Give Me Some Space!
August 5, 2024

Chances are you’ve heard of the importance of white space in design, but what really is it and why do we designers think it is so important?
It would be easy to dismiss white space as the absence of something, a gap where content or imagery could be but, in reality, it is a crucial design principle that boosts the impact of key visuals and allows room for your messaging to pop on screen and print.
So, why should you try to add white space to designs? Here are five reasons.
1. It focuses on what matters most. White space frames key elements of a design to draw the reader’s eye towards them. This establishes a clear visual hierarchy that leads to the content we want to be seen the most.
Have a powerful message, a standout quote, an impactful main image, or a key statistic that needs to be the centre of attention? White space is the visual cue that will highlight this most effectively.
2. It keeps things legible and accessible. There are many considerations within healthcare design, not least the need to keep text within acceptable sizes for ease of reading. Spacing out text horizontally with sufficient leading is also important to ensure enough room between sentences and to make paragraphs clearer.
In the UK the minimum recommended text size for the visually impaired is 16 point and it’s important in these instances to keep the messaging clear and concise and well arranged.
Whether it’s communicating a treatment path, a complex Mode of Action (MOA), or simply directing the user to a website for more information, the need for clear and legible type is ever present. Text needs room to be readable and white space does just that by separating paragraphs and avoiding a jumble of words.

3. It lets your designs breathe. While including as much information as possible is especially important within healthcare communication, too much information at once can be overwhelming.
Crowded designs in any format can be hard to digest all at once, meaning that some or all of the message can get lost in the clutter.
By using white space effectively, we can establish a balance between the different elements and allow the reader to take things in one at a time.
The user experience should be a guiding force for any design and white space maximises that.
4. Minimalism is timeless. White space in design can be linked to the principles of minimalism and simplicity. In this case ‘simple’ is not a bad thing, it’s merely distilling all the elements that could be on screen and removing those that are superfluous to the story.
You could have three patient images and three quotes but does having all three make any more impact than the one?
By following a minimalist approach, there is little risk of the final product looking dated within a few years whilst also presenting in a stylish and concise way.
5. It communicates relationships. Much as a larger amount of white space can separate out different areas of a design, a smaller amount of this space can be applied to indicate a relationship between different sections.
By varying white space, it is easier to connect messaging and imagery together to tell a more succinct story.
Using white space doesn’t mean the removal or lessening of creative elements to a design. In fact, it’s a tried and tested method of boosting the impact of the messaging and visuals that matter the most to give every user the best and most informative experience.