Despite the title sounding like a battle that’s about to commence on a whiteboard, there is an important distinction to be made.

The terms “the principles of design” and “design principles” are often used interchangeably or blurred into one. Often I see people refer to examples on this website and say “Great example, I’m going to use those in my design (or for my organisation).”

But who design principles are for and what they refer to are two different things. They operate at different levels, serve different purposes, and guide different kinds of decisions.

Principles of design focus on the how. How a design is executed, composition, arrangement, layout.

Design principles are strategic and focus on the why? They are used to aid decision-making about a project’s goals.

Understanding the distinction matters, especially when teams use the language loosely and assume everyone means the same thing.

The Principles of Design

When people refer to the principles of design, they are usually talking about foundational visual principles that are taught in art and graphic design.

These include ideas such as:

  • Contrast: The use of difference to create emphasis.
  • Balance: The distribution of visual weight.
  • Hierarchy: The organisation of importance.
  • Alignment: The deliberate positioning of elements.
  • Proportion: The relative sizing of parts.
  • Repetition: The reuse of elements to create cohesion.
  • Unity: The sense that a composition belongs together.
  • Rhythm: The visual pacing of elements.
  • White space: The intentional use of empty space.

These principles describe how visual elements relate to one another in a composition or layout. They help designers organise form, create clarity, and shape perception.

They are concerned with:

  • How something looks
  • How elements are arranged
  • How visual relationships are structured

They are craft-level principles. They guide execution.

They are also universal and relatively stable. The principles of visual design have been taught for decades because they describe perceptual and compositional fundamentals.

They serve a common purpose for all designers.

Design Principles

Design principles, in a broader organisational or product context, are different.

They are not about composition or how something looks.

They are about decision-making.

A design principle, in this sense, is a guiding statement that helps a team make trade-offs when the right answer is not obvious.

They operate at a strategic level rather than a purely visual one.

Let’s take a look at the following design principles, example (taken from Fisher-Price’s Toy Making Principles ):

  • “Intrinsic play value”
  • “Ingenuity”
  • “Strong construction”
  • “Good value for the money”
  • “Action”

These are not instructions about alignment or contrast. They are lenses through which decisions are evaluated.

They help answer questions such as:

  • We’ve had a great idea for a new product but it will be expensive to make, can we justify the cost? (Principle to consider: “Good value for the money”)
  • We need to cut production costs, what compromises can we make? (Principle to consider: “Strong construction”)

Design principles act as constraints. They shape direction. They reduce ambiguity. They establish a common goal but allow team members to have ownership, flexibility and empowers them to make decisions.

Strategic decisions are about what an end goal is but they need consider the decisions we need make now in order to get there. There are always compromises and trade-offs along the way.

Where the principles of design guide universal composition, design principles guide choices. Design principles are unique to an organisation, team or project.

Do they overlap?

The two are not mutually exclusive.

Visual design principles can inform decision-making principles.

For example:

A team principle such as “Prioritise clarity” may be expressed visually through hierarchy, contrast, and spacing.

In that case, the principles of design become tools used in service of a broader design principle.

  • The overlap happens in application.
  • The distinction exists in intent.
  • One describes how elements relate.
  • The other describes how teams decide.

Why the distinction matters

Confusion often arises when teams say “we need design principles” but mean different things.

If one person is thinking about visual hierarchy and another is thinking about product strategy, alignment becomes difficult.

Being explicit about which kind of principle you are referring to avoids unnecessary debate.

It also clarifies responsibility:

  • The principles of design belong to craft and execution.
  • Design principles belong to direction and judgement.

Both are valuable.

They simply operate at different layers of practice.

Applying principles in practice

The distinction between visual principles and decision-making principles is subtle, but words are important, they shape how we think and how teams work.

I write occasionally about how principles function in real organisations, where they succeed, where they fail, and how they evolve over time.

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    Written by Ben Brignell