· Marcus Johnson

Performance Is a Design Decision

Why we treat page speed as a core design principle—not a development afterthought—and how it shapes every project.

DevelopmentPerformanceUX

There’s a persistent myth in our industry: design is about how things look, and performance is a technical concern for developers to solve later.

This is wrong. Performance is design.

Every millisecond of load time shapes user experience. Every kilobyte of JavaScript affects who can access your site. Every layout shift erodes trust. These aren’t technical details—they’re design decisions.

The cost of ignoring performance

Let’s start with the business case:

  • Amazon found that every 100ms of latency cost them 1% in sales
  • Google discovered that a 0.5-second delay reduced traffic by 20%
  • Walmart increased conversions by 2% for every 1-second improvement

For a mid-sized e-commerce site doing $10M annually, a 2-second improvement could mean $200K+ in additional revenue.

Beyond revenue, performance affects reach:

  • 3.8 billion people access the internet on low-end devices
  • Average mobile connection speeds vary 10x between countries
  • Not everyone has the latest iPhone on fast WiFi

When we design without performance in mind, we’re designing for privilege.

How we approach performance

At Studio Minimal, performance is embedded in our process from day one.

1. Performance budgets

Before we design anything, we set performance budgets:

  • Total page weight: < 500KB initial load
  • Time to Interactive: < 3 seconds on 3G
  • Core Web Vitals: Pass all three metrics

These constraints shape design decisions. They’re not limitations—they’re creative guardrails that lead to better solutions.

2. Design system efficiency

Our design systems are built for performance:

  • Limited font weights — Two weights per typeface maximum
  • Systematic spacing — Fewer custom values = smaller CSS
  • SVG icons — Vector graphics scale without file size increase
  • Component reuse — Consistent patterns enable code optimization

Every design decision has a performance cost. We make those costs visible.

3. Architecture choices

We default to static-first architecture:

  • Static generation over server rendering when possible
  • Edge caching to serve content from nearby servers
  • Progressive enhancement ensuring core functionality without JavaScript
  • Lazy loading for images and non-critical content

The fastest request is the one you don’t make.

4. Image strategy

Images typically account for 50-70% of page weight. We’re obsessive about them:

  • Modern formats — WebP and AVIF with fallbacks
  • Responsive sizing — Right size for every viewport
  • Lazy loading — Only load what’s visible
  • Quality optimization — 80% quality is indistinguishable from 100%

A single unoptimized hero image can undo every other optimization.

5. JavaScript discipline

JavaScript is the most expensive resource on the web. It must be downloaded, parsed, compiled, and executed—each step taking time on mobile devices.

Our approach:

  • Question every library — Do we really need this?
  • Prefer native solutions — CSS can do what JavaScript used to
  • Async and defer — Never block the parser
  • Code splitting — Load only what’s needed

The best JavaScript is no JavaScript. We use it when necessary, not by default.

Case study: Chronicle Media

We rebuilt Chronicle Media’s website with performance as the primary design driver. The results:

Before:

  • 8.2s load time on mobile
  • 2.1MB page weight
  • Lighthouse Performance: 34

After:

  • 2.2s load time on mobile
  • 340KB page weight
  • Lighthouse Performance: 98

The design didn’t suffer. In fact, the constraints led to a cleaner, more focused reading experience. Readers stayed 45% longer. Ad revenue increased 28%.

Performance and experience weren’t tradeoffs—they were aligned.

The designer’s responsibility

If you’re a designer, here’s what you can do:

  1. Learn the metrics — Understand LCP, FID, and CLS
  2. Question your choices — Does this animation need JavaScript?
  3. Consider context — How will this load on a slow connection?
  4. Collaborate early — Involve developers in design decisions
  5. Test on real devices — Your MacBook Pro lies to you

Performance isn’t someone else’s job. It’s everyone’s job.

The business case

For agencies pitching performance work:

  • Frame it as revenue, not speed
  • Show competitor benchmarks
  • Calculate the cost of current performance
  • Propose measurable improvements with timelines

Clients understand money. Connect performance to business outcomes.

Want to discuss performance for your project? We audit existing sites and build new ones with speed as a core principle. Let’s talk.