Maybe "redesign" is too strong of the word - we're not advocating complete redesign (I'm one of the guys who collected these examples because I love HN), but HN could certainly use some improvements. Even a post "Why HN doesn't need a redesign"
http://jgthms.com/why-hn-doesnt-need-a-redesign.html features a point that "the HN Wishlist appeared on HN's front page. It unsurprisingly spawned some discussion about HN's design. The 3rd most upvoted wish is Refresh the visual design."
Redesigns are great thought exercises, each of these has something interesting, that can be taken away as an inspiration if HN will start looking to change (especially some repeating UI elements).
Btw the share amount of redesigns for HN online and comments on them clearly show that people are at least very interested in this subject. And it may prove the point that HN doesn't need a redesign, since so many designers see HN redesign as a major challenge to test their skill. Anyways, I enjoyed compiling this list :)