Change can be radical and change can be a slow evolution. Sometimes it can be both!
RVC is a vibrant and daring organization in Seattle that works to empower communities of color while developing new ways of working together and running a nonprofit organization.
RVC promotes social justice by cultivating leaders of color, strengthening organizations led by communities of color, and fostering collaboration between diverse communities.
RVC Mission & Values
After supporting RVC’s old website for a few years, I was thrilled to work collaboratively with staff to refresh the design and completely rebuild the site’s WordPress foundation.
More of a good thing
From the perspective of a website visitor, the RVC site has always had a clean design with bold pops of color and welcoming photography. As I’ve worked with other Seattle organizations, the RVC site was often brought up as a positive design example. If the website design were a house, it had “good bones.”
So our work was to “refresh” rather than “redesign.” When visitors saw the new site, we wanted them know they were still looking at the RVC they have followed and supported for years.
So the new version of the site started with the original design and improved it. We found many areas where the design could be more consistent, better on smaller screens, and more expressive. Working this way helped us work faster, conserve project budget, and reduce the amount of planning and feedback required in the design phase, all while still producing a site we feel confident in.
And a new theme brings about the opportunity to have fun! Try hovering over the logo.
A strong foundation
From the perspective of a logged-in website editor, the site did not look as good. The WordPress theme was very old and hard to work with, and pages used a cobbled-together group of tools for creating page layouts, navigation menus, and page banners.
The new RVC site embraces the modern WordPress block editor to support much more intuitive page editing. While the fundamentals of the visual design didn’t change much, the site now uses a completely custom WordPress theme. This development approach meant we could have a custom design inspired by the old site that still used the latest WordPress feature and, critically, resolved a significant number of accessibility problems with the old site.
Additionally, a number of old, abandoned, and unnecessary plugins were removed or replaced with tools better suited for RVC’s current needs. Features include:
- A variety of custom block styles unique to the RVC site
- Guest author and multi-author support
- Automatic accessibility checking for site editors
- Events calendar for organizing and promoting RVC events
Launching is the first step, not the last
As soon as this project started, the initial site launch was viewed as the starting point for the website, not the end. There are still many ways the site can be improved and adjusted to align with RVC’s needs. The first project will be to extend the block editor’s design features to allow for a digital annual report page.
Thank you for all of your patient support and for being the best collaborator! I’m so grateful for how consistently you center accessibility, clear communication, and consent in your work. My confidence in being able to manage an unwieldy project as a website revamp came on the heels of your reliable partnership.
Rae Lee, RVC Communication & Graphic Design Manager
Over the next year, we’ll continue evolving the design and adding new features to support more immersive and engaging pages that showcase the cutting-edge community-driven work of RVC.
The design changes were subtle, the technical changes were significant, and, like every site, the site will always need to evolve to keep up with the organization it supports.