Earlier this week, we asked Moonfruit founder Wendy Tan-White what she thought were the five best-designed websites around.

But what about the worst-designed websites? What are the corkers that Wendy Tan-White has come across through her career? And importantly, what makes them so bad?

1. FabricLand.co.uk

FabricLand.co.uk has a massive range of fabrics, accessories and products as well as a successful chain of shops. But the website makes it hard to find anything, the colours hurt your eyes and it uses technology from way back when. Whenever I see it, I just want to make it beautiful and functional!

2. Boo.com

The now-defunct Boo.com offered a service based on style and being stylish – but unfortunately Boo.com didn’t design their site to reflect their brand messaging. They went against usability conventions, and when you tried to use the site, it was hard for anyone to use. Plus, because it had lots of graphics, the site was extremely slow to load. A major fail.

3. Morrisons.co.uk

The Morrisons website looks pretty enough, but if you’re looking to find out what products they stock or if you want to shop online, you just can’t. The site is purely informational, even though it gives you the impression that you can buy online. Not good enough!

Generally speaking, poor web design comes down to a lack of simple things that all contemporary sites should include – for example, an engaging balance of multimedia content (if relevant) to retain interest, a clear usability and brand message, and simple social integration, so that it can be shared with others and engage wider conversations.

Which websites do you dislike the most? Which poorly-designed sites have you come across? Leave your comments below.

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