Dr. Valerie A. Smith's
Website Redesign
In 2024, English professor and poet, Dr. Valerie A. Smith, reached out wanting her website refreshed to match her changing brand. She was releasing her collection of poetry and needed her website to match this change.
Pain Points
Dr. Smith shared a few things that no longer satisfied her about her website, which were:
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Her site no longer connected with her and her work
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Some of her information was concealed by features that existed with the layout.
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She didn't fully connect with the color scheme
Dr. Smith's Must Haves
After sharing her paint points, Dr. Smith shared that she wanted to have:
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The same details and context, but wanted it organized so that each topic properly connects. (Create an organizational method for her work, theme, and genres).
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Make the colors match her poetry book cover
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Include a feature that can show the dates and times of when and where she'd be.
The Ideation Process
Using Figma, I constructed a basic layout that mimicked what already existed. I took notes on what features were doing what, then created two different ideations of what her website could look like. I utilized existing text, making small copywriter specific changes, to ensure it met her needs.
Then, I created a linear option and a multipage options with two different color scheme options that matched her poetry book.
Usability Test and Feedback
During the user usability stage, I sat with Dr. Smith for an hour and half where she explored each of the iterations of her design and chose which design she wanted to implement. During this process, we changed tweaked the color scheme slightly and settled on the look she wanted to go for.
Project Completion
After more testing, Dr. Smith finalized the design and was left with this:
