really need inspiration

[JDM71488]

i can go on forever about some websites that i love (http://stopdesign.com, http://alistapart.com, http://adactio.com, http://ryanbrill.com, etc). i look at them everyday as much as i can, and i really enjoy just looking at how their sites are designed. then i get into their portfolios and i like all of that work too.

i know how to design with xhtml and css and how to make my pages cross-browser compliant, but just making the page stylish is hard to do. i'll get something and then start over and after a while of that i just get to the point where i want to learn something that can possible help me, but i don't know what else to look at. i don't want to copy anyone and my trials to create my own but similar seem endless. they just never quite come together.

i use photoshop and fireworks so i'm not stuck with just text or paint. but i don't like a lot of graphics on a page. i like simple designs with icons and simple colors.

does anyone have any good tutorials for design. not really what the css looks like, but design concepts, theories, suggestions, tips, or anything like that. if i can get some pointers on how to design better then i should be able to produce more work.

tia,
JDM

[ray326]

Here are some pure design sites I had bookmarked.

http://www.stylegala.com/
http://www.thinkingwithtype.com/
http://www.designinflight.com/

[JDM71488]

thanks ray, the last two links i haven't seen. but http://stylegala.com i have. as well as http://cssbeauty.com, http://thesis.veracon.net, http://cssreboot.com, etc.

i can see the sites that i like, but turning that into a site of my own is the hard part. i honestly don't know what i'm looking for. books, maybe? something like the css zen garden book? something to step you through creating the visual and design portion of a site, not just the code.

[drhowarddrfine]

An art class because that's all it is. Art.