I have now (soft) launched the site in time for ScrunchUp.com‘s first edition, but I won’t lie, finding the time to work on my personal site has been tricky, and the version you see today will no doubt change in the coming weeks (just after I’ve had some sleep!).

In doing the redesign, the style changed at many stages, although most never made it past a quick Photoshop mockup. I knew I wanted a change, as I felt my style evolved, and the previous incarnation was no longer suited.

I had been working on this current style on-and-off for the past month or so, and I thought I had nailed the look and I eagerly began converting it to XHTML/CSS.

Always Finalise the Design Before Coding

Now at this point, if your client asks for changes this late in the stage, you ask yourself why the designs were signed off in the first place. But I was one of those clients!

The change of look came about after watching graphic designs videos on YouTube late one night. Afterwards, I was sketching s few logos, playing around with my initials and left it at that. the following day, I has only planned to make some PhotoShop versions of thr sketches for Flickr, but that soon turned into a major brand redesign. I had some positive feedback decided to bite the bullet and change my ‘brand’.

Never Rebrand One Week Before Launch

My old logo was Georgia based, and the site redesign focused on serif headings with additional touches of Adobe Caslon Pro. The new logo wasn’t going to match with the site. I had a dilemma.

Cue a week of frantic typographic redesigning and colour scheme changes; gone is the light brown, red and green in comes red, white and black.

The Results

I hope you like the redesign, but please bear in mind that the site is not 100% finished, and there are plans to add more in the coming weeks and months.