Exquisite! Design Studio

The Problem

Original Site

Exquisite! Design Studio, an award-winning floral design studio, was facing a very common web problem: they had an outdated website that was difficult to update and didn't match their corporate branding. Jennifer Dolan, owner, wanted to be able to always showcase their most recent work, but didn’t have the resources to hire technical staff to keep the site up to date with the latest work. She needed a website that would:

• allow non-technical users to update the site with new photos from recent events
• clearly articulate the services offered by Exquisite! Design Studio
• match the creative feel of her studio and incorporate the bright fuchsias, oranges and yellows of her branding.

The Process

New Home Page

Exquisite! Design Studio staff were kept involved with each step of the redesign process in order to ensure that the final produce was both visually appealing and met their technical requirements. Work began with a face-to-face meeting to gather requirements, conduct a competitive analysis, and establish any special technical concerns. After listening and analyzing the requirements and creative concerns, Lisa presented them with several color palette and general layout studies for comment and selection. Then Lisa got to work creating a prototype of the site for presentation. The prototype step allowed Exquisite! Design Studio to preview the look and feel of the site and request any modifications before the more costly technical work began. Upon approval, the technical work was completed and another face-to-face meeting was held to walk through the new site and go step-by-step through the process for updating the graphics of the site. Upon final approval, the site was optimized for search engine usage and accessibility concerns and then launched and monitored. Finally, a CD with source code and documentation was delivered.

The Solution
Lisa created a solution involving the use of Yahoo!’s Flickr™ photo management solution. This allows free and reliable hosting of Exquisite! Design Studio’s images (saving web hosting costs) as well as many tools to allow for easy updating and automatic resizing of images removing the need for any technical staff involvement. Exquisite! Design Studio staff simply upload their photos using one of Yahoo!’s many tools and they automatically display within the proper galleries on their website at the proper size and resolution. No costly software to purchase and no intensive training to complete.