Responses by Praline
Background: The website is the primary communication tool for London Craft Week (LCW). With web development by Platform 3, the site was built to enable users to go through the full events program and browse by categories, makers and locations. Our goal is to ensure that the site feels fresh and current all year round, not just during the week of the event. The target audience is broad, from established designers to young makers, with luxury brands and the wider public in between.
Highlights: The sliding fullscreen image sets the scene and showcases the event’s attention to detail and materials. The program page is the core section of the website; it is organized by the day and time of the day, and users can add events to their own short lists. There is also the map, a key feature that lets users navigate the program by locations. Finally, we have the “Makers” section, which puts an emphasis on people and their stories.
Challenges: Structuring the full program to be visually enjoyable to browse, while being practical via the filtering system. Favorite details: The overall design and look and feel. The design is clear and structured, allowing for the visual content to be the hero, while employing the visual elegance that the LCW deserved.
Navigational structure: The navigation structure was built to make the program engaging and accessible. Users can quickly gain an overview of the day or week. We had to plan for all ways of searching for events to attend, by interest, disciplines, time, areas and series. We have also added cross-references from event to makers, and vice-versa.
Anything new: Designing this sort of large program website can be tricky. We quickly learned that there is not a single way of browsing the content; therefore, we had to plan and accommodate for all possible ways. We also learned that there’s always room to improve user experiences, year after year.