Have you ever heard of anyone talk about the use of whitespace on webpages?  Have you ever seen a website that uses whitespace strategically and smartly?

Whitespace used in the right way – focuses the attention of anyone looking at it – on the things that you want to highlight.  It draws the focus in to the features that you’ve put on your page.  Also, whitespace means that the pages aren’t super busy with so many items that are challenging for attention.  I realize that as I write about webpages that I set myself up for the same critique that I’m giving here.  Some of the other benefits include legibility and increased comprehension.

So I was thinking about the implication of whitespace on identity.  When you fill your identity space with so many identity features, it becomes such a busy space.  When you flood the space with too many identity features, it is hard to focus in on the identity features that really matter.  In fact, too many identity features leads to identity confusion.  It leads to a very busy identity.

I know it’s a bit of a cheesy analogy, but you’ve seen busy websites.  People live with the motto – just because I can, I’m gonna.  You’ve seen websites that just have so many things going that you really can’t even focus in on one thing.  You watch ESPN or CNN – there’s the person talking, a ticker on the bottom, and the some other information on the side.  We live in a world where we just fill up all the space with stuff.  Look on your desk.  Can you even see the top of it?

Negative space or whitespace is a great thing – either on a website, but also in an identity structure.  You want to find your identity?  Get rid of some of those identity features that fills your space and fill it with whitespace.