Responses by Matt Robb, creative director; Trevor Lavigne, senior product manager; and Matt Bergmann, vice president, Arcane.
Background: Our collaborative mission for this site was to tell the story of beer and art together in a compelling, artful and inspiring way that could be interpreted uniquely for each type of audience we serve. Beyond that, we wanted to create on a platform that would allow for flexibility in the future, and best-in-class experience for our users.
The site’s main goals are to: let beer and art exist side by side and complement each other through content showcasing; showcase client’s vast amount of content in a clever and intuitive UI; build a powerful CMS to enable Collective Arts the power to shape and control all of the content; and display and filter content for beer lovers, artists and the beer community at large.
Design core: The homepage has a fullscreen 50/50 slider. Not only is it cool, but it also displays beer, art and events together in an interactive way. With a fullscreen takeover, it becomes more immersive and gives the illusion of infinite content beside an unexpected but incredibly intuitive set of movements.
Favorite details: We developed a custom CMS using Wordpress Advanced Custom Fields that tailored the content management to suit the business needs of its brand strategy. The Custom Artist and Juror portals lets artists submit artwork and manage their profile in the Collective Arts webspace and showcase their art. In addition, it enables Collective Arts to score and select artwork for the new series.
Challenges: Content management was the most challenging aspect due to the sheer volume of data that was slated to go back into the new site from the previous site and be restructured in the new interface.
Navigation structure: The main goal throughout the site’s navigation is to enable the users to engage with art, beer, events and shopping seamlessly and with clear direction on how they all relate to each other.
Technology: Wordpress and Advanced Custom Fields; JavaScript, HTML, PHP and SCSS; and customized scrolling using multiScroll.js.