As a trained graphic designer, coder and of course, writer, I've been building websites for almost 20 years. Good reference lists you've provided. I will simply add that having a deep and original design sense is a talent in itself, though with so many templates, people can (and do) put together decent websites. But when I see them, I always spot the "turn-offs", bad color template, misspellings and more. So, if you go to a designer's website and like what you see, it might be worth it to pay a professional.

I have one cardinal rule: I will not put your dog's picture on the homepage. Ha!

Good and helpful read, thanks.