Import other designs (and how to make that easier) (Score 1)

I recently created a really simple website. I am fully aware of the fact that I do not have design skills, but I do consider design important. So what did I do? I simply copied the entire design of another website and replaced the content and code with my own.

This shows how important it is to be clear about software and design license issues, but that is not my point here.

At the moment, it is often not easy enough to copy good design. Design should be as easy to copy as it is to import any other 'library'.

I think the problem is that people don't look at design as a reusable component. People are happy to use libraries when it comes to login systems, connecting to API's, database access, etc. Design should be treated the same way.

Good examples out there:
* Wordpress templates
* Skins in general (but many developers fail to pick a good default for their product)
* The default good looks of Ruby on Rails projects

But we need more. It should be much easier to copy good design elements from other software, without having to do much hacking.

In fact, it should be so easy to change the look of a program that designers can do it without learning too much coding.