Thursday 8 April 2010

Plans are afoot............

It cannot have escaped the more perspicacious readers of this blog that 2010 has been officially designated Year of New Stuff Happening.

OK, so it might need a snappier title but give me a break, it's only just April.

As well as the publishing project, which is progressing nicely, we have decided to totally redesign the Tower House Dolls website in preparation for the autumn launch of both The Book and a whole new range of miniature goodies.

The website was originally designed by a very good friend (you know who you are!) and has developed organically and sometimes haphazardly over the past 10 years. If you fancy a stroll down memory lane you can revisit some of its earliest incarnations HERE.

However, a bit like its owners, it's showing it age and could do with a radical makeover. So several hours today have been allocated to brainstorming the way forward and trying to come up with workable, feasible ideas which best represent the new image we want to present.

This was also the cue for some essential displacement activity research into websites we like, in terms of overall design, colour, layout, navigation, features etc etc.....

Naturally, with zillions of sites to choose from, we could only scratch the surface, but after an hour we had a list of attributes from which to choose, and had more or less settled on a 'look' that we like, courtesy of an epiphany stunning in its simplicity and originality.

Of course the 'vision' now has to be realised so PP will have her work cut out to make the dream a reality.

I have every confidence that by the end of this summer we will have The Book published and a lovely new website in situ.

This depends on both of us buckling down and getting on with things, fine tuning our time management and banishing the displacement goblins.

Having showcased my 'Writer At Work' ethos yesterday, I thought the following might be helpful for the website side of things.......

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sandra....dear....

GET A MAC!

Everything looks better with a Mac....
Even the husband!

Love
Sue
x

Sandra Morris said...

Sue,
I wish!
Aside from issues of cost around not only having to replace the hardware, but also every bit of software I own.

Which is a lot....

I dread the thought of having to come to terms with a whole new way of working, different programs etc.

Old dogs, new tricks...

Anonymous said...

Re the pie chart of "Time Breakdown of Modern Web Design"... it's bang on. I'm one of those masochistic types who consume and relish the whole pie :-)
Really enjoy the designing slice of your pie and the others will go down much easier :-)

Sandra Morris said...

Kay,

I am in the happy position of being able to hand the entire pie making process over to PP, who will have the task of mixing up all the ingredients to create a delishus pudding.

I had to censor the swearing on the pie chart, although it was actually quite funny and added a certain 'je ne sais quoi' which is now sadly lacking.

I could one for dollmaking, or writing, which would be broadly similar, but probably with more swearing.