This chapter covers
- Ensuring that your site looks contemporary
- Understanding cascading style sheets
- Mastering the YellowPencil CSS automation plugin
- Employing AI to write CSS animation
- Exploring AI inpainting and outpainting techniques
- Managing CSS in the Gutenberg editor
In chapter 6 you learned how to choose a strong theme and the basics of layout and design. Here in chapter 7, you’ll dive deeper into design, learning more ways to make your site stand out visually. We’ll explore how to ensure that your site looks contemporary and how to precisely fine-tune the design, beyond what options your theme offers in the Appearance > Customize screen.
And you’ll also see how and when to use AI inpainting and outpainting. Inpainting deletes or replaces an object within the image. Outpainting extends the image, creating new content related to the overall perspective, style, and content in the original.
7.1 Creating a contemporary design
Site design fashions change over time, much like architecture, art, and other creative endeavors. One gauge of current fashion is how today’s buildings look. And you can sum up much of today’s architecture with one word: stark.
Western styles throughout history have moved between two extremes: curved (decorative, dynamic, ornate) and linear (rectangular, static, minimalist). We’re currently in a linear period in many of the arts, including the art of website design.