The Design Pepper Redesign
By Joshua on December 28 2009
If you've visited the Design Pepper website in the past couple of weeks, you probably noticed that it's sporting a new look. It's also been updated under the hood.
Here are a few of the highlights.
(If you're using a feedreader, you might want to click through to see what I'm talking about.)
1. Type-based design.
While the old design wasn't bad, it was a little crufty in places. It also didn't reflect the minimal, typographic style that we most prefer. Now potential clients should have a much better idea of the type of design we'll turn to first.
2. Moved from WordPress to Expression Engine
Under the hood, the biggest change is the switch from WordPress to Expression Engine. While WordPress is an awesome platform, it just didn't seem like a natural fit for the new direction of the site, particularly the management of the portfolio section.
3. Switched to HTML5
At the moment, this doesn't mean much more than switching to <!DOCTYPE html>, I'm planning to start using class names based on the new HTML5 entities as soon as I have a little extra time.
4. Implemented sIFR for headlines and main navigation
Though I'd used @font-face in the past, this was my first foray into using sIFR. I was able to get things working pretty easily. However, sIFR doesn't play nicely with vertical rhythm unless you do quite a bit of tweaking.
5. Other changes
There are lots of other changes as well, like the new portfolio section, use of RGBA color, and time-based background images. But I'll probably go into more detail about those in a future post.