(WIP) Local Brewery site

talk design
1

I’m building a WordPress site (my first time using WordPress, liking it so far) for a local brewery, and would like some feedback of what I’ve got at this point.

It’s a very cool place, and it’s kind of a local landmark, with a lot of regulars, so all of the imagery on the site has actual meaning to it. I’m hoping to put across its laid-back/hip/small-town vibe.

Most of the pages are just filler text, but the pages that have at least some real content/design are: The home page, “Events” (under ‘Brew News’), and “Our community of friends”. So any feedback on those pages, in addition to the general layout and structure of the site, would be awesome.

Thanks :beer:

LINK

2

I think the header is a tad too large. I think shaving 1/3 of the height off would realllly lighten it up.

Preloading the nav with sprites would be sweet- to stop the flicker on mouse over:
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/sprites

The logo looks a bit blurry. Might want to crispen it up a tad!

The page structure works great. Simple and to the point!

:2c:

3

Man there is a lot going on. When I opened the page it just inundated me with stimulation and I didn’t know what to do. I’d work on your visual hierarchy by toning down some of the noise on the outside. I think what you have can work, you just need to cleverly use color and contrast to get the content to be the focal point.

4

I have similar concerns. Also, I just don’t feel the general style for a beer company. This style just feels old fashioned, and not really beery (if that’s a word). Also, why is the right side bar in flash?

5

There definitely is a lot going on here.
It’s like you found a ton of graphics and decided to use them all on one site.
I’d keep all the photos, but get rid of the pig and the bike.

6

All good points. However, the site is kind of made for people who have been to the actual place… I know most sites are designed to get new customers, but this is actually more of a way for them to keep up with existing customers, and sell stuff and whatnot… Which is why our design goals are a little different, and why I think the craziness you see is sort of ok.

I know that makes it sort of impossible for you guys to really “get it”, but actually a lot of this craziness you speak of is exactly what this place is like, and exactly what we’re going for.

Theros, you’re right that it’s not that “beery”, but this place has a whole culture around it, which is more what the site is about, if that makes sense. Sorry, I know I’m being vague and difficult. And the sidebar is Flash because we want it to have some animation (it’ll have more later).

Nobody, that is something I was concerned about with the “collage” feel… I’ll try reducing the header a bit as dark suggested, and see if that helps the content stand out more. I’m finding it’s tough to keep a good visual hierarchy when the design direction is “make it wacky”. I know that’s no excuse though… I’ll see what I can do.

Dark, I think I do agree with you about the header being too large, and that’s something we’ve actually talked about quite a bit… We’ll have to see what client thinks. And thanks for the sprites link, I’ll definitely check that out :beer:

skrolikowski, the pig and the bike are actually really important parts of this place’s culture, and definitely have to stay. That’s one of those things you can’t really get without having been there I think.

Ha I know I asked for opinions, and now I’m like “You guys don’t even know! You haven’t been there!” but really, you do have good points, and I’ll work on em.

Thanks :beer:

7

I think it looks really nice. A great Montana brewery feel. Never heard a shops tab called Schwag before other than that though looks really nice and is easy to use. I like all the little signs they are pretty funny.

The beer1 2 ect… needs some sort of rollover.

8

Thanks temp :beer: Yeah, that sidebar isn’t nearly finished… It’ll have more stuff.

Yeah, schwag just means anything with a logo on it. It also means bad pot, but I don’t think they’re worried about that.

If it gives you any more of an idea of what kinda place this is, one of their most popular beers is called “Bongwater Porter”, and it’s made with hemp.

9

I see it’s a WIP, so these probably don’t matter:

Your nav rollovers don’t line up
Your images are very low quality.

10

Would you mind giving me a screen shot? The rollovers line up fine for me. What browser are you using?

And which images are you referring to?

11

[quote=shane-c;2349734]Thanks temp :beer: Yeah, that sidebar isn’t nearly finished… It’ll have more stuff.

Yeah, schwag just means anything with a logo on it. It also means bad pot, but I don’t think they’re worried about that.

If it gives you any more of an idea of what kinda place this is, one of their most popular beers is called “Bongwater Porter”, and it’s made with hemp.[/quote]

That does explain a lot though…but whoever heard of a company not wanting to expand its customer base lol.

12

Ha, I know it is weird, but they are actually growing much faster than they would like to. State law only allows a brewery to have a tap room (a bar attached to the brewery that sells drinks by the pint, in case you didn’t know) if they produce under a certain amount of barrels per year. Their tap room is really important to them (and to me!), so they actually don’t want to expand too much.

13

Sure.
http://img133.imageshack.us/img133/3733/sssq7.jpg

As for the images: The kayaking guy, the license plate, and the dog photo don’t look very sharp. Although the dog one looks deliberate.

I’m on Firefox 3 on a Mac.

14

Like nobody and the rest were saying, way too active. And the roll-overs didn’t work for me, I’m on Firefox 3 on Windows.

15

The first thing I noticed is that the image quality is poo, one quick highpass would make it so much better

^ same image less drab

i also think that the nav font should be a photoshopped font too, or at least another color that sorta blends in with the mood of the site, right now it sorta just jumps in your face, and then pokes you in the eye.

there are some consistency things that you should look into, like the picture frame animation in the body copy should probably look similar to the other pictures around it.

16

The rollovers didn’t work for you at all? That is really weird… Anyone else having that problem?

[quote=Awesome-O 4000;2349860]Sure.
http://img133.imageshack.us/img133/3733/sssq7.jpg

As for the images: The kayaking guy, the license plate, and the dog photo don’t look very sharp. Although the dog one looks deliberate.

I’m on Firefox 3 on a Mac.[/quote]

Thanks, I’ll look into that… It seems odd that FF3 would mess with it a little like that, compared to FF2. The images are all scanned old polaroids, so yeah.

[quote=simplistik;2349902]The first thing I noticed is that the image quality is poo, one quick highpass would make it so much better

^ same image less drab

i also think that the nav font should be a photoshopped font too, or at least another color that sorta blends in with the mood of the site, right now it sorta just jumps in your face, and then pokes you in the eye.

there are some consistency things that you should look into, like the picture frame animation in the body copy should probably look similar to the other pictures around it.[/quote]

Thanks simp… that image does look way better. Would you mind telling me what you did? I don’t know what high pass is :stuck_out_tongue: And the rest of your suggestions are good, too, I’ll definitely work on 'em. Thanks :beer:

17

Sorry, I wasn’t describing it well enough; the text showed up, and I could select it and view the page it linked to, the problem was that there was no background which made it kind of hard to even see the text.

18

Ok, I did the high pass to all of the background images (thanks simp, that was great to know), and I think I got the menu dropdown backgrounds to preload, so there shouldn’t be a “flicker” delay.

The design has just been approved by the client, so I don’t think I’ll be messing with the header any more, as far as reducing it or whatever. Oh well.

Thanks guys - keep me updated on more problems you see, I really appreciate it :beer: