Working closely with True North, the branding agency of the Dublin-based National Gallery of Ireland, UK-based digital agency Reading Room created a digital touchpoint for visitors, students and researchers, bringing the informative experience of a physical visit to the gallery’s online presence. The site features the National Gallery’s abundance of art and artifacts at its forefront with a fitting showcase that enables more people to discover its collection. Storytelling features prominently throughout the site, with an in-page navigation that guides visitors through each section. An innovative megamenu pulls out key content directly into the navigation, making the most of the National Gallery’s informational tidbits and strong visuals. Microinteractions encourage visitors to explore every aspect of the site, from hover effects on images to related content appearing based on key taxonomic terms.

For the site’s structure, True North and Reading Room conducted extensive stakeholder research via a series of workshops undertaken at the National Gallery. User perspectives were collected and reviewed to ensure that the new site promoted exploration and the discovery of information and made it easy for visitors to find what they needed while engaging with the art. The site was built in Drupal 8; using the Drupal Paragraphs module, Reading Room created more than fifteen components, which can be reused and reordered across content types, giving editors greater flexibility in how pages are structured.