Helwig Whistle Stop is a retail and office complex located in Berea, Ohio. The client was seeking a full redesign and content update of their website. The goals of the project were to make the site more modern, easier for the administrative staff to update and focused on offering significant information about leasing opportunities at the complex for prospective tenants. The client also wanted to promote their conference room as its own rentable space to the public.
Our team worked closely with the Administrative Assistant throughout the project to understand the goals of the redesign and reach out for feedback.
As an Account Specialist and Creative Director for the project, I selected a content management system (CMS) and chose the overall look and feel of the website based on the client’s value propositions and brand identity. This included going on-site to take updated photographs of the complex and restructuring the client’s logo to fit the needs of the website. I worked with another Account Specialist on the team to develop webpage layouts and finalize the pages after layout approval.
In the beginning, I viewed potential content management systems (CMS) to find the best option that would be easy to update and edit to meet the client’s visual identity and content preferences. Wix was selected due to the variety of highly customizable templates and simple editing capabilities. I also researched other shopping and office complexes to get ideas for the layout and sitemap.
A layout template was chosen and edited to match the client’s brand style and the needs of the content we planned to add to the website. This included selecting the colors, fonts, and format used for each section. I customized the header, footer, home page, and directory pages from the template.
The client’s primary badge-style logo was vectorized and modified into a horizontal format using Adobe Illustrator to better fit the main site navigation. This was also used to create a custom favicon.
I took and edited photos of the complex using a DSLR camera and Adobe Lightroom Classic to showcase the business and increase the imagery available for the website.
Wix
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Lightroom Classic
New Horizontal Logo
Custom Favicon
Images Taken at Helwig Whistle Stop
The new Helwig Whistle Stop website has an easier back-end editor, addressing the client's need to update the website periodically and list available rental units as necessary. The site showcases the option to rent on multiple pages; interested businesses can get more information about the rental options at Helwig Whistle Stop than they could on the previous website.
Due to a delay in domain change, the website did not launch until after my time on the project had ended. To ensure a worthy return on investment, I would keep track of prospective tenants that reach out with an interest in renting after viewing the website. Measuring the increase in time spent on site pages from the original website to the current one would confirm the need for more information about rental options.
Check out the live Helwig Whistle Stop website!
