i’m so thrilled to introduce you to the new design*sponge! i’ve been working all summer with the team at also design to update d*s in a way makes the site easier to navigate as well as a more accurate reflection of my current design aesthetic. i’m so thrilled with the results and hope you will be, too. i just wanted to thank jenny, julia and matt for all of their hard work on the site. thanks, guys!
the d*s sneak peek will be posted at 1:30 pm today but i wanted to give everyone a few hours to check out the new site and see how everything works. here are some details:
*categories: this was the biggest change on the site and required the most work. all 4,700 posts from the past 3 years have been put into several categories for more targeted browing. simply click on the “categories” button to your left and you can browse by furniture, lighting, ceramics, artwork and much, much more.
*new editors: stay tuned on wednesday and friday to meet the new members of the d*s team. there will be an incredibly talented husband and wife team posting a great modern DIY project every wednesday and one of my favorite bloggers writing about food in relation to our favorite indie designers. stay tuned!
*sneak peeks: sneak peeks have their own page that will be automatically updated each time a new sneak peek is posted. just click on “sneak peeks” on your left and you can browse all 60 homes.
*guides: guides have their own page now divided by city guides (stay tuned for the chicago guide on thursday!), product guides, gift guides and more. the letterpress guide is housed on the new site now so no there’s need to click back to the old version.
*event calendar: i’m so thrilled to have a place to list design related events like the biz lady meetups and design fairs. just click on the word “events” and you can browse by month. days written in red have a related event listed. (more after the jump below)
*guest blog: the guest blog is back! this year guest bloggers will take one week stints to share their thoughts with us. starting today: kim and jo from desire to inspire! when you click on the “guest blog” link above the main page will stay the same but the guest blog will in the center column with each post identified by author. no separate site- everything will be on the same page, hooray!
*job board: coming soon, i’ll be hosting a job board for the design community. we’ll list internships and jobs with a focus on independent companies.
*around the web: there’s a brand new column of eye candy to your left, right below the main menu tabs.
*”more”: finally, i’m able to prevent majorly long posts by having more content after the “jump”. so, if you see the words “more” in a post just click on those words to few additional photos and text.
*previous/next entries: when you reach the end of the page on d*s you’ll see a button for “previous entries” or “next entries”. so you can keep clicking as far forward or back as you like to view content. no more going to the archives to see posts from 2 weeks ago.
*rss: the d*s rss feed is in the top right hand corner. i had to cut a few features to focus on improving the overall content of the main site so unfortunately the newsletter had to go. but you can keep up with d*s via rss if you don’t want to visit the site daily.
*d*s shop: unfortunately, the d*s the shop will remain closed. i really want to focus on improving the quality of the site and the resources it offers so for now i’ve decided that the shop will remain closed. it was such a fun experiment but ultimately i want to focus on covering the best artists and shows, rather than selling them myself. i’ll be sure to let everyone know if things change.
*scholarship: this scholarship is going to be MUCH bigger this year so i’ll have new details on the prizes later this fall.
[rainbow striped pillows above by row pinto knitware]
