“I wouldn't hesitate to take any web project to him, if only to get his professional opinion of the intended plan-of-attack. Solid developer, highly recommended.”
—Ryan Imel, Aspiring Indie &rarr
The way I see it—
I'm somewhat of a rarity in this industry. At my core I'm a web developer—but unlike my peers I somehow developed a sense of design along the way which I use to compliment the code I write. In fact, I designed this very site along with most of those listed above.
Don't get me wrong—I never claim to be purely a designer, and it's by no means my strongpoint. But give me enough time, coffee and inspiration and I'll mock up a pretty nice site.
I've found that by having a sense of design, art and creativity—in addition to my programming ability—at the end of the day, I'm a more well rounded and better developer overall.
It is this that I find to be the most beneficial quality of preferring nice looking things.