Leslie Howard Yoga Website
Web and Interaction Design, Front End Coding, Project Management
Introduction: I’ve always been an advocate for process, especially for small design projects with tight budgets. As a consultant, I’ve found that process helps small business clients understand and appreciate what it takes to create an engaging design solution. I teach process in my college classes, guiding students through the phases of strategy, design, and execution for branding, print, and web projects. I’ve received feedback that this teaching has been invaluable to students as they venture on into other classes and real-world projects that lack clear structure and organization--they are able to rely on their own solid foundation from which to solve design problems.
Problems and Goals: The original Leslie Howard Yoga (LHY) site was outdated, hard on the eyes, confusing to navigate, and had a clunky shopping experience; users often emailed the client with content and functionality issues on the site. Interest in the client’s services was growing, and she wanted to solve these design and usability issues to improve the customer experience and perception of her brand. The client also had a strong vision for the creative direction of the site, using an artist’s mixed media works to represent her brand. She wanted a feeling of openness and warmth.
User Goals: The primary goal of the users is to find information on workshops. A secondary goal is to learn about the topic of LHY’s expertise, yoga and the pelvic floor, and to find resources on it.
Process: I managed the project and partnered with a WordPress developer to build it. I started with a site map, used as our tool to discuss the site architecture and content strategy. Once approved, I gave the client guidance around content creation, and later helped edit the writing.
I built wireframes of the template and shop pages to share with the developer, ensuring that she could find and modify WordPress plug-ins to support the proposed solutions. Design comps were created and approved, and then I coded the main template in HTML and CSS. This allows me to fine-tune the typography and pixels, saving back-and-forth time with the developer.
Results: The successful redesign is a playful, inviting site that’s easy to navigate and addresses the primary business and user goals. The workshop schedule is located on every page, so it’s quickly accessible. The shopping solution is based on e-commerce design patterns to create greater trust in the user. The client has received rave reviews of the new site from many of her customers.
Original site.
