3 Little Buckets Part 2
2nd edition — by Patrick McNeil — Oct 2, 2007
The Design Element
Assembled here is another set of sites that make use of the standard 3 bucket format. I can't help but ponder why it is that designers gravitate to this magic number. Off hand, I can see several reasons why it is so appealing. For one it creates a perfect balance. One item split in the middle and one on each side. Four is balanced as well, but not quiet as perfectly. The other big plus is that three items is not too much to consume. You can easily scan it, four is a stretch and any more becomes cumbersome. Three is indeed the magical number. One other nice feature is that they act as a single unit and carry a lot of visual weight; through in some design elements that reinforce this and you have the perfect spot to put calls to action. This is just what many of the sites below have done; they have leveraged this focus stealing element to promote the actions they want visitors to take.
Sample Usage
