CSS web templates for inspiration?

There are many websites that provide CSS web templates (either free or for purchase) and they can offer some advantages when creating a website for a client.

I have been considering using CSS XHTML web templates for recent projects and this is a summary of my recent thinking.

Advantages are:

• Many designs available to present as a starting point to any client.
• Designs can act as a stimulus for your own design ideas.
• Templates can offer a new ‘look’ for your own portfolio.
• A lot of the initial CSS and layout work has been completed – although my experience is that there can still be a lot of work to do when ‘customising’ the template.
• CSS web templates can provide great learning points for designers wanting to move from tables-based websites to table-less layouts.
• Cheap prices

Disdavantages:

• The template you use may be used by someone else – although in practice this is unlikely to be a problem so long as the client knows this (be honest!). In any case, the finished website will have images/text that are relevant to the client which will differentiate it (at least in part) from another website using the same template.
• It’s not my original idea.

Conclusions:

Overall, as a freelancer, I think I’m going to make more use of web templates in the future. Not for every project – but for some. One of my main motivations is to broaden out my ‘usual approach’.

Purchase: » 4templates.com | The Template Store
Open source: » Open Source Web Design | Open Web Design