SERA Has New Energy on the Web!
The journey to a new website for SERA has been a long time in the making. In the midst of fast-paced projects and an obsession with client service, these sorts of initiatives can sometimes be found collecting dust on the back-burner.
Yet, despite our collective busyness, we knew the time had come for this task to be crossed off the to-do list. Truly though, let’s call a spade a spade – our old website had a splash page. “What’s a splash page?” some of the younger members of the audience are asking. Well, those were a design concept born in the 1990s era of “compact discs” and the artist formerly known as Prince (now, again, known as Prince?).
At any rate, the challenge at SERA was particularly daunting: how do we go about communicating the many layers that combine to form this 44-year-old company? What started out as a small Portland architecture firm has evolved into a multi-discipline organization active in a wide range of markets.
Adding to the design pressure was the well-documented criticism of websites in our industry. From “Why Can’t the World’s Best Architects Build Better Websites?” to “Architecture Firm Websites: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly,” we knew we had to do this right.
Our solution: Surround ourselves with the right people!
Capturing the firm’s ideas for the website in March 2012
Early in our process, we leveraged our collaborative instincts and harvested ideas from the entire firm to be sure we were heading the right direction. We are incredibly grateful to all of the outside people who have been involved in this design effort. It takes a village to pull-off something like this, and we have been fortunate to work with some of the best folks out there.
Huge thanks to…
– Chuck Spidell of Illusio Design and his development collaborator, Justin Korn of Korn Development, for being heroes in capturing the visual essence of SERA and bringing it to life in WordPress!
– Chad Upham of L Studio for bringing a fresh and consistent voice to the writing throughout the site.
– Marianna Leuschel of L Studio and Mary Breuer of Breuer Consulting Group for guiding our leadership through the process of understanding our market position and determining how to best communicate our story to the world.
And last but not least…
– All of the SERA employee-owners who contributed content at scales both large and small.
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Great, now what are you going to do with this new media site?
I would like to hear about Clarks Living Builing Chanlange updates? LEED project updates would also be intresting as well.
Thanks, Jefferson! Our goal is to create a lively discussion around design, sustainability, and the future of the built environment with this blog. Your suggestions are excellent, and we will be weaving in updates like those along the way.
Stay tuned!
Congratulations on a superior end-product!! Worth all of the extra time, effort, forbearance, and creative juice that it took to make it happen. May it bring much success to SERA.
Thanks, GLB!
We’re super proud of the design, functionality, and overall slickness of the site. SERA was a blast to partner with on this project and they are masters of their craft.