What makes your Designs stand out !

Have you ever thought what makes our buildings so strong?
Well my asking this question doesn't imply that I am an architect of buildings but surely I am an architect of websites and find little differences in my job and an architect's job.
A colleague of mine yesterday asked me what I thought makes a good design. I pondered for a while (frankly the basic factors are many and I know a lot of my readers agree to it) and then told her about four basic factors..(a)Layout (b)typography (c) relevant designs & (d) color (yes the simplest always comes at the last)
You might wonder why I marked out only four but sincerely these are the basic factors which I think make a design make or break a site theme/message/purpose.
Now,starting with the first one, Layout is as important as having your maps prepared before you start building your house. You should be clear where you want what features,effects,images etc. (just as you would for your study,living or dining room).Use of "healthy" enough white space makes the site appear lighter and this can be best done utilizing wireframes.
Also, Logo Design goes a long way in establishing your business.Having your company/business logo at the optimum places would assist in making your logo come alive in memories of the visitors coming to your site. If needed have your logo redesigned.
These make your job a bit detailed but this comes a lot handy when you start having the features on your site. Write down as much as you can on the specifics for your details and include these in the wireframes. I mentioned white spaces,why? because they make different sections in your site "different". The visitor should know with considerable ease where he is on the site. The blocks,tables,divisions have to be "clear" for this.
Under Typography would come your selection of fonts and their styles,color etc. If you want people to make it easy going through your site then there is no way your avoiding this essential feature. Here you also have the backgrounds too to work on. Contrasts have to be just correct or else they would make your readers appear like drunk people walking along a busy highway in the night,dazed due to the traffic headlights hitting their eyes...
Now, Relevant Designs come in. I usually come across some really marvelous blogs,sites with equally impressive designs (blogs of teenagers,professionals,artists etc.) I must say I am fanatically inspired by people like them who make their sites so wonderful to keep on gazing at and admire. I love such people. Designs here includes not only placement of images but also of customized fonts with nice colors and some personalized effects like an animation of a pet of the writer (of a blog which I had visited last week) I was so much impressed with this guy's imagination.
Last (and the first too!) is the Color. NO need to have as much or as less of colors out there. Trust me,leave the job to your designer after asking them to produce their "best" color themes. Have sample themes from two and above and I bet you would certainly have an "original" for your site. Yes I stressed on original as this aspect is loosing to the copies going around these days.
I know there are many aspects interlinked and dependent on each other within the above four ones but in my opinion these are merely the startups on which the entire structures of wonderful sites exist.