Hi Emileigh
I went back through our convos and just wanted to re-visit everything you mentioned in the beginning about what you love and need in a new blog design. I'll be using this as a strong reference as I work and will be looking at these elements and designs closely while we build yours!
Blogs/pages I like the look of and why:
- http://boyerfamilysingersblog.com - very open and clean, jump breaks, social media square, not all white
BRITTANY's NOTES
this blog is really nice! I love how clean it is and their side bar is so un-cluttered and easy to navigate. The drop down menu is nice too! Here are some screen-caps of the design elements:
- http://www.abeautifulmess.com - navigation and theme pages like this: http://www.abeautifulmess.com/gift-ideas/
BRITTANY's NOTES:
I love how the top nav bar is all business and the bottom one directs to content. I think splitting things up when you have a lot of pages makes it easier to navigate. ABM uses a different blogging platform that allows for the themed pages to automatically populate. As I mentioned before, blogger doesn't have this feature but I do know how to manually code pages like that and I can do that for you for an additional, $50. They do require up-keep so if you post a new tutorial, you'll have to go in and add the code for it to the page but it's really just copy and pasting in the right spot. You can see an example of a manually coded blogger page like this on my blog here:
http://www.vavoomvintage.net/p/beauty-tutorials.html .
If you decide that you want this feature, I'll always be here to help you figure out how to add new posts to the pages also! :)
- http://www.thecluelessgirl.com - navigation is clean and easy to use, layout is great, open space at the top, social media buttons awesome
BRITTANY'S NOTES:
I can definitely make the social media buttons part of your banner like that!
Keywords:
Clean – strong – military – ethnic
If Rosie the Riveter and Captain America traveled to Africa and had a blog baby, this would be it.
Colors I like:
- Navy
- Sea foam/mint
Improvements from current:
- More open space
- Better, more organized navigation
- cleaner look
- updated head shot
- less wordy, more visually appealing organization on sidebars
Must haves:
- search bar
- easy to update
BRITTANY'S NOTES
add white space between header and content
custom logo design for blog, social media, business cards, etc.
jump-breaks on posts
drop-down or regular navigation bars
social media buttons with roll-over color effect- any shape or orientation that you like
lots of open space, clean look
subscribe by email button so readers get your posts in their inbox
search bar
custom category buttons in sidebar instead of labels
blog archive
social media share buttons on all posts at footer
pinterest hover button on all blog images
gallery footer with more content at the very bottom of your blog
pages- about, contact, sponsor, subscribe
nav bar pages- “DIY, patterns, home and hospitality, reviews, intercultural”
NAVIGATION:
if you would like a drop down navigation, we'll need to decide what we want the nav bar to say and what drop-down pages there will be. I can have them link to a separate gallery page or link to a post label, for example, if you clicked "outfits" it would take you to all of your outfit posts
I went back through our convos and just wanted to re-visit everything you mentioned in the beginning about what you love and need in a new blog design. I'll be using this as a strong reference as I work and will be looking at these elements and designs closely while we build yours!
Blogs/pages I like the look of and why:
- http://boyerfamilysingersblog.com - very open and clean, jump breaks, social media square, not all white
BRITTANY's NOTES
this blog is really nice! I love how clean it is and their side bar is so un-cluttered and easy to navigate. The drop down menu is nice too! Here are some screen-caps of the design elements:
- http://www.abeautifulmess.com - navigation and theme pages like this: http://www.abeautifulmess.com/gift-ideas/
BRITTANY's NOTES:
I love how the top nav bar is all business and the bottom one directs to content. I think splitting things up when you have a lot of pages makes it easier to navigate. ABM uses a different blogging platform that allows for the themed pages to automatically populate. As I mentioned before, blogger doesn't have this feature but I do know how to manually code pages like that and I can do that for you for an additional, $50. They do require up-keep so if you post a new tutorial, you'll have to go in and add the code for it to the page but it's really just copy and pasting in the right spot. You can see an example of a manually coded blogger page like this on my blog here:
http://www.vavoomvintage.net/p/beauty-tutorials.html .
If you decide that you want this feature, I'll always be here to help you figure out how to add new posts to the pages also! :)
- http://www.thecluelessgirl.com - navigation is clean and easy to use, layout is great, open space at the top, social media buttons awesome
BRITTANY'S NOTES:
I can definitely make the social media buttons part of your banner like that!
Keywords:
Clean – strong – military – ethnic
If Rosie the Riveter and Captain America traveled to Africa and had a blog baby, this would be it.
Colors I like:
- Navy
- Sea foam/mint
Improvements from current:
- More open space
- Better, more organized navigation
- cleaner look
- updated head shot
- less wordy, more visually appealing organization on sidebars
Must haves:
- search bar
- easy to update
BRITTANY'S NOTES
add white space between header and content
custom logo design for blog, social media, business cards, etc.
jump-breaks on posts
drop-down or regular navigation bars
social media buttons with roll-over color effect- any shape or orientation that you like
lots of open space, clean look
subscribe by email button so readers get your posts in their inbox
search bar
custom category buttons in sidebar instead of labels
blog archive
social media share buttons on all posts at footer
pinterest hover button on all blog images
gallery footer with more content at the very bottom of your blog
pages- about, contact, sponsor, subscribe
nav bar pages- “DIY, patterns, home and hospitality, reviews, intercultural”
NAVIGATION:
if you would like a drop down navigation, we'll need to decide what we want the nav bar to say and what drop-down pages there will be. I can have them link to a separate gallery page or link to a post label, for example, if you clicked "outfits" it would take you to all of your outfit posts
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