We have been receiving some tremendous feedback about our Platter posts from you guys and we’re glad that you like the word we’ve been doing. We have a lot more interesting content to share with you guys this week, so here’s what this week’s Platter looks like.
The New Article Design on The New York Times
Earlier this week, The New York Times announced a new article design that it would be bringing to its web presence. Stepping away from their age-old newspaper design, this new layout would work seamless across a desktop browser, tablets and smartphones. Based on modern web technologies, it sports a nice & clean interface with a lot of whitespace, easy access to the website’s sections on the left and quicker access to comments on the right. NYT has only teased this design and is not yet available to the general public. The folks at The Verge were lucky enough to get some hands-on access to this design, which they’ve detailed here. We’ve requested access too, but haven’t heard back.
Daniel Eden’s Font Pairings
Web Typography is beautiful. A good font can be the difference between a regular page and a great looking page. Daniel Eden, a designer from UK, has put up this fantastic project he calls ‘Just My Type‘. It’s a long list of carefully picked font pairings that look great together. There’s some great use of colors on the page as well. The fonts are sourced from TypeKit, a service that we ourselves make use of on Beautiful Pixels. Go ahead and check the project out, you’re gonna love it.
iA Writer 1.8
A few days ago, iA Writer, the phenomenally good minimal text-editor for iOS was updated to version 1.8. This update brought along a much-needed update to the UI. While it still maintains the same layout and structure, the UI now has an enhanced look with subtle gradients that give it a much nicer feel. The update also introduces a new, rewritten iCloud engine, iPad optimized keyboard accessory & landscape mode. iA Writer is a universal app and at just $0.99, it’s a steal. iA Writer is one of the few apps we recommend to new iOS users.
Prekesh Chawda’s ‘Prime’ Icon Set
Prekesh is another talented icon and user interface designer from UK who makes an appearance on this week’s Platter. Prekesh has put up a beautiful icon set called ‘Prime’ on sale. The icon set contains 50+ Retina ready icons, available in two sizes as PNG files. His craftsmanship with pixels is world famous on Twitter and his work is definitely something you should check out. Prime is available via Creative Market for $20.
Heads vs. Tails
Heads Vs Tails is a simple coin-flipping app for the iPhone that features some amazing 3D animations. With a simple tap, you can flip a coin and keep a tab on the results. There are 12 themes that you can choose from, each with its unique coin. 4 themes are available, while the rest can be unlocked. The app also has a “God Mode’ that you can use to “force destiny” by using the gyroscope to force the outcome of the toss. The sounds in the app also are a little treat. It’s Free on the App Store, what’s there to complain really?
Portfolio by Squarespace
Squarespace* has been on a roll lately with their launches. A few months ago, they launched Squarespace Note which we absolutely loved. Last month, they launched Squarespace Commerce, giving Squarespace customers the ability to seamless add an ecommerce solution to their existing websites. What we missed was another app they launched, called Portfolio. It lets anyone who hosts their portfolio on Squarespace showcase their work to clients via an unbranded, beautifully minimal interface on their iPhone or iPad. The app is totally free on the App Store and requires a Squarespace account. You can try the app with a ‘demo mode’ that comes with some default photos.
Breezi
Clearly, there’s a huge market for weather apps on the App Store these days. Almost every week, our inboxes ring with the tune of a new weather app that has just landed and every developer seems to be doing something unique their app to set it apart from the rest. Breezi is a new weather app from the guys at studiomagnolia and blackcherry. It’s surprising to us how developers keep churning our these beautiful UIs. It has a simple, minimal UI with bold colors that change with the temperature. Swiping down reveals the map (Apple Maps) and swiping up reveals the min/max for the next 3 days. It uses a fan-out UI accessible by swiping left to right for the locations and big numbers to show the temperature. Swiping right to left reveals the forecast for the day for the next 3 days. It costs $1.99 on the App Store.
Feedback about this Platter, as always, is welcome.
Masthead Photo by Anton Novojilov.
*Disclosure: Squarespace has been a premium sponsor for Beautiful Pixels.