When the decorators come in for a makeover, you’d hope that the end result would a nicer, new-look living room – otherwise, what’s the point? But sometimes, a look “just works”, making changes a perfect example of fixing something that isn’t broken.

App designers are caught between these two divergent camps, which is perhaps why email clients and services seem never to have had a proper revamp – they are still based on linear rolls of messages that generally have all the design hallmarks of a 1970s filing cabinet, which perhaps reflects the way they are used.

It’s no wonder that younger generations are turned off by this formal, stiff approach and are turning to IM and social networks at the expense of the older communications tool.

Google chose to switch to icon-based buttons — there’s no longer any blindingly obvious indication which button is ‘reply’

Even when email services do change their appearance it is more a lick of paint than a proper, function-enhancing makeover. When Google gave its free mail service a facelift, the reaction was largely negative. From a small straw poll of users, most have switched back to the classic look rather than the update.

To make the clunky appearance even less navigable, Google chose to switch to icon-based buttons. There’s no longer any blindingly obvious indication which button is “reply”, even. In recent weeks, three non-techie friends have been in touch to ask how to use a function, compared to none in the years since the service launched.

Fluent email

Not a bad time, then, for a trio of former Googlers to set up a new look email service that taps into Gmail for content, but presents it with the sort of interface you’d normally see on a social network.

The Australians behind Fluent worked on Google’s doomed Wave project, and the social aspects of their background are clear from the chatty presentation of the service, with in-line reply boxes immediately below message content.

Attached images are browsable and expandable from within the email, and multiple accounts can be used within the same feed. It all looks and feels intuitive, clean, and friendly. According to the founders, the service also makes dealing with email 20% faster.

The site is being as exclusive as a Mayfair club in its invitations and we are on the list, and will report back on the experience, but the early signs are good — making us wonder why our specialist inboxes, from Outlook to Gmail and dozens of other services, remain so humdrum.

When email clients first appeared they were a direct decendent of the business filing mentality, and little has changed. Fluent, or similar enhanced “skins”, could be the sort of hybrid to show that email still has a huge role to play and incorporate more features of our social lives, but also that it doesn’t need the stiffness of a bowler hat any more.