Redesigned Site for SXSW

About a year ago, I started redesigning this site with lofty goals and no deadline, so as you might imagine, I’m very relieved to be writing this post. The first version of gridworkdesign.com was conceived while it was still just me working out of my mom’s guest house. It worked well enough, but didn’t reflect the current state of the company, nor did it go any deeper than a few samples from our portfolio and a brief creative process. What I wanted was more than just a marketing tool, I wanted a site that we could track staff hours and client projects from start to finish. Something bold and different, where I could obsess over our grid and typography just as much as I do on paid projects.

So what you see here is the beginning of our integrated portfolio, project management, staff management tool. Using ExpressionEngine, we can weave clients, projects, task, deliverables and static content together seamlessly, floating our favorite content to the public site as “portfolio” entries and hiding everything else behind password protected pages.

It’s taken several late nights to meet the self-imposed deadline of South by Southwest — where Erik, Mary and myself are sitting this very moment — so there are some missing pieces and unfinished sections. But it’s good enough and something I’m actually excited to show people we might meet here in Austin.

Posted by Seamus Holman on March 13, 2009