This also brought with it an unstable legacy of technology. We transferred almost 100k posts from 40+ Wordpress installations into one system that interfaced with a single front-end to serve mobile, tablet, and traditional computers, across their sites.
Then we refreshed the brands of the network sites.
Story
We were one of the first sites on the web to utilize high definition graphics. Social media and ads were loaded dynamically to keep the site as snappy as possible, and a switch from small to large image display allowed the visitor to choose how they’d like to view their site.
Work
Graphic identity, web design, engineering, database conversion
Tech
HTML5, CSS. JavaScript, PHP, Wordpress, Social Media Integration, SEO
We refreshed the Titel Media brands, starting with Selectism. The strikethrough on the -ism performs the blog’s ultimate task: to be selective.
Palette
Dark
Grey
White
Type
Every brand had their own type stack.
Selectism was set in Alternate Gothic No. 3.
The concept of design that systematically responded to the resolution and capabilities of the device was relatively new.
The iPad with ‘Retina’ displays had just hit the market.
So we jumped in with both feet; ‘Foreseeable-future-proof ’ meant support for both. Here are our Titel Media Network blue, nay, grey-prints.
87% desktop computer
4% tablet
9% phone
In addition to the new design, we worked to have every page talk with search engines, that meant to integrate with Google+ author profiles to show their portraits in search results, and post automatically to social media feeds, like Twitter and Facebook.
Our team also built the international HighSnob store guide. Posts could now be associated with stores, and vice versa across the network of sites, and browsed on the go.
Going in, we took inventory. Bringing hundreds of thousands of posts, comments, tags, and other data together was real work.
20 cm view
Category
Data type
uid
IntegerField
tstamp
IntegerField
explicit_allowden
TextField
+ so much more
3 km view
Try scrolling left above. This is not actual data (think socks), just slots for data to be saved in (drawers). That’s a lot of drawers but a magnitude more socks.
Titel network already drew millions of visitors a month before we were involved. But 8 months later HighSnob had gone from 100,000 Facebook likes to 150,000, and the average page render time was reduced by more than half. A solid base for the next 8 years.
50k+ ‘likes’ in 7 months
Within 8 months of relaunch HighSnobiety alone added 50k facebook likes, 30% more than it had ever accrued.
42% traffic increase
Following launch, HS retained an increase in traffic over a 6 month period. That doesn’t mean traffic decreased after—we just stopped checking.
72% faster
Loading times were much improved through smartly deferred calling for external assets.
“Highsnob got dat fiyah this morn! They have definitely stepped n2 the AM! @highsnobiety”
@oajewels
“Web Highsnob ma hezky re-design. Parada.”
@milankolan
“HighSnob with the redesign and proper gallery. #wellplayed”
@seanbot
“oh sh*t, highsnob with the new layout.”
@Ty_Sneakhype
“Thumbs up to @highsnobiety + @selectism on the new site design. So fresh + clean.”
@FRESCOGoods
“New @selectism site looks ace. Congrats @jeffcarvalho and the team.”
@glenn_rig_out