Text / Gao Yang (WeChat public account: Quantum Theory)
Waking up early in the morning and staying in front of the computer, I was thinking that AI painting is the future trend, but what is our pursuit of beauty? How does it affect brand design?
This is worth studying.
When it comes to the design of iconic brands, the first thing that comes to my mind is Apple. Apple currently has products such as MacBook, iPod, iPhone, and iPad, and its design often leads the trend of the times.
I suddenly became interested in the evolution of Apple's official homepage, so I found out the Apple homepage of different years.
The way to find it is very simple.
1. Open the Internet Archive website
https://archive.org/
This site cannot be opened directly, requires magic.
2. Enter apple.com in the Search box and click the "GO" button.
3. The system queries the website snapshot of the home page.
4. Select the desired time point and open it. For example, this is a snapshot of Apple's official website on February 2, 2006.
Next, please enjoy the results of my morning reading.
This home page is from early 1997, around the time Jobs returned to the company as an advisor through the acquisition of NeXT Computer.
Vertical navigation was common on web pages in the 90s, and the homepage in 1997 included three separate GIF images and a two-column layout that stretched down. This layout didn't last long, let's fast forward to 199 years.
This is Apple's homepage in October 1999, two years after Jobs returned to the CEO role.
It can be found that the navigation on the left has disappeared, the content is centered and kept simple, and the main picture has only one clear focus: Power Mac products.
This will be the basic web page structure of Apple's home page later, let's continue to look down.
This is the home page from May 2000, showing the colorful, translucent iMac desktop. As you can see, the signature style of the previous design is still there: a large image of the product with the content centered.
But there is a new navigation bar at the top of the page. The design of tabbed navigation has influenced many other websites and is still the navigation location used by Apple today.
When the iPod launched in November 2001, Apple's influence on modern design really started to gain traction. Colorful ads, dancing silhouettes and clean copy make Apple stand out in the advertising world.
The homepage was unveiled in late 2005. By this point, Apple had established itself in the worlds of design and technology.
When the iPhone was launched at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in early 2007 (the homepage on the left in the image below), Apple.com used a dark background for the homepage, forcing you to focus on the iPhone in the center of the screen.
Notice how the white navigation contrasts with the rest of the page.
By the time Mac OS X Leopard came out in June 2007 (the homepage on the right, above), the navigation had faded to gray and the icons were more skeuomorphic—interfaces designed to mirror real-life objects.
This kicked off a great era in Apple design history, with icons like Safari turned into lifelike compasses and iMovie looking like a camera tablet.
In early 2008, Apple introduced the Macbook Air. On the homepage at this time, the product function map is very large, occupying about 2/3 of the layout.
In April 2010, the iPad debuted, and the homepage uses this perspective image to enhance its appeal. Apple uses this design to show viewers that the iPad is significantly larger than the iPhone.
When Steve Jobs passed away in October 2011, this iconic photo was the only one on Apple's home page, and it linked to the Jobs memorial site.
With the arrival of iOS 7 in September 2013, Apple's homepage adopted a simpler, flatter design featuring vibrant colors that grab attention.
By 2014, the navigation on Apple.com was lackluster. Here, we can see that the navigation has been made transparent so as not to affect the rich imagery behind the display font.
When the iPhone X hit the scene in November 2017, Apple tried something very different. An entire page is dedicated to iPhone X and product photography. The main image has a product image, a title, a subtitle, and two links.
When the iPhone 14 is released in September 2022, a dark purple device with shiny edges will take over the first screen of Apple's home page, which will look particularly eye-catching.
The last time the latest iPhone took up so much space on the homepage was in 2017 with the release of the iPhone X. For the three generations of iPhones, the focus has been on improvements, not major changes.
Whether you're an Apple fan or not, there's no denying the brand's influence in the design world. From brick-and-mortar stores to the homepage of its official website, Apple takes the visual appeal of its products very seriously. It lets us know that the aesthetics of a product is very important.