The Metropolitan Museum of Art website had not had a redesign since 2000. The home page inevitably became stale and dated in a society where online presence is becoming essential. The site featured a splash page requiring additional clicks from the user to reach content. It also had small static images, namely special exhibition posters originally designed for print that were then re-sized to smaller web versions and icons. To the web visitor, these adapted versions lacked clear meaning. Also, small text placed against a dark background caused poor readability. Since the museum is currently involved in a complete redesign of their website, a new home page was needed to ease the transition from the old design to the new design, for both museum employees and visitors.

With the removal of the splash page, this interim home page is the first thing people see when they come to the site. Now, large banner images featuring a current special exhibition rotate in an unobtrusive slideshow. Simple, logical controls allow the user to pause on and page through different banners. Dynamic content from the Museum’s online publication, Now at the Met, is displayed beneath the banner. Since new articles are published on a regular basis, a frequent visitor will be able to see what’s new at the Museum since the last time they visited. Visiting hours and information are clearly displayed, eliminating the unnecessary search for basic content. Four large promotional boxes with photographs replace the former iconography. These photographs draw the visitor’s eye and a mouse-over box further informs them about where a click will take them. The overall coloring of the page is lighter and the text is black on white. This allows the user to focus on the content of the page instead of the bold colors of the former page.

The new home page is much more visually interesting and improves the communication of pertinent information while remaining true to the rest of the website.

Note: As of September 26, 2011, The Metropolitan Museum of Art has launched a newer website.

Launch site »

I created this site for guitarist JP Gilbert’s “country” band, JP & the Gilberts. The aesthetic concept is based on 19th-century newspaper mastheads set with wood type or engraved blocks. Using this as the anchoring thematic element, the rest of the site is clean and simple. Typefaces used include League Gothic (The League of Moveable Type) for the headlines, Museo Slab for the main body text, and Museo Sans for sub-headers (both by Jos Buivenga).

I built the site on WordPress and used both TypeKit and @font-face for font rendering. The audio player is a customized version of Opentape.

Launch site »

Abacus’s music is harsh, mathematical, and in-your-face. The website design reflects these characteristics on two levels: Aesthetically, the site is stripped-down, but pushy, using bold text and oversized images. Structurally, all of the information is presented upfront on one page. The single page design also allows visitors to stream the band’s music without interruption as they browse the site. The design’s sterility reflects the band’s precise compositions and plays with its laboratory-inspired wardrobe during performances.

This design is coordinated with the album cover for Abacus’s upcoming LP.

Abacusabacus.com was built on WordPress and features a Franklin Gothic Medium, Helvetica, Arial font-stack. The audio player is a customized version of Opentape.

Launch site »

Now at the Met is The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s online publication that features articles by curators, educators, and conservators. I tried to keep the design clean, so that the user would focus on the content, while maintaining consistency with the overall look and feel of the Museum’s site.