WEBSITES- SQUARESPACE AND WIX

When it came to making a website I went with my gut feeling and decided to look into the two website builders I had heard most positive  reviews of- and for me thats Squarespace and Wix.

I kind of went along with both at the same time to see how each compare starting to build a website.

First of all I looked at Squarespace, a site that my friends have used and one I have heard about countless times as they always advertise on podcasts!

From the start the website is easy to follow and it takes you to a separate page of different template designs straightaway. I chose Art and Design to narrow down my template options, as they are tailored more towards portfolio style websites.

I also know that I want my website to be very clean and minimal, and I immediately saw a couple of templates that I could imagine as my website- I chose Forte.

I logged onto Wix to try and build a similar kind of website, and it starts with you choosing what kind of website you're designing. I was torn between designer and portfolio & cv- but I went with the latter.

 Immediately I thought it was more complicated than the very straight forward template method that SquareSpace uses- it comes up with two different editors that can be used to create the website, but it doesn't offer much explanation as to what the editors are and what they do. I have no idea what 'Artifical Design Intelligence' means! It makes me think that Wix is good for people who have a slight knowledge of making websites ( I have absolutely none)

I went with Wix Editor because it seemed less intimidating than the other one.

Compared to SquareSpace I was put off by the editing page, it seems really busy and off putting. I had picked a fairly similar style template to the one I was looking at on SS, a minimal canvas to put my images on. I found it really confusing, and I became bored quickly trying to upload images and edit the template.

After a while I did give up with WIX. Maybe if I had started with it before SquareSpace I would have been more patient, but compared to the ease with which I set up a page I was happy with relatively quickly with SquareSpace, I felt like there wasn't much point struggling on with WIX.


--------BACK TO SQUARESPACE --------

I went back and concentrated on experimenting with Squarespace. I looked at other templates and reorganised images to see what would look best on a homepage/ as a first image/ as a group etc.

I started adding more of my images, and I like how they look against the bright white of the website. I had to pick images that could be viewed properly, the one above was too large and got cut off- I think it looked interesting but I know what the illustration is, someone visiting the site might not know what the image is and then it looks quite abstract.


Different layouts and images:

Different 'Home page' ideas:

I didn't like the pale great background so I changed it to white so that there was zero contrast.

I also experimented with different layouts, which with Squarespace you can easily swap between templates.

Home pages:

Illustration page:

I also looked at including different pages which hold different type of work, such as having one for illustration and another for costume. This is something I might explore later on, when I have more costumes to actually show off!

In the end I went back to the 'Forte' layout because I like how clean and simple it is, and I think it shows off my work well.


I created a home page that could hold one 'welcome' image, a portfolio page which would show all my illustrations and an about & contact page so anyone interested could get hold of me.

I thought a moving image would be a fun addition to the homepage instead of a static image- so I decided to make a GIF for the homepage, details of which can be found here.

I checked how the website looked on my phone and I was happy with how clean and simple it looked. Although. the images are below each other rather than side by side, I think it would have looked too crowded on a phone screen anyway

I also added an external link to my blogger page, something I set up in first year to show off my work. As I started using instagram more the work I uploaded onto the the blog was a bit think on the ground, but I thought it would now be a good place to upload sketchbook work/ WIP and any extra things people might want to see but is not polished enough for my portfolio.

meg tallis blogger:

However although I like using blogger for university blogging, I don't love the layout options for creative/ image based blogs.

I also did have a tumblr that I started putting my work on (again, back in first year) and I might look into building up the tumblr page with my images and then linking to that instead. A lot of illustrators use tumblr as a platform- and they have a greater range of templates suitable.  I think what has put me off before using tumblr was that all my images were too big and I had to resize them all, but looking at this layout I definitely prefer it to the blogger one!

very old and unused tumblr page:

After I was happy with my website and my trial with SquareSpace was ending, I decided to go ahead and have my website live with SquareSpace. I found out that they offered 50% student discount so I changed my email to my student email, and the offer also included the domain name free for a year.  I went with my name as a url, as most illustrators I know just use their names for their websites.

Overall I set out to create a simple and clean website as easily as possible, and I think that's what I achieved with SquareSpace. I think it is slightly pricier than the other platforms, but the student discount definitely made it worth while. Whenever I needed to figure something out the website had great FAQ pages and helpful videos, so I think I made the right choice for me. The website editor is also easy enough for me to change the layout quickly if needs be.