Atomic Design

While reading an article about the shift to responsive design, ‘View Full Site’ must die by Jared Spool I came across a reference to Brad Frost’s Atomic Design system. In Atomic Design a site is made up of Atoms (buttons, fields, images), molecules (combinations of atoms), Organisms (combination of molecules), Templates (groups of organisms forming pages and displaying layout) and Pages (specific instances of a template).  A very clear way to break down the components of a site with a chemistry twist. I particularly like how each higher level builds on interactions with the previous level. Atoms by themselves aren’t that interesting but molecules…there’s something working together.

I highly suggest a read if you aren’t familiar with it!