As the Web evolves to incorporate new standards and the latest browsers offer new possibilities for creative design, the art of creating Web sites is also changing. Few Web designers are experiences programmers, and as a result, working with semantic markup and CSS can create roadblocks to achieving truly beautiful designs using all the resources available. Add to this the pressures of presenting exceptional design to clients and employers, without compromising efficient workflow, and the challenge deepens for those working in a fast-paced environment. As someone who understands these complexities firsthand, author and designer Andy Clarke offers visual designers a progressive approach to creating artistic, usable, and accessible sites using transcendent CSS.

In this groundbreaking book, you’ll discover how to implement highly original designs through visual demonstrations of the creative possibilities using markup and CSS. You’ll learn to use a new design workflow, build prototypes that work well for designers and all team members, use grids effectively, visualize  markup, and discover every phase of the transcendent design process, from working with the latest browsers to incorporating CSS3 to collaborating with team members effectively.

Transcending CSS: The Fine Art of Web Design:

Uses a visual approach to help you learn coding techniques

Includes numerous examples of world-class Web sites, photography, and other inspirations that give designers ideas for visualizing their code

Offers early previews of technical advances in new Web browsers and of the emerging CSS3 specification

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 56 Ratings

Very dissapointing start, but improves at the end - 2008-11-29
Reviewer Rating:
I'm the stated target audience for this book - I already have a good working knowledge of CSS. I'm strong technically but weak in graphic design. What I hoped for was some fresh ideas on how to approach design, some examples of good web designs, and discussion of what makes a design visually 'good'. This book was not the right choice for me.

The first 160 pages are repetitive, circular consultant-speak heavily padded with gorgeously reproduced pictures that have nothing to do with web design (unless you perhaps find them inspirational.) I almost didn't keep reading, but I'm glad I did. When it finally gets into some CSS deconstructions and design techniques I found it more interesting and picked up some nice technical tips.

Excellent buy ! - 2009-06-08
Reviewer Rating:
After reading many reviews I could not wait to get my hands on THIS BOOK...many people said many different things. But here is what I feel.

I beg to differ with many people who say that this is not a beginners book, well, after reading most parts of the book I can safely say that this would appeal to a beginner, Intermediate and Advanced CSS designers. Infact, I feel many books that "Teach" CSS don't often cover topics about Wireframing and Prototyping, workflow tips etc but Transcending CSS does just that along with other cool and interesting stuff which is always expected by Andy. I love the Screenshots and the stock-images which are spread all over the book.

All in All I feel that I am going to take my Web-design career to the Next Level after buying & reading this book.

Ps: Amazon is awesome. I got the book one day earlier before the estimated date.

Transcending CSS - 2009-03-09
Reviewer Rating:
I had hoped this would give explicit CSS information, but instead the book was based on getting the user to understand the important of using CSS.

Great Content--Lousy book binding - 2009-07-28
Reviewer Rating:
One of the great things about this book is the design themes that you can see as you move through the pages. Filled with neat examples and lots of great ideas, beautiful images and really some great content-- what a shame that within a month the book just fell apart! Poorly made, poorly bound.

It's all changing now - 2009-06-27
Reviewer Rating:
I bought this book 2 days before Internet Explorer 8 was released. It seemed to be full of maxims that were universal, until I found out that IE8 passes the ACID2 test. To that end, we're going to need a new version of this book.

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