New WordPress Website for HelaStone
Spring 2019 | School project
Difficulties with Maintaining a Website
Originally, HelaStone’s website was hard to maintain. Its layout was outdated and it didn’t scale in smaller screen sizes. Furthermore, the client was worried about GDPR law and how to put it in practice on their website.
The client wished to have their website converted into a WordPress site. They had used WordPress before so it was familiar to them.
HelaStone
HelaStone is a small family business from Hyvinkää, Finland. The company was founded in 1947. During the decades the focus has changed from importing and wholesale to retail and stone works. The current form of business started as warehouse sales in the beginning of 2010’s.
Well Begun Is Half Done
Before designing a new layout, we brainstormed with the client about the website’s structure. Their old website had lots of information about company’s products, but the information wasn’t easy to find. I made a sitemap of the old website to concretize the problem. After this, he client understood that the old website was indeed a little illogical.
In the end we decided to organize product categories the same way that many other online stores do. It took a while to arrange the structure, but it was worth it.
When the new sitemap was ready, it was time for wireframe mockups. We made the mockups intentionally to look like a hand-drawn sketch, so the client understands that the completed visual layout won’t look like that.
After the client accepted our wireframe mockups, we made some visual mockups of the layout. We decided the company’s colors with the client at the start of the project. The client wished to maintain the company’s red color, so we chose some fresh colors to combine with the red.
