2015 has inherited a lot of trends from previous years, there’s been a steady evolution of ideas — Flat Design into Material Design for example — but nothing as revolutionary as Responsive Design.

However, we are starting to see trends that feel fresh, either through new treatments or because they’re genuinely new ways of approaching old problems. The most widespread of these so far, has been the use of patterns in web design.

Patterns serve a variety of purposes, from communicating a brand value, to adding motion to an interface, to enlivening the simple blocks of color that flat design favors. And the use of patterns, although not scientifically categorizable, falls into one of five broad and inter-related categories…

GENERATIVE PATTERNS

The combination of design and code that makes up the Web has meant that it was always going to be a fertile environment for generative art, and designers working with mathematics. From the earliest days of the Web designers were experimenting with particle systems, but in recent months we’ve seen an increasing emphasis on particles existing within a more formal pattern. These geometric patterns are a natural evolution of the form, thanks to the fact that it relies so heavily on design units and code loops.

What’s really new is that, in 2015 we’re increasingly seeing businesses adopt these kinds of pattern as an integral element of their brand.