For most of the programmers, working on a project is more about the coding part. The technologies, its versions, the framework used, database design and various techniques utilized to make non-redundant functional scriptlets.
But for me a web project is more about the finished product, which immediately gets global (or published, world wide) the moment it is hosted. The user interface and all related activities that come bundled with the project. The whole experience of being on a site for a while and admiring it as a complete product.
When I say a "complete product", I intend to define it as a set of user interface screens, with attention to detail. The portraying of useful graphics or icons or self explanatory images with the right blend of text to keep the visitor interested. Each interaction (may be a form, a set of links in content, menu(s), representation of common aesthetics for the site) needs to have the finishing touch. To pleasantly surprise the visitor with the unexpected.
With the advent of internet access in the most remote parts of the world, the interface should bear the theme of the site along with being generic enough to be understandable by anybody and everybody.
Experts say that, for a first-time visitor to stay on a site, the golden words are "to get what you are looking for, at the earliest with higher accuracy". I agree with that, but would like to add, that the visitor must get the feel and the urge to visit the site again, not only for the content he had found but also to re-experience the warmth that he had felt.
Maybe I am echoing a designer's perspective on a web site, but the point that I want to make here, is that, any web project has to have a blend of both technology and design to have a great user interface.