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The bus full of hippies edition

Sunday March 20, 2005

Okay, after much umming and arrring I have decided to launch the new design, even though the site itself is still undergoing a fair bit of reconstruction and still needs a bit of tweaking.

You may need to empty out your cache, and I know some of you had trouble with Firefox last time, so it will be interesting to see how things pan out this time around.

I have, to be honest, had a mixed response to the flowers and there is no doubting this is broadband material. For these reasons I was close to not using them on this site (though I would have used them for something else I am sure). Anyway, in the end I thought fuck it, let's do it and see what happens.

I have a lot of notes concerning both the re-design and some new Texpattern stuff waiting in the wings, and they will be published over the next few weeks.

For now though, all that remains to be said is a big thank you to Denis for nailing down the brief to perfection (anyone looking for illustration work would do well to consider Mr. Radenkovic). Also thank you to Joen from Noscope for providing valuable feedback, and, of course, what round of thank you's would be complete without a nod to Mr. Hicks!

I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

  1. Joen

    1237 days ago

    Looks great John. Very lovely.

    The green hues fit perfectly with the flowers, and I like that you’ve cut back on amounts of fonts. But you know that :)

  2. Rob Mientjes

    1237 days ago

    Nice. Glad the flowers returned. And the log of course.

  3. B. Adam

    1237 days ago

    Wow, looks great John! We’ll miss you in the CSS Reboot but this is certainly worth it.

    The blue outline is fantastic—I had to do a little doubletake at first. Great detail.

  4. Schultzy

    1237 days ago

    Nice I was seeing bits of it come through.

    Im still unsure about the flowers.
    Could you have a alternate css without the flowers how you had it about a hour back.

  5. AkaXakA

    1237 days ago

    It really does look fantastic.

    I like how it frames the site from the top without becoming top-heavy. Also, the subtle in the comment boxes is a great find.

    Can’t wait for your next textpattern articles!

  6. Schultzy

    1237 days ago

    I must say like the hover logo and the transparencies with flowers make it look better than the first time.

    I also loving in the archives the latest articles and sumaries being in there and making the layout less cluttered.

    My mum says it looks girly but there is nothing wrong with that.

    I am also new to this laptop lark …
    sitting on the bog with is it better than a newspaper.

  7. Kev

    1237 days ago

    Looks great. I was wondering how you were going to balance all the imagery and you’ve achieved it brilliantly. I love how the forms look especially.

  8. Rob

    1237 days ago

    Looks very nice, are those still guide lines from fireworks at the top :p

  9. Jeff Smith

    1237 days ago

    The new design looks great John. Excellent attention to detail and great readability.

    I’m working on a new design and structure for my site as well, but am really struggling to find the time to sit down and concentrate on it. I hope it comes out half as slick as this one.

  10. Kris Khaira

    1237 days ago

    Wow.. I like the flowers.

    Did Hicks make your logo?

  11. Steve Urmston

    1237 days ago

    Love the new design, flowers are stunning. I’ve tried myself to make a site that had a ivy header & had to give up totally, so I know how hard it is to get it looking this good.

    Great details as well, form element look pretty & I love how the go button appears when you click the search (always the tiniest things eh!)

  12. Rogier

    1237 days ago

    Looks great. The flowers and colors are absolutely brilliant.

  13. Eric

    1237 days ago

    I like it alot, great job! I especially like the comment name rollover effect. I wonder how long it will be before everyone does this :P

  14. Peter J.Lambert

    1237 days ago

    Nice one John. You must spend far too much time thinking.

    So many ideas to steal.

    But where’s the Cohorts list gone? Where’s the love, Oxton?

  15. Indranil

    1237 days ago

    There’s flowers in here! Where? Great design, by the way.
    Does this mean that you ain’t gonna take part in CSS Rebbot?
    Ah! I see them now! Damned connection.

  16. AkaXakA

    1237 days ago

    How come my gravatar doesn't work though? And John: The images are cached anyway, so the sites fast in loading (on my broadband anyway). PS. The Forget next to the Forget checkbox needs some padding. PPS. That's the only mistake I can find! If that doesn't show the quality of this site, I don't know what does.

  17. AkaXakA

    1237 days ago

    This mail is directly copied from my gravatar login.

    It might be case-sensitive. If so, this should work. (And it does – on the preview at least!)

    PS. Nooooo my lovely comment! It’s ruined! Abused! The HORROR!

  18. Tom

    1237 days ago

    Indeed its bit slow, there also seems to be one of those blue fireworks selections lines.

    If you run your site though this beast, http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/

    It should give you the time for a 56ker, and it doesent look good, perhaps you can do some compression on the images.

  19. Martin W

    1237 days ago

    Now that is damn nice – and nicely timed for the excellent weather today!

    I’m waiting to see if the flowers wilt and die come September….a nice bit of pruning may be in order :O)

  20. fb

    1237 days ago

    cool. even loads ok on dialup :cry:
    not sure about the blue construction lines but eh, cool :)

  21. JD

    1237 days ago

    One word for you.

    Sexy!

    JD

  22. Tom Werner

    1237 days ago

    Sweeeeet. Looks loads better than the three column layout you were rocking a couple weeks ago. I love the transparency, and the blue guide line is kind of cool. It would be even cooler if you could attach it to a :hover on both the column’s divs so that the guide would only be on the one with focus, or default it to be on the main one and switch it to the side salad if your mouse was over that. That would be bitchin’.

    The mouseover on the commenters’ names is really a good idea and perfectly executed.

    I still like the flower header, and even moreso now that you got the dangly things to extend beyond the main flower area so it fills up the full width of my screen.

    Let me know if you still need help getting gravatars to link to the poster’s site. I think there’s even a true plugin for gravatars on TxP RC3, I haven’t yet tested it out and put it up on gravatar.com, maybe you could find it and test it for me?

    The submit buttons on the search box and comment form are unstyled for me, I think they would look nice with a little color. The default grey on Windows just doesn’t mesh with the lush feel of the rest of the site.

    Oh, and I always think it’s nice when the site author’s comments get a little bit of extra style to distinguish them from the other comments. I find it to be a big usability enhancement. You might think about doing something with that.

    Overall fantastic work…a real pleasure to look at and use.

  23. Sembazuru

    1236 days ago

    Wow.

    @Kris Khaira: It’s not Hicks, it’s Radenkovic (who also did the flower illustration.)

  24. Pierce

    1236 days ago

    I am becoming more tolerant of the flowers.

    Actually, I really like the right hand column, and the way the foliage wraps around it.

  25. Denis Radenkovic

    1236 days ago

    This is absolutely beautiful !!! I LOVE the way it all works so well together.

    And, thank you! :)

  26. Andrew Hume

    1236 days ago

    Yep, still lovinª the flowers: but not the “construction lines” (as they have become known). I keep wanting to click them off.

    Good work mate.

  27. Martin

    1236 days ago

    Dont like it!
    Its just not …well… YOU?
    ....Sorry :(

  28. Yannick L.

    1236 days ago

    I absolutely love it. Great Job!

  29. Anton

    1236 days ago

    =snif=

    I think meh allergies are kicking up a touch…

    =achoo!=

    Nice look though. I’m expecially fond of your attention to the form elements.

  30. darren

    1236 days ago

    teh shit
    fucken A, bro! This is an awesome design! :)

    i love the mouseover on the logo.

  31. Jon Hicks

    1236 days ago

    You’ve got it right now – so don’t you dare go changing it gain – y’hear?!

    Gotta love it for its sheer brazenness!

  32. daveeee

    1236 days ago

    Looking good J! In the apple store on Regent St., London, displaying your site to onlookers; aw, the power of code & safari unite!

    I especially love the blurred flowers in the content part of the site, very cool . . . :)

  33. Khaled

    1236 days ago

    Very cool stuff. Nice simple clean.

  34. Michael Bester

    1236 days ago

    This is absolutely stunning! Fantastic work…

  35. Cowboy Dan

    1236 days ago

    Isn’t that Modest Mouse’s logo?

  36. matthew

    1235 days ago

    Truly an excellent header image. More than a header it embraces the elements below it in a very welcome fashion. As an image, it’s stunning.

    The layout and composition of the other site elements complement each other very well. Nice work.

  37. Andrew

    1235 days ago

    You should probably offer an alternative style sheet w/o the backgournd images. It would be uber easy to pull off. Just change three parts of the code.

  38. Gordon

    1235 days ago

    Other than the blue “construction lines” which I really don’t see a need for and they only serve to drag my eye away from the content…

    I’d possibly up the post title font size a notch, as it’s kinda swamped in among all that glorious detail in the graphics.

    Other than that (and hey, what do I know!) it’s wonderful, inspiring, bold, and a million other adjectives my brain refuses to dredge up for me.

    Bravo to all involved.

  39. Garrett

    1235 days ago

    Amazing. Period.

  40. Narayan

    1235 days ago

    Well done, John, not that I had any doubt.

    Looking forward to those writeups.

  41. Matthew

    1235 days ago

    John, lovely design. I love the colors, and I think the way you’ve gone about using the flowers is just lovely. I’m on dial-up and find it all to be perfectly acceptable, by the way. Cheers, and keep up the fantasticness. :)

  42. Marco

    1235 days ago

    That’s really awesome. What a great looking site. I’ve listed it on my design showcase site. Lovely!

  43. Ed Merritt

    1235 days ago

    It’s all looking pretty damn gorgeous John. Well done.

    Put an ear to the ground and you might be able to hear the sound of a distant round of applause coming from the south.

    That would be me, still being impressed.

  44. Hunter Chorey

    1235 days ago

    Very nice :) I like it a lot.
    – h.

  45. Tomas Jogin

    1234 days ago

    I don’t know how I stumbled in here, but I was just awestruck by the design. Fantastic. I then found this entry and figured that this might be the best place to say so.

    Very very nice work. Very original (a good thing), very distinct (also good) while still keeping the familiar blog format (a good thing, imho).

    A perfect example of “insanely great” unique design without compromising familiarity and thereby causing confusion.

    Fantastic.

  46. Jeff Wheeler

    1233 days ago

    Well, I’m sorry to report but I’ll never be leaving your site now. I thought The Big Noob was good, but this is indeed, my new favorite website.

    I hate/love you. I can’t decide which.

  47. Rob

    1233 days ago

    Is it just me of are you skipping over the issue of the blue fireworks lines?

    Perhaps I’m just going mad :p

  48. Small Paul

    1233 days ago

    Terrible. Terrible, terrible, terrible. Single worst blog design I’ve ever…

    Hah! Not really. It’s charming, gorgeous. Makes me feel like it’s summertime. Complex, but in a very relaxing way.

  49. Ian Lloyd

    1232 days ago

    That really is a work of art. There’s more love in that bus-load-of-hippies page than I’ve got in my hippie-free bus that really should have more lovin’ in (see avatar for reference!). If I’m not mistaken, that must have taken an insane amount of work.

  50. Mathias Bynens

    1231 days ago

    Woah! This looks so 60s! Great job, John.

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