>In the years I spent studying design and typography in art college later on, I never once heard anyone mention this rule. But it is the very first thing I bring up with designers I hire.
This is interesting because when I was in design school we had entire courses on Swiss grid systems. "Grid Systems in Graphic Design" by Josef Müller was like the holy bible.
That said there are a lot of design peers that I've worked with that were either never taught or simply ignore this. I wonder if it's a generational thing and simply not taught anymore (I went to design school in the mid-90's).
Of course one downfall of having worked with various grid systems for so long is I can tell when something is off by one pixel and then cannot unsee it.
Grid systems are one way of generating alignment, but not the only way. They're a means to the end, but it's helpful to focus on the end itself, which is that elements are aligned with each other.
We also studied Swiss grids in design school. But much of the class was about how to use and break them; and they were presented as sort of one dish on a buffet of design philosophies. Practical alignment of everything with something else - for commercial work, especially - wasn't presented as a holistic rule. It would more just be an unstated byproduct of using a grid.
This is interesting because when I was in design school we had entire courses on Swiss grid systems. "Grid Systems in Graphic Design" by Josef Müller was like the holy bible.
That said there are a lot of design peers that I've worked with that were either never taught or simply ignore this. I wonder if it's a generational thing and simply not taught anymore (I went to design school in the mid-90's).
Of course one downfall of having worked with various grid systems for so long is I can tell when something is off by one pixel and then cannot unsee it.