS books. In that respect, this book, "The Zen of CSS Design," is a dream come true. It's the first and only book I've read that combines graphic arts know-how with CSS layouts. Written in plain english, the book deconstructs and analyzes the best designs from the most inspirational CSS website on the internet. In short, the book exists to make beautiful CSS designs possible. While the book focuses on graphic design for beginners and up, a working knowledge of CSS and probably Photoshop is required before you can really get into the book. The text is not a tutorial in the mechanics of CSS, and frankly, thank goodness. Those subjects have been written to death in a number of other books, and their inclusion would have made this book a drag to read. No, "the Zen of CSS Design" is lean and straight to the point. I finished it over a single weekend, and I immediately started work on a comprehensive site redesign. It's the best book Iv've bought this year, and I whole-heartedly recommend it.