Style

A style defines a set of familiar and recognizable attributes which, when combined, produce a coherent and meaningful image. Attributes can include visual elements, musical chords, techniques in painting, clothing, fabrics, decoration, fashion styles, color and compositional techniques or architectural elements. Styles can also be based on taste, geography or any number of other variables.

Styles are not invented by individual designers, but are instead representative of the combined work of many designers of an extended period of time. Ideas are exchanged and combined, using variations on a limited set of variables, which over time leads to development of a recognizable style.

Examples of styles include art deco, Tex-Mex, Victorian, Baroque, punk, Classicism, Renaissance, pop art, rock ’n roll, Western and Modernism.