Whitespace (and why designers love it)
- Shea Beck
- Sep 17
- 6 min read
Let’s shine a light on one of the most useful tools in your branding toolkit: Whitespace.
What is Whitespace?
Whitespace (also referred to as Negative Space) refers to the unmarked space that is left around elements in a design. Whitespace does not have to be white* and can instead be any colour or texture, best imagined as an empty void between parts of a scheme.
*gaining the term due to its origins in print and publishing where columns of black type were inked onto white paper.
Where do I find Whitespace?
Negative space or the buffers between elements that we call Whitespace are all around us, real-life structures such as:
Central park in New York (for the expansive, breathable gap that serves as an oasis inside a towering mass of concrete)
Corridors in hospitals (for how they bridge loud departments and operating theatres with a sort of liminal noiselessness and peace when you’re alone in them)
Benches in the middle of art galleries (for the quiet they demand when sitting and observing installations or artwork from afar, the whitespace exists from the bench to the wall in all directions)
It’s helpful to spot these liminal spaces in our daily lives as these physical markers better inform our usage of the concept when we design layouts. Negative space is a critical tool because, without its presence, things would quickly collapse in on top of eachother and become overwhelming. Humans, by their very nature, demand green spaces and the ability to ground themselves in the open air. We use claustrophobic and tightly-packed spaces as a form of punishment (prisons, holding cells) to the human condition and so it makes sense that the opposite of this; facilitating openness and allowing breathing space is conducive to effective communication across a brand’s touchpoints.
Examples of Whitespace In Print Media
Whitespace not only serves to make layouts more visually interesting but also helps to reduce fatigue when reading. Indents and line breaks in writing are all useful implementations of the same principle and are exercised in text formatting at large. Reading a paperback book without margins, where the text rides all the way to the edge of the page without line breaks would be an exhausting experience for the reader.
Earlier in this post we established that Whitespace doesn’t always mean a white background and that couldn’t be made clearer in this bright yellow Rowntree’s Fruit Gums advert. Whilst subtle, you can find whitespace around the girl’s head to pull the illustration into the middle of the page and again under the girl’s chin, leading to the ‘Taste the fruit!’ tagline.
Smart placement of the girl’s face, the tagline and the product illustration mean more space for that eye-catching canary yellow whilst limiting any excess content that distracts the viewer away from the purpose of the advert: to show how yummy Rowntree's fruit gums are.
This cutting from a newspaper ad might haunt some readers for the wrong reasons but it stands a nice example of how text can be arranged around images to guide the reader.
Whitespace is tighter in this example until you reach the ‘Scotch Tape’ block at the bottom, where the highest concentration of space has been employed around the text to let the product name shine and for that black writing to gain the highest contrast.
This should serve well as a warning to never cut one’s own bangs.
Back to colour again - I’m sure you’re well versed in spotting all of the whitespace in this Sunkist Orange’s ad by now. Text is interspersed between the orange illustrations but note how it’s not difficult to follow and clear to read from top to bottom. Allowing ‘pockets’ of space to come into the layout reduces reading fatigue and can be used sparingly to encourage the reader to pick up on the order of text blocks.
At the bottom, all of the main information is laid out but more crucially the ‘Sunkist Oranges’ name is outlined in bold so that, at a glance, the audience associates the bright orange images with the blue Sunkist branding.
For our final print media example we have an ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ poster. For this example I’m not interested in the white border around the imagery; although it may useful for framing our content it’s not the main focus here.
The crucial whitespace in this poster is actually present from ‘The Man With The Hat…’ paragraph all the way down to the ‘INDIANA JONES’ title. And you may be thinking; “Well, how does that work? Indiana Jones is right there taking up all the space!” But bear with me: the main photo of Indy serves less as a separate image and more as a background for the content (sorry Harrison Ford!).
Whilst the background is eye-catching and makes up the bulk of the poster, all of that space on the left and down to the title is actually whitespace - there’s nothing there - and these are the pieces the reader needs for context.
The requirement of whitespace isn’t to be flat or meaningless but rather perform its function as a suitable void for letting the eye rest. Gradients, texture or colour can all be present inside whitespace as long as it’s not too overbearing and offers contrast to the other elements in a composition.
Whitespace as a device in design
As above, the definition we ascribe to whitespace in layout and print pertains to unmarked space that is left around elements in a design.
**With regards to logo and icon design; whitespace on the whole tends to have a different meaning; this usually references the cutting away of a shape to reveal or show an entirely new design. It’s still void space but this often features inside elements in a design.
Below are examples of this from my own portfolio:
In this illustration of Marilyn Monroe, the arms, legs and body are missing their fills with only the shoes, dress and hair present to inform Marilyn’s figure. Paring away colours and visual information lets our eye imagine the rest of the image and makes the overall composition more interesting.
Here, two small dots and an elliptical shape sit together to make up the facial features of a hedgehog mascot - we use no other colouring or fills to dictate the presence of the ‘face’. Using whitespace lets our brains fill in the remainder and this affords the design a minimal silhouette.
Reading from left to right, whitespace is used in icons 1 and 3 to infer crest patterns over the two shield shapes. Note how the white parts of 1 and 3, when taken apart and laid on a table, would all be distinct whereas on 2 and 4 the shapes match up and fit inside one another.
This illustration of ‘Little Edie Beale’ uses a similar tactic to our Hedgehog mascot above but the use of whitespace is clearly displayed in the book she’s reading. Note how our brains signal to us that she’s reading a book with an open first page with very little visual information there to show the back cover or spine. The same can be observed for her right hand holding the magnifying glass up to the cover; a line is all that is necessary to suggest the presence of her hand in the design.
A love letter to whitespace.
It forces the reader to interact with the finished materials and for the designer themself to think creatively when approaching a new project. There are many devices and tools that sit under the spectrum of a design toolkit but whitespace is one of the most useful implements because of its capacity make complex content instantly accessible.
Design is about communication: taking elements and moulding them to fit an end purpose or platform. It can be a complex road full of twists and turns and feedback but the core idea of design is to deliver something in a pure form that works wherever it is placed. On a principle level, Whitespace enables a designer to stretch elements out and form an underlying structure for someone else to follow, almost like a hidden scaffolding that adds to the design by taking parts away.
Margins, Padding, Tracking and Kerning are all supporting players in how we’ve ingested media in throughout time and knowing how to best implement these tools is the privilege of the designer.
Such a language is diverse across the many disciplines of layout; the first block printers, typesetters, desktop-publishers, architects and secretaries all understood whitespace and the power that “adding a little bit here, taking away something over there” held on a page and, in this way, there’s a lot to be said about the designer’s intention to add in a buffer of absolutely nothing at all.
To recap.
Let’s have a quick rundown of the concept covered in this post. Whitespace:
Doesn’t have to be white, it can be a fill of colour, a background, an image or have its own texture.
Allows separate parts of a document or asset to remain legible.
Reduces content fatigue when faced with huge blocks of text
Lets things b r e a t h e.
Helps to guide the viewer through content and drive them toward key points.
Gives a polished edge to media and serves a function.
Can be treated as space around materials or used as a device inside materials.
Need help with your brand?
Unsure if whitespace is worth writing home about? I offer 1:1 consultations to help you explore cost-effective solutions to graphic design and more. Email me (hello@sheabeck.co.uk) or visit my branding services page to learn more.
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