"my friend really wants to get into web design"
If they really mean that, you should consider the point made by Awestruck, perhaps take that further.
Dreamweaver was and still is a popular tool but like all the rest is only truly beneficial when you understand what it does and how to modify that when required.
Also worth noting that in many places the rate of using that type of tool is falling. Plenty of good developers just use something like notepad2, very free, very simple. Even if the site is going to end up pinned to a chosen CMS, this is still the way development often starts.
If you are just building a site or two for personal use, good luck with whatever you choose but to move beyond that, learn the basics of (X)HTML/CSS first, to the point where you could put together a reasonable static site from scratch.
There are plenty of free templates to play with, plus many other ideas for galleries, forms, whatever. Neither does this bar you from throwing a copy of certain pages up in one of the many free visual editors if you feel so inclined and want to see whilst you play around.
The key is to be in control, rather than the software in control of you and the learning curve is not as bad as many think.
