Mundane task, done in less time, equals a happy designer.

The web team for Southwest.com deserves praise. Look how beautiful and usable their web site is! It’s amazing. Especially when you begin to compare it to the American Airlines web site (or most of the other airlines, for that matter).

“We have a ‘strategic’ plan. It’s called doing things.” — Herb Kelleher, founder Southwest Airlines

Maybe that’s their secret. They do things.

But in all honesty, their web site keeps getting better. Three years ago they started down this path towards having a nice site, and they’ve been refining ever since.

Even crazier, the article mentions a Paternoster. A sort of elevator that never stops. Watch this video for a demonstration. It does not look safe!

Inspired by a post on Hacker News.

Useful for identifying the particular parts of a letter.

I stumbled across this beautiful motorcycle this morning. The 1928 Sunbeam Model 90.

Actor Jeff Bridges fills his site with interesting illustrations and writing.

Inspired by a post on Hacker News.

Whenever visitors are viewing an article they can rate it based on a number of factors — like “Laughing” or “Furious.” It’s a great way to gauge reader opinion without requiring that they leave a comment.

And — after you’ve shared your opinion, you can easily share it on Twitter or Facebook.

They recently released @Font-Face Kits, which is a tool that allows you to easily use any of the fonts on Font Squirrel in your web sites. It’s a great tool for using custom fonts but preserving search optimization.

A few of the things I liked:

• The way the video is at the top of the page, but mostly hidden until you click on it.
• The way the navigation bar is a pull down showing extra functionality — it’s not really a navigation bar in the traditional sense.

Hat tip: Josh Pigford.

Interesting way of showing which posts are the most popular.

When you click “Submit Tip” this panel pops up with the giant headline “Boss of the year entry form,” and right under that in small type it says “Now that we’ve thrown ‘em off the trail.” — cool idea!

I liked the search input field design for the way they graphically made it feel important.

Sections are separated with this fantastic divider which shows the number of comments, and lets the user share or get a link.

The calendar showing the number of posts by day, which I find is often useless, looks awesome on this page layout. When you hover over a specific day you get a pop out that shows the number of posts.

So that’s just a few of the things I liked about the current Engadget site design.

What is Ketchup Week? It’s one week where you can “catch up” on all of the projects you’ve been putting aside. It’s the one week when all of your customers are on vacation, and when the phone rarely rings. It is the one week when the office is quiet and distraction free.

So take the mantle, er, the ketchup and get to work on those personal dreams. Start a new business, or make a craft, or just spend time away from the mundane. Have a great Ketchup Week, everyone!

You can follow Ketchup Week on Twitter, or become a fan on Facebook.

We chose to go with a dark background so that the photos would really pop (we also took most of the photos). We then used some of the orange color tones in our design that the store is using in their other branding, and in the store design.

Press Coffee home page.

The food menu layout.

On their site, you can order live Maine lobsters and other shellfish. I’ve got to hand it to them for using real photos which absolutely make the web site.

I ran across the James Hardie web site today and instantly liked the design.

I really like the graphics on the Burton web site. Check it out.

It’s not the best way to show data, but it’s new and interesting.

Here’s how Brian describes it: “You put your grandfather IN the grandfather clock!”