While Google didn’t unveil Material Design 2.0 at I/O last week, it did unveil quite a few changes to Material Design, which included more customizability and the theme engine. But that’s not all. It also debuted a new app, Material Gallery. It’s a pretty simple app from Google, that allows designers and developers to share their work and even get feedback on it from other designers, developers and users. The app is available on Android, iOS and the web, and anyone is able to use it, all you need is a Google account to sign in.
This new Material Gallery is going to help designers create even better looking apps for Android and other platforms, while also getting feedback from others – which is very important. This is all part of the new steps that the design team at Google has been taking in recent months to make Material Design better suited for everyone. Matias Duarte, VP of Design at Google, told a group of journalists at Google I/O this past week that the biggest complaint the team got with the first edition of Material Design was that there wasn’t enough customizability, so that some brands weren’t able to use their colors and use the design guidelines to best fit their app. The design team has changed that with the Material Theme Engine, so that designers can use virtually any color they want.
With the addition of this app, Google is hoping to get more designers on-board with using Material Design, which is very likely to happen. Google has already been working with a number of developers and designers on this new iteration of Material Design, including popular Podcast app Pocket Casts. So it’s likely that in the near future, you’ll see plenty of other apps coming out with an updated Material Design look and feel. Which is not only a better looking app, but a better app to use, as the design team at Google have married functionality with design in the latest version of Material Design.