My Website Re-Launched - What do you think?

I rebuilt my website victoriachampion.com from the ground up, using a bare bones boilerplate called Skeleton.  Having had my site since 2006, the code had become cluttered and the files messy.  I scrapped the entire thing and started fresh, copy/pasting only necessary elements that I stripped of any code using Notetab, and rebuilt by hand.

Skeleton allows my site to reformat itself based on any browser size, including phones, without breaking the content.  It has the latest up-to-spec code requirements for browser/phone compatibility, including css, js, and html 5 compliant code as well as a favicon template, among other goodies.

My new site is designed to be clean, modern, minimalist, and easy to use.  My Dreamhost guestbook, Dreambook, has even been redone and fully integrated into the site.  My site is hosted at Dreamhost.

I used Helvetica Neue, sans-serif, for the primary font, and Georgia for the italics.  The scripts I have used are from Google API, Dynamic Drive, and Skeleton. The buttons are from MySiteMyWay.

My art galleries are still being hosted at DeviantArt.  I wish I could alter the color scheme there, but their gallery system is still the easiest to use and best solution for me at this time, as it integrates with my prints shop there.  Maybe someday they will let us alter the colors.

Reducing clutter and streamlining the finding of content was the primary focus in all my design decisions, hence the giant links with buttons, and the page pathing.  Clicking on the top graphic returns you to the home page.  There is also a small homepage icon in the footer.

Of course all this is subject to change as I will inevitably tweak things.

I'm interested in some viewer/user feedback. I was considering using tabs instead of page pathing. Well, I have been working really hard on this for a couple of weeks, so hope to hear some feedback.

Thanks for taking the time to look at it.

V

UPDATE: I went with ajax tabs instead of page pathing for the index page, and site is finished!

» Edited on: 2011-07-08 19:49:59

Okay well apparently it only works as intended in FIrefox! *pulls hair out* I'll fix it and get back to you.

It is getting annoying coding for all these freaking browsers so I definitely feel your pain. AHHHHHHH conform to the standard!!! I wonder if they heard me? Edit: Also I added you as a friend on DA my name there is BlackLotusXX nice gallery!

» Edited on: 2011-07-08 08:07:58

Added you back! Now to get back to work on fixing the site.

hehe thanks and GOOD LUCK! You may need it lol :)

Thanks Ciarach but the site was broken when you looked at it! I think it might be fixed now tho.

Okay I tested the site in Firefox, Internet Explorer and Chrome. Looks great in FIrefox and Chrome. Is functional but the fonts are not so pretty in IE. Oh well! I am gonna say it is finished now and invite everyone to have a look. One thing I noticed in Chrome is on my blogs the Headers get truncated and the bold is ridiculously too bold as to be unreadable almost. Weird. In conclusion, Firefox rules the interwebs.

Awesome! Love it :D

In both Safari and Opera it looks great. I like the modern streamlined look, it fits the content beautifully! Nice work, the time spent shows! :)

I have yet to look at your site on a Pc, but it does not like my Android phone O.o It does not scale right, but from what I can see and probably should see on my pc, the graphics elements looks nice.

Thanks all for looking! Mahret thanks for checking those browsers for me, I appreciate that. Booie I don't have a phone that can surf the internet so I have no idea what is wrong. The Skeleton was supposed to be compatible with phones. I'll look into it.

To test Android download the Android SDK and use the included emulator. Doesn't work so well in w3m, not that I'd expect it to. Text-only browsers + heavily graphical pages = not so good.