We’ve just launched a website redesign for Cynthia Barrett, a local Portland attorney. Cynthia works with special needs families, elders, domestic partnerships, and estate planning. One step into her office and you realize what a thoughtful, empathetic person Cynthia is. We wanted to bring this sense of experience and calm to Cynthia’s website redesign.

Original Website

Redesigned Website

We had a blast creating this website for a number of reasons:

• We were forward thinking. It was built very much with modern standards in mind. The website should validate as HTML5 already, and uses many CSS3 enhancements. The subtle effects don’t cause problems in IE6 because they aren’t necessary for visitors, they’re just enhancements.
• The site was built in Photoshop based on the 960.gs framework. Once the site was approved by the client, we grabbed the few necessary original graphics from PS, then quickly built the layout in HTML.
• Because it uses a pre-built grid system, it was easy to keep the basic layout intact even in older browsers. We could relax and design as others have already done the gritty browser testing for us. Sure enough, when we ran the site through our battery of tests, there was only one single layout problem to be corrected.
• Template files were written individually and only as necessary. We didn’t feel, for example, that an archives page was necessary. However, we did want to be sure a good ‘404’ page was there, to catch people who have a bad link. The page includes a search feature, to help guide lost visitors.
• It was a joy to build the site in WordPress 2.9. We’ve been studying WordPress for the past few weeks, and it’s making a lot of sense. It’s quite surprising the number of different projects that can be done entirely in this system.
• While building the site, we included the jQuery javascript library in the header, but never ended up needing it. The few effects that it does use are all from newer CSS. And there are few. This is a website for a lawyer, so we didn’t feel as though too much of that was appropriate.

We do hope you enjoy.

We have just wrapped up a round of improvements on the Savoir Flair website and are looking forward to seeing what they have in store for the fashion world this year. One of our favorite parts of working with this website has been the ability to work with the beautiful illustrations of Bella Pilar. Bella’s illustrations and hand-lettering are dotted throughout Savoir Flair and give the online magazine a distinctive fun fashion identity. We’ve become big fans of her work (you can even now find her t-shirts at Target).

Congratulations to our friends over at Saint Cupcake for their write-up in Friday’s Daily Candy. Perfect timing for announcing their new Saint Cupcake Takes Flight shop where customers are able to order cupcake decorating kits of 3, 6 or 12 cupcakes (which we coincidentally launched Friday as well).

Can’t say a whole lot, but we at Needmore are fast at work on a new project. Here’s a little teaser - a fine logo by our dear friend Amy Ruppel!

So stay tuned, we’ll have more to say in the next week or two.

As we head out of the studio for the holidays, we are thankful for so many friends and clients that have shared the past year with us. Happy Holidays to you all! We will return to the studio in the New Year…

Good Morning, friends and clients. Christmas is so close we can almost taste it. Trying to think of a last minute Christmas gift? We’ve just recently added the ability to purcahse gift certificates on the Stumptown Coffee website. Were I to receive such I lovely gift, I’d surely opt for their Anniversary Blend (coffee and jar included). From Stumptown, Our Anniversary Blend is a celebration of our work to date and a tribute to the customers who are part of our family. The blend consists of coffees from the three major growing regions. We truly hope you notice the love that went into this coffee.

We’ve just launched a new blog for longtime Needmore client Presents of Mind.  The folks at Presents of Mind have a strong online presence already (with active Twitter and Facebook pages). Their new blog integrates seamlessly with each of these and takes it a bit further with slideshows of their products.

And, if you have any last minute shopping needs, we have it on good authority that Presents of Mind is open today and tomorrow…

We are coming up on the Year of the Tiger and, while pondering our resolution list, we’re awfully smitten with the calendars coming out.

Calendar by Patricia Kaegi Weiss available on her Etsy page.

Calendar by Amy Ruppel (soon to be) available on her Etsy page.

As the tiger is the first animal of Spring, we tend to see this as a positive sign for the year ahead…

“Be more like Apple and Less Like Dell” and other nuggets from the Needmore crew. We were recently asked a handful of questions by Josh, a student in a Digital Portfolio class at the Art Institute. Josh is focusing on getting ready for the real world in this class by polishing his portfolio’s and talking to people about the design business and how they get started. Below is our advice to Josh and others getting started.

Read more…

Amy Tavern has been a longtime client of Needmore Designs. In the years working with Amy, we’ve seen her designs grow and mold. She’s easily our favorite jewelry designer around (she made our wedding rings even).

Amy’s holiday sale begins today (25% off). But that’s not all she has in store for us. Not only is Amy having a big sale, but it looks to be her last for a while:

i should also mention that this sale marks the end of my collections for now. as of january 31 i will retire everything completely and will take a break from production/collection work for awhile, maybe a year. it’s time for me to really focus on my residency work and i think it’s important to have a clean slate. i will return to production jewelry in the future but it will be all new and most likely very different from my current collections. i still have a lot of work to do to prep the site for the sale and i must say i am really eager to get this one started. 5 years...very cool.

We cannot wait to see what Amy accomplishes in this exciting time ahead!