Part Two
ELEMENT 1: DOMAIN NAME TO ACCESS YOUR WEBSITE
Level of Difficulty:
Low
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What’s required of you?
Decide on what domain name you would like. This is the address that your website is going to be accessed on e.g. www. joecoulter .com. The most common domain extensions are .com, .net, .org and recently new domain extensions have been added to domain registrars such as .music
If you have a domain name that you like already but you didn’t acquire it through Squarespace then you will need to connect that domain name to the Squarespace Host Server (explained in Element 3)
ELEMENT 2: HOST SERVER TO HOST YOUR WEBSITE
Level of Difficulty:
Low
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What’s required of you?
Nothing! Squarespace is going to be your Host server
ELEMENT 3: DOMAIN NAME CONNECTED TO HOST SERVER
Level of Difficulty:
Medium
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What’s required of you?
Nothing again! if you have acquired your domain name on Squarespace, it will automatically connect to the Squarespace Host server. A domain name and Host server work together—the domain name needs to connect to the Host server so that the website can open. If you have acquired your domain name somewhere other than Squarespace then you will have to go to your domain names DNS settings (from the registrar your domain is registered with) and connect the domain to the Squarespace Host server (instructions are provided to do this on Squarespace, it is a very quick process)
ELEMENT 4: DESIGN
Level of Difficulty:
Medium
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What’s required of you?
—1— Style
When we open Squarespace we begin with a Theme—which is a template that serves as the starting point for us to design our website on. Typically by default, each theme has been populated with design ideas for you to work from. It doesn’t matter which theme we choose to start from because we are going to clear it all so that we are looking at a blank white page as a starting point.
The power of white space on a website — Every page starts off as blank white space and our first instinct is to fill it up with content. Studies have shown that websites with more white space have 35-45% higher visual attention than those with cluttered websites or too little white space. Books are white space pages with words on the pages, Art Galleries are white space walls with paintings on the walls. The late fashion designer Virgil Abloh discussed the power of white space in design a lot. In a demonstration, he picked up a candle and said “If I put this candle in an all white gallery space it looks like a piece of art. If I put this candle in a garage it looks like a piece of trash.”
Background colour: Let’s start off with white. Some of the most popular and familiar websites that we use every day, all have white backgrounds (Google, Wikipedia, YouTube). If we opted to use a background colour other than white, e.g. a red background, then the font colours that look good on that background become limited.
Font colours: Any font colour can look good on a white background (except very light gray or white itself!).
Font types: fonts are going to be used all over your site. They are typically categorised in two categories: Serif (Baskerville, Garamond, Times New Roman etc.) and Sans-Serif (Arial, Futura, Helvetica etc.).
Font arrangements: Throughout your site the text will either fall into Headings or Paragraphs so you can either decide on using Serif fonts for both your Headings & Paragraphs, Sans-serif fonts for both or combine Serif and Sans-serif fonts. Then from there you can decide on additions like font Sizes and Looks (Bold, Italic, Underline)
—2— Content (I)
Every website is comprised of a Header, Body and Footer
[Header]
This is where your name is going to go which will remain a constant throughout your website as people use it. You can either type it in on the required field or upload an image of a logo of your name. Then, you can position your name on the left, center or right of your header
This is where the Menu is going to go which will hold the Pages of your website. Then, you can position your menu on the left, center or right of your header
[Body]
This is the area where you will see the majority of your sites content
[Footer]
This is where you typically include a piece of text to state the copyright of your website and the current year e.g. ‘Copyright © Joe Coulter 2024. All Rights Reserved.’
—2— Content (II)
Too much content can be overwhelming. Keep things simple and to the point, if there is too much then there is also too much for you to maintain. The average human being’s attention span fell to only 8.25 seconds in 2015 (BBC). “Absorb what is useful, discard what is useless and add what is specifically your own” — Bruce Lee
Decide on the content (a short Biography etc.) that you wish to include on your website, this content will have to be held within Pages
We will then create Pages and add in that content
‘Home’ Page: This is the first page that someone sees when they visit your Website. It is called a ‘Home’ page therefore you want to feel welcome (as you do when you visit someones home). Try and include a photograph of yourself and a little introduction/elevator pitch about who you are and what you’re about. Then we will add a little line to read more about you and hyperlink it to your ‘About’ page
‘About’ Page: Your story/a short Biography and additional information e.g. Press, Testimonials etc.
‘Work’ Page: Any output that you have been involved in (bibliography, photography, images of albums you have worked on, images of books you have worked on, and so on). If you have work in multiple disciplines then you can add more than one ‘Work’ page such as ‘Work: Photography’, ‘Work: Paintings’. If you have work coming soon or in the pipeline you can add a holding piece of text to explain that
‘Contact’ Page: Your email address, social media etc. for people to reach out
‘More’ Page: This is for any external links you may want to include
Any unique Pages: This is if you have any unique content that you wish to add to your website such as a Media page with miscellaneous photographs or a Blog page with miscellaneous stories, plus more
We will then place those Pages in to your website’s Menu
When your website is accessed on a browser, each website has a small icon on the left side of the browser tab called a ‘favicon’. Typically it is just a logo or one/two letters. For your website as an individual it looks good to have your favicon as one or both of your initials
ELEMENT 5: DEVELOPMENT
Level of Difficulty:
Low
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What’s required of you?
Website Design and Development used to be two separate components but with the emergence of Content Management Systems and now All-in-one platforms they have merged together and work in tandem. So, as you are designing your website, the platform is working at developing (the back-end) in real time as you are designing (the front-end).
ELEMENT 6: SECURITY
Level of Difficulty:
Low
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What’s required of you?
Nothing! All-in-One platforms like Squarespace have security so that any Website created on their platform is looked after in terms of security.
ELEMENT 7: MAINTENANCE
Level of Difficulty:
Low
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What’s required of you?
Renewing your domain name (each year)
Renewing your host server (each year)
Adding new things to your Website