Announcing the Launch of 5 Niche Galleries

Published June 8th, 2009 in Galleries

Today I’m happy to announce that I have launched a network of five niche gallery sites! Many of us visit design and CSS galleries on a consistent basis for design inspiration, and there is no shortage of galleries to choose from. Some of my favorite galleries are those that exist to showcase work of a specific kind (We Love WP is a good example, it is a showcase of WordPress-powered sites).

Niche galleries are especially useful for designers because they allow you to get the specific type of inspiration that you are looking for without being overwhelmed by too much that doesn’t interest you. You can go to a niche gallery and quickly find helpful and relevant inspiration that applies to your own situation. With that in mind, I have chosen five topics for galleries that I thought would be of use to many designers.

If you have any interest in some of these types of design, please check out what has been posted already and subscribe to the feed or follow on Twitter. Each gallery has been launched with more than 30 showcased items and they will be updated consistently (The amount of new additions will depend partly on how many quality submissions are received, so please feel free to submit your work for consideration. Ideally, there will be about 10 additions each week per gallery).

Minimal Exhibit

Some of the most popular posts that have ever been published on the Vandelay Design blog are the collections of websites with a minimalist design style. Minimal Exhibit is a niche gallery that showcases only sites with excellent use of minimalism in the design.

Minimal Exhibit RSS Feed | Minimal Exhibit on Twitter

CartFrenzy

Designing an e-commerce website brings its own unique set of challenges. If you’re looking for inspiration for some of the most well-designed e-commerce sites around, CartFrenzy will be an excellent resource.

CartFrenzy RSS Feed | CartFrenzy on Twitter

Folio Focus

A portfolio website is one of the most significant assets of any designer, and these sites are often excellent examples of creative and innovative design. Folio Focus showcases the best portfolio sites of all kinds. You’ll find inspiration from the sites of freelance designers, design firms, photographers and more.

Folio Focus RSS Feed | Folio Focus on Twitter

Blog Design Heroes

Blog Design Heroes is a showcase of the best blog designs. Whether you are designing a blog theme for a client or for yourself, you’ll find tons of inspiration here.

Blog Design Heroes RSS Feed | Blog Design Heroes on Twitter

TypeInspire

For typography lovers, TypeInspire will be constant source of inspiration. The gallery will feature typographic works of all kinds, including websites with exemplary use of typography, poster design (from sites like deviantART and Behance), other forms of graphic design, and anything else that is appropriate.

TypeInspire RSS Feed | TypeInspire on Twitter

How You Can Get Involved

Each of the five galleries has a submission form that will allow you to submit your own work, or that of others, for consideration. I would love to have your participation in this way as the success and usefullness of these galleries will ultimately depend on the community of users that develop around them. Also, feel free to leave comments on any of the posts. I’m greatly appreciative of the readers that have made Vandelay Design and DesignM.ag successful and fun to work on, and I hope that some of you will also benefit from the inspiration that is available at these new galleries.

40 Responses to “Announcing the Launch of 5 Niche Galleries”

Oscar Martell June 8th, 2009

Congratulations, great sites..!!

You are fantastic people..!

Shapia web designs June 8th, 2009

Five gallery sites are having very high attractive galleries. I am going to use these templates for the designs of our company. I think this will attract the visitors also a large extent.

Jack Rugile June 8th, 2009

They all look great! I subscribed to Folio Focus. I am in the middle of designing my portfolio and freelance site, so some inspiration and creativity to get my mind out of the box would be great.

Good luck with these galleries, I hope they are a success!

Thomas June 8th, 2009

Nice sites, Good luck

David Airey June 8th, 2009

Sterling work, Steven, and a smart progression from your showcases here on Vandelay.

Michael Mallon June 8th, 2009

I have always liked the idea of niche gallerys and have launched one myself about a month or two ago called:

bestofvideosites.com

Its still in the early stages and is being used as a project to teach myself a few bits and pieces and so still has a long way to go to reach the standard of these galleries.

Aneslin June 8th, 2009

very useful ,
thanks for sharing bro

Nathan Beck June 8th, 2009

Mmmmm so new regular haunts, cheers!

Paul June 8th, 2009

nice man …

Todd June 8th, 2009

Great idea for these sites, they’ll definitely be very useful not to mention fun to kill time with.

Good luck with their success!

Janko June 8th, 2009

Nice idea. Will be interesting to see all the submissions

David Perel June 8th, 2009

Congrats on the launch Steve, this is something which looks quite promising. I am looking forward to CartFrenzy especially.

Awesomeness

Lee Munroe June 8th, 2009

Great work, these will come in useful. Don’t know where you get the time to run all these

Vandelay Design June 8th, 2009

Thanks for the feedback and support everyone. I’ve received a lot of submissions today to each of the galleries, and I’m especially encouraged that I’ve gotten some good e-commerce submissions for CartFrenzy. Good e-commerce designs can be hard to find and I know CartFrenzy can be useful if there are enough featured sites, so thank you.

Zoli June 8th, 2009

Very good galleries. WP themes you used are nice too

ms June 8th, 2009

Good effots, but honestly I’m a bit overwhelmed with “gallery” sites these days. I’ve seen so many, many redudant things. I suppose if you like one in particular and always go there, but with all the selection, seems like an area already filled. However, if you are doing research and somehow a gallery niche covers the niche you happen to be researching (pharmaceutical site before 2004 for example) then maybe it’s absolutely wonderful.

Inspiration is good though, right?

Vandelay Design June 9th, 2009

ms,
I agree that there are plenty of gallery sites in general, but if you’re looking for exemplary e-commerce sites or something specific, it can still be hard to find what you’re looking for. There are some good niche galleries already out there, but most of them are no longer updated. I know that not everyone will have an interest in them and that is fine with me, I just hope that some people will turn to them when they’re looking for something specific.

Eliffio June 9th, 2009

I think this is a great idea. Sometimes us designers are looking for a specific kind of site for inspiration.

This comes really handy, thanks!

csoxa June 9th, 2009

Hi!This awsome, i love the TypeBased site.Nice work, can everyone explain what kind of plugin are used for this kind of sites, i have one site, and i need this plugin(Niche), thank you fro reply!

Regards

Lorant

Vandelay Design June 9th, 2009

csoxa,
I’m not sure what you mean about a niche plugin. Can you explain what functionality you are referring to? The basics of the site could function with no plugins. There are some plugins installed for use with Twitter, for SEO and things like that, but the basic gallery functions with no plugins.

csoxa June 9th, 2009

Pf,sorry for my english….
Thanks for reply!
I mean, the site with Submit Your site, like on TypeInspire.I use Css Gallery from OS designer, but there, i need put every submit(they submit the url’s and i make screenshots and than put on site, its bad) on site.I will be happy when the users can submit they sites,and i just apply.
So, pls tell me the secret!:)

Kindly regards

Lorant

Vandelay Design June 9th, 2009

csoxa,
The postings are not automated on these sites. I am using contact form 7 (a popular plugin) for the form, then I look at the submissions to see if I want to include them, then I take a screenshot and create the post.

csoxa June 9th, 2009

Thank you.Than you make same.Anyways,i will upgrade my site with the Contact form 7 and some Woo.Than redesign and will schick.
Thanks
Lorant