Wearing Design Week: Disgruntled Julie: A Ph.D. in Progress

Hello love muffins!

Woah what a day it has been! I am pooped but I want to share with you another featured blog: Disgruntled Julie: A Ph.D. in Progress. I have always been drawn to her blog because she is in graduate school (like me!) and her name is Julie (again, like me!). Well, that’s not only why. Her design drew me in and her content kept me around. At first, I thought her design was created by a designer but nope, she did it herself:

It’s very impressive and the colors are very cute and very her! I love how everything flows together nicely. This girl will inspire you to take the design into your own hands! Here’s what she has to say about her design:

I did the design for my blog myself.  I’ve had my blog since 2005, and over the course of 4 years, I’ve probably completely overhauled everything and started the design from scratch at least 12 times.  With all the great new designs that have taken off over the past year or so, I considered hiring a designer… but everyone states that since the design was created by them, they have all ownership over the design, and you have to pay even for a simple color change.  Knowing how much I like to change things up, it didn’t make sense for me to continually shell out money every time I wanted something a little different.

For the past two years or so, I’ve had some variation “myself” in my lab coat with a flask, since it started as a chronicle of my experiences as a science Ph.D. student.  Over time, I’ve expanded to include cooking, photography, crafting, and life as a newlywed, but since so much of my life revolves around science, I wanted to stick with the scientist theme.  I purchased a vector image off of istockvector.com and redrew parts of it in Illustrator, changing the face shape, eyes, and hair to look more like me, and adding the signature flask I had in previous header designs.  As far as the circles.. well, circles just make me happy.  I like to think of concentric circles as an ever-so-slightly more mature version of polka dots, and who doesn’t like polka dots?

My favorite colors are navy and lime green, and since they happen to work well together, I used them as the base for my colors.  I wasn’t inspired by anything but rather just went with colors I like — after all, this is a blog about me, so it’s only appropriate that the colors are something I enjoy.

My biggest advice for designing a blog would be to pick a theme or illustration which represents you and your blog.  While a pretty pattern is always attractive, it doesn’t say too much about who you are, or serve as an extremely memorable design for your blog.  For me, I’ve been using my flask-holding scientist for years, because that’s who I am in reality and often what I write about.  It visually connects my blog with my topic.  Also, if you see a design you like, don’t hesitate to e-mail the blogger and ask for some advice — I’ve had many individuals email me for help setting up their own blog and asking how I added borders, a horizonal menu bar in Blogger, etc., and I’m always happy to help them set everything up — after all, it’s true that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery!

Julie actually helped me out recently with recommending a website with different website wallpapers (see my background?). She really is a true virtual friend and someone who I’ll have to meet soon (seriously!). I agree with what she said about having a “memorable design”. Readers want to know your blog and be comfortable coming back again and again. Thank you for participating Julie!

Have you missed a featured blog? Go to these links:

Speak On It

Chic Runner

That Night

The Design Girl

Make Mine a Mojito

Quarter Life Lady

Have a good Wednesday everyone! xoxo,

Julie