The internet has taken a decidedly peculiar turn. Weird web design is all over the internet, and brands are embracing a liberating and outlandish visual language.
The allure of the strange has always had a way of captivating audiences. We can look back at the literary nonsense of the late 1800s, Surrealist art, or the Theater of the Absurd in the early 20th century.
More recently, we’ve got the weird music videos of the '80s and absurd Nickelodeon cartoons. Today, Gen Z humor has further fueled an embrace of the odd (see: "brat girl" summer).
Adi Huri, creative director for WOW, Wix’s visual innovation team, has seen this web design trend coming for a while, but she wouldn’t call it absurd. “It’s unique and odd—but in a good way,” she says. “Weird web design is full of personality and identity, and it makes the website memorable.”
Let’s look at some websites that embrace the weird. We’ll also dive into tips for how to lean into weird web design using the latest Wix Studio design tools.
10 weird website examples
01. Treep Tours
Treep Tours is a female-owned small business that curates tailor-made adventures for tourists in Mexico City. Think: street art sightseeing, graffiti workshops and food tours that go beyond your traditional city tour. The site embraces the absurd to facilitate a memorable user experience, which reflects their mission to share an unforgettable tour of Mexico City.
The site incorporates a bold combination of brutalist web influences and design nostalgia to make it intentionally weird and authentic. A quirky customized cursor, unconventional floating imagery, vintage-like filters and lots of animation are used to reflect the diverse sights, flavors and rich culture of the city.
02. Sprightly Creatives
Loud, vibrant and wonderfully weird are three characteristics the folks at Sprightly Creatives use to describe themselves on their homepage.
A call-to-action on their website reads, "Don't follow us on social media," setting a casual yet cheeky tone. And a seemingly out-of-place menu item labeled "Groceries" intrigues visitors, inviting them to sign up for a newsletter filled with "digital snacks and essentials."
Still, there’s visual balance thanks to ’70s-inspired colors and features. Neon colors, textured filters, groovy imagery and psychedelic fonts combine to transport visitors into the unique visual mind of the agency whose goal is to “create loud groovy designs for loud groovy brands.”
03. Mouse Parallax Goes to Wonderland
Wix’s visual innovation team, WOW, is always searching for trends to inspire the development of cutting-edge features for Wix Studio. To showcase their newest no-code web design tool, Mouse Parallax, they created an eccentric and over-the-top website that brings the feature to life. The site draws inspiration from Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, the perfect nonsensical literary tale to encapsulate the whimsical nature of the landing page.
The awwward winning site is visually captivating, incorporating a Surrealist style to facilitate an adventurous journey that’s memorable, fantastical and—you know where this is going—a little weird. Alongside vivid gradients, 3D imagery and dreamlike animations that reflect the theme, each movement of the mouse cursor is used to manipulate the site’s visual layout.
04. Luci 121
Artist Luciano Vallejo created a collection of six digitally sculpted rings called Luci121. His website is a reflection of these unique designs, bridging the gap between the digital and physical realms. By combining 2D and 3D elements, the site achieves a style that is distinctly digital yet subtly strange.
Vallejo’s website is an example of how this trend doesn’t necessitate complete chaos.
The site's typography, characterized by a bubble letter aesthetic in a vibrant array of colors and shiny special effects, is juxtaposed against a clean black and white background and straightforward navigation. This contrast allows Vallejo's jewelry designs to take center stage, with just enough absurdity and effects to intrigue visitors.
05. Blux Studio
Blux Studio’s website is both quirky and sensible. Upon landing on the homepage, visitors are greeted by an astronaut floating in 3D space, visually representing the studio's tagline: "United we raise your brand." This unconventional imagery showcases Blux's prowess for digital design, capturing the attention of visitors and encouraging them to explore further.
Throughout the site, interactive elements and unconventional visuals challenge the norm, using floating text boxes to convey different aspects of the studio's mission.
06. Ryan Haskins
Ryan Haskins' online portfolio pushes every boundary of weird web design, solidifying his personal brand. The designer's style exudes raw energy and personality, characterized by vibrant color schemes that amplify his multifaceted branding. Equally eye-catching are the bright images and collages that embrace a kitsch aesthetic, a trend that celebrates the unconventional and imaginative.
Haskins' website showcases his work, intentionally disregarding symmetry and traditional design principles to engage visitors. Drawing inspiration from nostalgic web design themes, he incorporates exaggerated typography, vivid colors, animations and intentionally low-fi visuals. The result is a free-flowing website design that reflects his confidence, visual awareness and exceptional design skills.
07. Nasir Studio
Upon entering Nasir Studio’s site, we’re greeted with a famous quote by Picasso: “Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.” This accurately reflects the studio's philosophy of pushing boundaries and standing out, while respecting design fundamentals. The website exhibits a unique and eccentric brand identity, incorporating images of skulls and bones alongside neon hues to create a punk-inspired aesthetic.
Pairing fields of solid color with abstract videos and a grid background, the website becomes a collage of unconventional elements. It presents Surrealist visuals of men adorned with flowers on their heads and animals dressed as humans, offering visitors an escape from reality through its overflowing creativity. The portfolio website's unconventional approach sets it apart, daring their clients to join them in a journey beyond the ordinary.
08. Ancient Drinks
There’s no doubt about it, beverage brands are getting weird. With an unapologetic design, the Ancient Drinks website tells a story to introduce their new sports drink. This brand embraces an anachronistic aesthetic to highlight its organic ingredients inspired by bygone eras. Their peculiar web design skillfully bridges the gap between the simplicity of the past, the technology of the present, and our generation's ongoing desire for distinctive products.
Ancient Greek-inspired sports visuals, mythical imagery and collage aesthetics are paired with scrolling technique and animations to narrate their unique brand story. One of their slogans, "life used to be a dangerous sport," comes to life through quirky visuals and videos that transport us back to a time when “shit was real.”
This theme is developed even more with a cohesive written language throughout the site. Ingredients are labeled as ancestral elixirs, historical characters are referenced (e.g., "Davy Crockett's favorite fuel"), and product testimonials are presented in a unique way. For example, they blend historical reviews (like "Sekanjabin 'provokes urine'") with honest and witty customer feedback ("I'm still not sure how to pronounce it, but it's my jam"). This approach evokes laughter, transports us to the past, and establishes an authentic, creative tone that resonates with visitors.
09. Nonna's Pizza
Nonna Pizza's website stands out for its delightful strangeness, despite its minimalist content. It employs a childlike aesthetic, consistently using simple line drawings and cartoonish visuals to represent the brand. Teeth frame the restaurant's name, and on hover, a delicate shake brings the illustrations to life.
The restaurant's branding draws inspiration from one of the most crucial ingredients in pizza: tomato sauce. A friendly tomato mascot is placed at the bottom of the homepage, accompanied by a cutout of realistic tomato vine photographs.
Unexpectedly, the website's typography deviates from traditional pizza restaurant aesthetics, using a technical font to contribute to its intriguing appeal. Overall, the brand's quirky simplicity gives it a distinctive character that resonates with new and existing customers, while embodying the belief that traditional Pizza Napoletana should emphasize key ingredients and traditional practices.
10. Gucci
Huri highlights one popular high-end brand: “I love the Gucci landing pages from 2016 and on,” she says. “They bring something fresh that, even today, after eight years, I still remember and find inspiring.” She highlights that “Gucci’s official site is very clean and minimalist. But the LPs are wild.”
Let’s take, for example, the site for Gucci Mascara, which uses a 3D game to promote the new product. Or the ongoing project Gucci Vault, which was launched in 2021 to promote the fashion house’s heritage using gamification techniques. Another example is the interactive website promoting the Gucci Flora fragrance collection, which allows visitors to enter an alternative world to explore each scent.
These landing pages create a dialogue between audiences and the fashion house, drawing on absurd influences, rich fashion traditions and contemporary digital artworks to inspire the design community.
“On one hand, Gucci has a rich heritage of craftsmanship and high-end classic fashion. On the other hand, under the previous creative direction of the oh-so-talented Alessandro Michele, Gucci has become even more maximalist in its aesthetic, blending vintage influences with modern trends,” Huri tells us. "This revitalized the brand and expanded its appeal to a younger, fashion-forward audience."
Weird web design tips
Ready to get weird? Huri shares how you can implement weird web design into your own work.
Have a personality
“If you can go wild, go wilder.” says Huri. “Think of layouts beyond the conformist standards, place elements one on top of the other and combine colors and textures.” The goal, she says, is to make visitors smile.
Use animations
“Website animations and effects are THE tools for this mission,” says Huri. “You can create cool experiences full of motion, like micro-interactions using mouse parallax effects and loop animations that add consistent movement." Or, "try full-on scrollytelling or background parallax scrolling effects."
Implement website gradients
Consider adding gradients to the background of a section.“They can be just a spot or two of fluid gradients that give an old school, graffiti vibe, or you can make it more dynamic by filling the entire background using more color stops,” Huri says. You can also add linear or radial gradients, she says. "If you’re a bit bolder, use the newest gradient feature, the conic gradient; it’s going to be iconic.”
Get experimental with your text
Beyond using trendy font styles, like psychedelic fonts or handwritten fonts, your website’s copy can give off weird, eye-popping vibes with special effects. For example, Huri says the text masks are “great for bold titles, filling the text with video, images or gradients” to the grab visitor’s attention. She says that “glass effects add layer and depth by incorporating a glass morphism texture.”
Use stand-out visuals
“Transparent videos always add movement and depth, while vector art allows for cool illustrations, especially the handcrafted-looking ones which are very trendy now,” Huri says.
Whether you use visuals from Wix Studio’s extensive gallery or customize them yourself, Huri says you can add “image and video masks to provide cool cut-out layers and achieve a collage look.”
Get started on Wix Studio to tap into these features today.
