Graphic Design Trends for 2026 (So Far)

maximalism embraces thoughtful chaos.

First up, let’s talk about maximalism. Rooted in 17th century Baroque and Rococo, maximalism is the philosophy that more is, well, more. A celebration of opulence featuring dramatic, ornate layouts, this style later resurfaced as a countercultural statement against the dominance of sleek modernism, finding new life in the mid-to-late 20th century through pop art and postmodernism. That spirit endures today.

In today’s advertising and marketing world, maximalism can be used to create “curated chaos”: a single hero element embedded in mixed media, vibrating color combinations, and dual aesthetics. Created with an experimental eye, these designs are more about evoking an emotional response from the viewer than piling clutter onto a page.

One example of maximalism in action this year is the 2026 FIFA World Cup branding. It uses bold typography, a vibrant color palette, and layered effects to grab the viewer’s attention and capture the energy surrounding the tournament.

Another brand leaning into the “more is more” philosophy in 2026 is Poppi. The image below, which showcases Poppi’s new sour apple flavor, uses mixed typography, a loud neon color palette, bold textures, and thoughtfully layered chaos to make the soda can the single hero element.

neobrutalism takes on functional web design.

Next up, let’s dig into neobrutalism. A 2020s web design trend that has evolved from a post-war Britain 1950s architecture aesthetic, neobrutalism takes brutalism’s practice of favoring raw materials in lieu of decoration, and translates it into UI functionality. It’s often described as anti-design because layouts are stripped to their bare bones, only including what’s absolutely necessary.

Here’s an example of an iconic brutalist architecture building, the National Theatre in London.

While brutalist architecture can feel cold and harsh with its lack of embellishments, neobrutalism emerged as a web design trend that answers these critiques by combining functionality with a humanistic twist. In 2026, the neobrutalist trend brings bold typography, vibrant colors, and textures that warm up the bareness.

A longstanding example of this aesthetic is the Craigslist website, which has held onto its simple, text-based homepage since its early days in the ’90s.

In 2026, Gumroad’s website offers a prime example of neobrutalism in action. It uses high contrast colors, bold type, and stark outlines to avoid oversimplification while still prioritizing usability.

craftsmanship and a handmade poster for the festival of the arts.

Last but not least, here’s a design trend I’m calling craftsmanship. A style on the rise as a counter to AI slop, craftsmanship design features tangible, handmade details, or digital recreations of them, like cursive fonts and tactile textures. These elements are often layered to create a collage, emphasizing the feeling that the work was created by human hands.

Craftsmanship can take shape in many different ways. Some designs apply halftones and paint smears, others showcase paper tears, some even include scanned imagery. Whether created physically or digitally, all of them rely on elements that feel tangible and real.

Take two prominent rebrands for example: Apple TV and “We Are XBOX”. When Apple TV dropped the ‘+’, they recreated their logo sequence using practical effects. A physical logo cut out of glass was then filmed while multi-colored lights were manipulated to create a prismatic effect.

The XBOX rebrand achieved something similar, albeit digitally, by reverting their brand to their 2000s logo featuring the iconic XBOX “x” and green glow.

At ICG, we’re big fans of the creativity and resourcefulness that come with handmade design. Take the poster we made for Arts Council OKC’s 2026 Festival of the Arts below as an example. We’ve worked with Arts Council OKC since 2011, and for the festival’s 60th anniversary, we were given the special task of creating a poster that spoke to this year’s recycling theme. So we rolled up our sleeves and got to work with hot glue guns, foam board, popsicle sticks, and a whole lot of Mod Podge to build a collage that represented everything the festival offers.

The collage includes recreations of the Devon Tower and the Civic Center Music Hall, two iconic backdrops to the festival. It also features symbols of the festival itself, like a paintbrush trailing streaks of orange, red, and yellow paint made with popsicle sticks, and a pressboard guitar representing the live music central to the festival experience.

We embraced the recycling theme by weaving in bits of repurposed ephemera, including old festival memorabilia, photos, pins, and an aux cord.

Here’s a video of Brandon, our creative design lead, telling the full story behind the project.

they all lead back to one fundamental thing: human ingenuity.

So what do these trends point to? As the world is thrust into a hyper-digital age, people are craving authenticity. All of these styles lean into the human experience. While AI-generated layouts and ads create a sea of sameness, the mixed media of maximalism, the intentional rawness of neobrutalism, and the one-of-a-kind textures found in craftsmanship all send a human signal.

None of these aesthetics can be achieved by following a set of instructions, making them difficult to replicate with a prompt. They’re built on sourcing colors, typography, layouts and combining them in tasteful yet unexpected ways. Consumers are drawn to this type of authenticity and the advertising world is starting to catch on that a design’s effectiveness resides not in its repeatability, but in human ingenuity.

If you’d like to see how ICG brings our own spin to these trends on your next campaign, give us a ring.