The North Texas Green Council, the Dallas chapter of the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) is an active and growing association; its old site did little to reflect that. In fact the old site had a total of about ten photos, no story about what the chapter was involved in and it was all green—literally.

The new site incorporates a wealth of educational and news oriented features, most of which are presented in a familiar blog style, designed to be digested quickly. The show stopper of the site, however, is the new project gallery. It turns out, the organization had a huge resource library of beautiful architectural images that serve to educate people on the LEED experience and highlight the work of local members and firms.

As an organization, members needs came first followed by the general public, so the home page was designed to be a snapshot of all the current activity—and much more colorful. New articles, events, news and projects are clearly marked and easily promoted on the home page along with the large banner housing featured content.

• The redesign took about five months, three in the concept/design stage and two in development. The original timeline was to be two-and-a-half months, but content gathering turned into a hurdle (uncovering the person with access to the image library was like striking liquid gold).

• The site was built on the Joomla CMS system and designed with plenty of client access in mind; thorough site documentation ensures that each successive round of volunteers enters will know exactly how the site works and functions.

• All content is classified as an article, a module or a project which makes it easy for the client to update.

• The North Texas Green Council is a non-profit organization so sponsorship dollars are everything. Since the site launch, those amounts have significantly increased, as have volunteer inquiries.