The latest approach to website design seems to be increasingly flat in appearance. Gone are drop shadows, swirls, fancy corners and bevels, in are flat, square boxes and buttons.
This is partly because of the demands of mobile responsive designs where it can be difficult to resize or reposition a fancy graphic, curve, or gradient, but also makes websites easier to read and navigate without any distractions on the page.
Ultimately you want your site to look to-the-point and professional, and for the end user to read what you have to say and buy what you have to sell, so keeping site design simple is an obvious step in the right direction.