I think your work is really good. I think tweaking the website would help bring attention to the variety of work you do. For example, when I clicked on "portfolio" the first time, I just saw t-shirts and assumed you just did t-shirts. I would include a sample of each kind of your work on the home page of your portfolio, and make it bigger. Or make the portfolio link off of 237am.com go straight to your full portfolio.

Really nice work. When I view the full portfolio, select an item and it takes me to the page displaying one image with the thumbnails for the others on the left, then if I click another project from the menu below, the description below the project remains the same...

(that might be confusing, let me try again)

From full portfolio, I clicked the clear model case, looked at the images of that, then still in that view clicked the birch box, but the description remains that of the clear case although the images have changed. Did the same thing when looking at the INT/EXT projects.

Again, nice clean work on all of it.

ahh..... i thought that was fixed

are you viewing in an older version of IE?.....


i'm thinking about redoing the home page and maybe doing up a few more designs and maybe tweeking the ones i have......

some say dont put all you eggs in one basket, while others say you need to focus on one thing.................. let me know if anyone figures that one out....

b

the biggest problem I'm seeing is that I don't know what your role in some of the projects is. For example, on one of them I see that the architect was Pentagram, and the GC is Sun River Builders. So were you a sub for sun river? Were you called sun river at the time? were you with pentagram at the time? What the heck did you do on this project? You've got all that room off to the left in that green box, so using it to clarify some of this might be useful. Of course this only applies to some projects, because on others it is perfectly clear what your role was (the ones that say design/build, or list your firm name under one category or another).

On your front page, the links for exhibit/display and design/build are mixed up: I click on one and get to the other.

I'm seeing other problems with your shop area, but the thing I think is a bigger problem is that I can't figure out if you are marketing yourself as a business (retailer, possibly a consultant to larger businesses), or as a person seeking a job.

rationalist....

thanks for the feedback.....

i'll look into what you said and go from there......there is some text i have to revise and add....but thinking that i need to tie it all together some how....


yes, i have done alot of stuff over the years...... is that bad?.... it's a portfolio...... i've been having the same issues since day one where people say stick to one thing........... but when your one your own, you have to do what you can to eat......


i would like to be a consultant.... but for now i, looking for a job...... simply because theres no appreciation of what my talents are in the traditional world of architecture......... looks like i have to start from the bottom and work up............


maybe i should just market myself as an "artist" and be done with trying to find a fit back in the firms......

b

with the services links...they take you to the main services page..... i cant link to the direct image/service.....

maybe I'm stupid, or maybe your website is broken on Safari, but I can't find any pictures in your portfolio - only the text.

Hierarchy.

I am confused when I get there as to what you want me to look at.

I would consider just making a separate site. One for your portfolio, showing the range of your talents and skills, one for your services, maybe even a third for your products.

I always get clients that want to stick all their projects on their main site (to save $$). But once I can convince them that clarity is worth a ton more $$ and to make dedicated sites, they never go back. The results are clear in their success marketing - clean, clear and concise.

You end up diluting the obvious diversity of quality work by making the viewer search around, never really knowing what is what.


I'd suggest:

Make a frame work for the 2(3) sites, just change the nav, colors and content. Keep it simple. I get lost pretty quickly with the nav changing locations, size, etc.

You need to tell us what you want us (the viewer) to contact you about. Don't try to hit too many nails with one hammer!

trace said it much better than I did! I don't see it as a problem that you've done a lot of things in the past, but I see it as a problem that I can't figure out what it is that you want to be doing now.

why not put the t-shirts under a category like shopping only - I've looked at this page a couple dozen times before but you've really improved on it recently. Also some of those images on your portfolio it wouldn't hurt to take some of them into to photoshop and tidy them up - I'm not sure anyone needs to see items in the background.

i'll see what i can do............


thanks

I agree with trace.

While your architectural/design portfolio could have a few t-shirts you really want to have a separate portfolio site from your online store. It seems rather crass to have the link to your online store featured MORE prominently (above) than the link to your portfolio on your design site.

Your intro page is also rather bizarre. All the info is there, but the middle is just a big, blank white square. I got there and was like, huh???

Another way to do it would be to have your 237am.com site(But probably, better yet, either a yourarchitecturefirmsname.com or a yourfirstlastname.com site, unless you are named John Smith or something too common to easily google). Like, you would hit 237am.com and there are 3 big buttons in the middle, and nothing else:

PORTFOLIO
SERVICES
ONLINE STORE

each of these is its own, self-contained, dot-com (yournameportfolio.com, yournameservices.com, 237amshop.com or whatever you want to call them), that you can link to individually for the appropriate purposes (you don't want to confuse potential clothing vendors with a site that prominently features architectural design, any more than you want to confuse a potential architecture boss with your t-shirt store).

The whole thing could benefit from a more clear information organization, GRAPHICALLY. The information architecture of how you navigate through actually seems ok, but the graphics are not really scaled or positioned in a strict order of importance, nor positioned in places where you are likely to find what you're looking for. I got a bit tripped up in a few places.

Because we read from left to right, things that are in the top left tend to be seen first - so you typically want to put important things there. Things that are big are seen before things that are small, so you want to make important info big, less important info small. Bolder colors are seen before less-contrasty colors. Etcl Obviously if everyone had sites with important giant things in the top left and unimportant things in the lower right, it would be boring - but you can exaggerate certain things and play with these techniques to come up with something that is clear, legible, original-looking.. without being annoying to use.


It's important that your portfolio and shop convey your personal design sensibility and graphic style, but ultimately, they don't JUST exist to be examples of those things - they exist to convey information to your potential clientele (and in the case of the online store, to make it really easy for people to purchase things.) People who see a site usually want to find things as quickly as they can, and if it's unclear how to find information or things load slowly or the images aren't loading, they will give up. This will affect your business, so it's best to try to be careful about that from the start!

PS _ after the site I am still confused as to the 237am.com identity - is that the Design Firm name that covers EVERYTHING you produce, 237am your personal nickname, is it the name of your t-shirt line only, etc.?

(PPS don't just tell me here.... make it really obvious which is the case, on your website(s) !!!

thanks...

i think i'm just gonna redo the homepage and take out the apparel section in the portfolio..........

it's a pain to try to tie it all together but yet let it all read/etc.....

this is actually the 4th website layout that has been done in the past 8 years..... so it's been an ongoing process for me to get it right...grrrr....


i would like to market myself as a contractor...... but not sure if my work is really strong enough to push that.........

then the models is just side work really,.,... considering that i do contract for a larger shop here, i dont really want to put any of that work on my site


but in all honesty...... i just need work............... would like to be in design/cd's but think that i'm too far out of it to get back in....hmmm


b

cryz dude, you got some nice work in there. also some work that feels a bit like filler. but there is enough of it that i would be surprised if you couldn't get a job somewhere...

what you don't got is clarity. i would suggest showing just a few projects from each category, and clean the site up as mentioned above. make it simple. then make it more simple. design is also about knowing when not to design. which can be hard.

looking at the website i would not think you wanted to be a contractor. there is no reason for me to get that impression. if that is the goal then you should focus everything on that. if you wanna be a designer then same deal. i would not include the clothes or the models though if you wanna be contractor. and i would start looking for bigger projects to work on...otherwise the scale of your work would lead me to think you are not experienced enough (which may not be the case).

with clarity i think you got a chance but the lack of same suggests to me, and maybe any employer, that you are not really gonna stay, so why hire you if commitment is not part of the package. computer skills and all that are not impt. at least not to me, but attitude is. which is what you gotta convey.

good luck.

thanks...

i'm actually going to see if i can breakup the site into 3 sections..... but not sure if the way the programming is will let me... and my programmer has really helped me over the years with my sites and dont really want to make any drastic changes now....

i'll figure it out today....... i'm thinking about taking out some of the b.s. items and maybe spending some time in photoshop and tweeking a few..... unfortunatly i dont have all my cad files due to a computer crash a few years back while i was organizing things....... but practically all the images in the design section were hand drawn on mylar with ink...just scanned them and tweeked a bit...

maybe i'll make a 237amclothing site or something........ hmmmm....

thanks for the feedback

b

Yay! I finally get it now. Congratulations on making your site clear and focused.

I think it helped that you said above that you want to be a contractor. Within the first two clicks, I began to be convinced that you are good at what you want to do (design-build).


Oh, wait - I see that the page is randomized when I click on "Portfolio" from the main page. I liked it better when I thought that the default was your design-build work. That would be the commitment we're looking for - nailing down what you really want to do.


And the small links on the bottom with your other interests are useful, too, for the geeks like me who like to drill down to other aspects of people's interests.

hehe... I was intimidated by the 'delete' button on the bottom, and my heart skipped a beat as the page was slow to load... I don't know if it's intentional, but it's kinda whimsical.

Maybe it's just my screen resolution, but I find myself wanting to scroll up / feeling like I'm at the bottom of the page.

Good work, now continue to focus focus focus.

i'm still working on the site...

i have the test/delete button that needs to be removed...but my programmer has to do it.... so i just labeled them like that for now...

i'm playing with the site so dont take it all literal just yet.... but i think my mindset is better

i'm treating :2:37am: as the portfolio of brian (me)...instead of a company (that really doesnt have any backing)...... so now i just have to figure out a few things...

we'll see where this leads me.... would be cool to market myself as a contractor or something........ design/build is nice.... but too mush liability and costs...materials/insurance/etc...... so trying to push my designing/detailing now..... but smaller design/build projects would be cool

thanks
b

if that is the case then remove any mention about wanting to be a contractor, and just put that skillset on the list.

dreamweaver and fireworks are easy to learn if you know photoshop. then you won't need to rely on someone to remove buttons and such.

i can access all the files/codes for the site.... but the catagories are coding in with something else....... not sure how.... but last time i tried to delete a catagory, i nuked my site.....so....i'd rather wait......

i've been diggin up projects and trying to make it look like i know something....... not really sure how it's all gonna turn out...but i really dont have much left to show/tweek/etc.......

i was thinking about having a resume online linked to the site.... or have something along those lines......


b

the work looks great as always, man. but i think as some people above have said, some manner of written description about your role in the work if it's something other than your own creation, but also what we're looking at with each image.

update...

i think i'm done with the design section...... i added a few models that i did per project to help clarify the idea....

i merged the cad section with the sketch section..... still need to scan a few sketches i have and go from there...... not sure if i want to add more CAD stuff since i dont have anything on hand.... i could cad up a smaller project...but i think that first exhibit engineering layout should be enough to show for now

i took out a few models and might take out a few more just to clean it up a bit...

still need to delete the 3 catagories that say delete...... so hopefully tonight i'll make it happen....

i'm gonna try to give a better description underneath the projects.... i dont want to make another side text frame to coordinate per project..... i already have alot of coding on my site and my programmer has been doing all this for free.....so i think i'm wayyyy over my tab now...

i'm still trying to figure out the services idea....... i have to be able to tell folks that i'm available but not sure if that catagory throws people off..... hmmmm


let me know if you think the colors/graphics are corny/stupid/etc.... i'm trying to do what i can with keeping it simple but still showcase elevations/plans/etc without getting into crazy text/lines/etc...


thanks for all the help so far

b