If the site is plain, it looks hand-crafted; like somebody who cares about it made it, and they're too busy making awesome content to fuss about the paint job.

If the site is plain, it looks hand-crafted; like somebody who cares about it made it, and they're too busy making awesome content to fuss about the paint job. If the site is "designed", it looks like someone just hired a designer to sell me something.