PROJECT 1: QFA REDESIGN - BONIFAZI 2021
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BONIFAZI 2021 PROJECT 1: QFA REDESIGN CASE STUDY The client I worked with to redesign their website is the Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum in La Connor, Washington. This museum caught my eye when I was looking another museum in La Conner that I had visited years prior and noted how terrible underdesigned it was. The Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum sufferes from a very similar dilemma as my original subject for this redesign project. This museum is a spectacular place to view some of the best quilted and fiber work across the state, even featuring pieces from across the country. I truly believe that this place is one of the must -sees of La Conner. That being said, the audience they’ve snagged over the decades is a tiny, niche group. The majority of visitors are eldery quilters, which is fine for business, but not at all for the legacy of the museum. In order for the Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum to reach the next generation, they need to modernize and rebrand FAST.
ORIGINAL WEBSITE The site so far for the Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum (qfamuseum.org). From left to right; the home page, the exhiibits page, the announcements on the home page, and the ‘plan your visit’ page. After lurking around the site for a while, I learned that despite the demographics of their vistors, this museum’s website is optimized for smartphones.
ORIGINAL
USABILITY TEST
USER COMMENTS
“Too much information on the home page, the type is kind of small and narrow between lines.”
“The font is extremely big and makes it hard to read due to its size. It’s not pleasing to the eye.” ORIGINAL
“The sizing is the only part I like and I don’t mind the font but some of the color choices create a lot of eye
strain, there is too much writing, and it doesn’t guide the eye well. A good example is the history page on
WEBSITE RATING
desktop, it is legit kinda hard to tell which order the paragraphs are supposed to be read in.”
“There doesn’t seem to be a logo at all, just a title...”
SITE LOAD TIME: 2.5
“It is unclear what the logo is. Firstly, it would be better if you could click on a logo to return home rather than a
tab. Secondly, if the logo includes the arrow pattern then it blends into the background color sometimes which
ACCESIBLE TYPSETTING: 1.25
creates a weird optical effect.” LOGO: 2
HOMEPAGE IS DIGESTIBLE QUICKLY: 1.75
“[The major headwinds] are clear and descriptive but again, WAY too big.” CLEAR NAVIGATION: 1.75
NAVIGATION IS CONSISTENT: 1
“The major headers are fairly clear (although there are a lot, some are kinda wordy, and a few are a little CLEAR HEADINGS: 2.25
hidden) but the hierarchy of the secondary type is pretty wack. Also, the type treatment is super inconsistent.”
PAGE TITLES ARE SATIFSATORY: 1.75
“The museum and its content looks very dynamic and fun, but the website does need to be redesigned to better
STYLE/COLOR CONSISTENCY: 1.25
present the works, especially during the quarantine, a museum could use their website as a platform for the WEBSITE I EASY TO UNDERSTAND: 2.5
exhibitions.”
“It seems as though the website was made more for mobile viewers and not for desktop viewing, as all the titles,
descriptions, and pictures were massive on my laptop. Each section just on the home page takes up almost my
whole screen and makes it very hard to read and take in, and it takes a long time to scroll through the whole
thing.”
COMPETITORS The National Quilt Museum Seattle Art Museum Simple but effective, the slideshow provides engagement. Navigation is easier to work with For the audience of QFA, the navigation here might be a little too modern and abstract. But because the tabs are vastly condensed. This museum has a MUCH better logo than QFA. the bright colors and large logo stand out strong to let the viewer know where they’re at. . The Burke Museum of Natural History Museum of Northwest Art Interactive experience with video running behind the page as the background. Bold and open Simpler color scheme, not a perfect site by any means but the branding is more clear and message makes the website feel more personal. I would love for the QFA site to emulte this concise. style.
PERSONAS
Hannah McGill
Pronouns: She/Her/Hers
Age: 22
Occupation: Full-time college student, working part time as a
server
About: Hannah is an outdoorsy spirit who often makes use of
local hiking trails and parks. She’s trying to keep her head above
water in erms of entertainment; money is a little tight and it seems
like there’s barely any time in the day to get out and explore. She
discovered the QFA museum on her way up tio Deception Pass
with a few friends, so she’s decided to indulge curiosty and see
what the site is like.
Values: Creativity, Community, Nature
Goals: Experience something new, learn more about local
history.
Demands: She wants to get through the website quickly and
smoothly, theres no time to waste!
Pain points: She has a very full schedule that she’ll have to plan
around to visit, if the website is redundant and convaluted she’ll
abandon the idea.
PERSONAS
Edgar Lim
Pronouns: He/Him/His
Age: 74
Occupation: Retired, formerly employed at USPS
About: Edgar is a retired mailman who spends his sunset years
with his wife Vera. His hobbies include building model ships
and other projects that involve woodworking, and he enjoys
video calls with his 3 adult children and their total (so far) of
2 grandchildren. Vera adores sewing and quilting and Edgar
loves his wife, which is how he finds himself on the QFA museum
website.
Values: Family, Creativity, Traditions, Community
Goals: Have a fun outting with his wife, help her get connected
with community members that share her passions, not falling
asleep on a bench at the museum.
Demands: Likes to print an itinerary so he doesn’t like lengthy
multi-page goosechases, wants to know what the museum looks
like driving up to it.
Pain points: Knows technology well enough but takes a bit to
get situated with a new website (still uses msn as his homepage),
only browses the web on a desktop computer.
PERSONAS
Alaia Dean
Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs
Age: 10
Occupation: 3rd Grader, Multimedia artist!
About: Alaia is a 3rd grade student who recently attended an
“Artist’s Day Camp” at another elementary school in town.
Needless to say, they LOVED it. They’ve got the bug for any
and every type of art, and the craft of the month is quilting after
reading The Patchwork Quilt with their teacher.
Values: Fun, Creativity, Family, Community
Goals: Learning more about sewing, getting inspiration for an
upcoming poster project, having a fun day with dad!
Demands: Schedule and ticket prices/shopping should be clear
to show dad, more pictures to make the museum look cool!
Pain points: Alaia has a high reading level but misunerstands
sometimes due to their dyslexia, gets bored looking at massive
swaths of text... All book and no pictures?
AUDIENCE
https://picrew.me/image_mak-
er/613816
So who makes up the audience here? The unique situation about this museum is that
anyone can be the audience. You can visit this museum on purpose as a lone traveler or
a teacher guiding students. You can wind up here on accident too, seeing as there are a
lot of places you can get to by driving THROUGH La Connor.
With that in mind, I wanted to make this more challenging than it needed to be by
making the goal audience people that don’t knoe anything about this place. My goal is
to make the website for this museum so cool and graphically appealing that everyone
will want to get a ticket and learn about the art of quilting
GOALS
BUSINESS GOALS BRAND GOALS USER GOALS
SELL TICKETS TEACH VISITORS BUY TICKETS
INDUCT NEW MEMBERS, PARTNERS KEEP THE ART OF QUILTING FUN FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE FUTURE QUILT
AND VOLUNTEERS THE NEXT GENERATION
RECIEVE DONATIONS PRESERVING TRADITION FOR LEARNING ABOUT THE PAST QUILT
HISTORICAL RECORD
STRATEGY
STATEMENT
The Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum
website needs to be redidgned so the user can more
easily browse for relevant information, the staff can
encourage a younger audience to learn and become
members, and the brand as a whole can preserve the
art and history of quilting.
SOLUTIONS Easy to navigate Consistent type treatment Information should be divided distinctly on pages, and not needlessly repeated everywhere The design needs to be bold and modern to appeaal to a younger audience Shift in title from Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum to QFA Museum (like the url) New logo
SITEMAP
CALENDAR
HOME
BUY TICKETS
ABOUT US EXHIBITS WORKSHOPS GET INVOLVED CONTACT US
HISTORY JOURNIES FIBER FRIDAY VOLUNTEER EMAIL
STAFF BLACK HISTORY APPLIQUE PARTNER PHONE
COMFORT IN THE MEMBER MAILING ADDRESS
FAMILAR DONATEMOODBOARD In my redesign, I wanted to make the atmosphere of the website into a bold, modern, and confident art museum, without misleading the viewer or detracting for on the beauty of the pieces on display. In designing the hub on the main page, I looked to modular quilt patterns for reference.
WIREFRAMES I was really suprised when I recieved so much positive feedback for the purple wireframe. I think the hexagonal hub draws the viewer in and screams “QUILT” in their face. I deccided to discard the red wireframe after critiqu and move ahead with the “quilting hub”.
ITERATIONS 1
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FINAL DESIGN
FINAL DESIGN
FINAL DESIGN The mobile adaption for the QFA Museum site is one of the greater acheivements of this project. The original website was clearly optimized for mobile (and poorly done at that) which made the desktop site design fall flat. I put a lot of work into making sure that the mobile and desktops versions, wwhile not twins, we cohesive enough to define the museums brand across platforms.
FINAL DESIGN The finialized version of the mobile Exhibits page is far more effective than the last! each patchwork banner features some of the work shown in the exhibit name, and tapping on saud banners brings down a dropdown description of the collection.
FINAL DESIGN
RESULTS I’m really pleased with for far this project has come along! There’s always room for more updates, but I feel satisfied overall with the result of all the different critiques and ideations. The “quilter’s hub” looks great and serves as an interactive expeience that people seem to be really interested in. I think this redesign could definetly stand up as a functioning website! However. I’m not sure if the client, the Pacific Northwest Quilt and Fiber Arts Museum, would be interested in this new design. its boldness and modernity can be both its selling points, and its downfalls.
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