It’s a rare and wonderful opportunity, as a designer, to work on another design professional’s website. It’s a unique project to get to re-construct a peer’s creative calling-card through your own design sensibilities, and deliver a synthesis of your style and their creative strengths. Of course, it’s also a big creative challenge — are there any eyes more critical than those of a fellow designer? I must admit, the project was a bit intimidating at first.

Fortunately, I got to work with Nick Finck, who made the entire process fun. In fact, it was one of the smoothest and most successful projects I’ve worked on since I opened up my company full-time.

The process

With most of my client work, I do quite a bit of upfront discovery. It’s a lot of questions, color moodboards, phone calls and research. My average client is usually new to the process of thinking about their website goals and marketing strategy.

With Nick, it was the opposite. Obviously, Nick’s an industry vet, and had a pretty firm grasp on what he wanted — a fresh, clear ‘personal brand’ website. It had to reveal his social outlets (blog, twitter, flickr, etc), and serve as a one-stop point of reference for those looking to book him for IA/UX work (through Blueflavor) or speaking gigs.

I thing the process worked out so well because I think this is a really compelling type of website. Focusing a brand and a site around a personality is a really effective strategy for marketing a speaker or a professional with as much community visibility as Nick. Not only did I understand what Nick wanted to build, I saw how helpful this project could be for him and Blueflavor.

The design

Nick’s already done a great write up of the design details on his site, but I there are a few things I wanted to mention in more detail.

Overall mood
I wanted the site to be very light, open and inviting and cut to the quick of things — Nick’s resume and writings. I used quite a bit of negative whitespace and a simple grid (thanks, 960.gs) to anchor the layout. Again, the site was all about Nick, so I used the great publicity shot from Rasmus as the centerpiece of the homepage.

Typography
I used the insanely flexible Museo Sans typeface from Jos Buivenga. If you haven’t checked out this font, you’re missing out. It’s an absolute steal right now — roughly $90 for a full family of weights.

It works really well in Nick’s site because the strong, geometrical shapes scream function — the type is ridiculously easy to scan and read. Even more exciting for me, is how well the family plays against Helvetica/Arial. It’s a perfect heading font for any site that leans on a web sans-serif for body copy.

Colors
Really, these were pulled mainly out of Nick’s preferences (he likes orange) and my desire to build a site on a strong, punchy key-color scheme. The blue/orange combo is nice and stark, and the look is softened just a bit with muted tans and off-black type.

It was a nice change of pace to have a client get behind a somewhat “risky” color choice. Honestly, I was just thrilled I didn’t have to mute everything and muddle the look into something too conservative.

A big shout out

Anyway, if you have a minute, do check out the site. For me though, the most important part of this project wasn’t the end result — it was the chance to work Nick, someone who’s been incredibly supportive of my work over the last year. He’s helped me secure my first speaking opportunity, put me in touch with key figures in the community, and given me co-working opportunities at Whitespace.

More than that though, he’s been a great friend and an example of a professional who always makes time to help and assist others. This whole internet business can get pretty lonely and silly sometimes, but it’s people like Nick that really make it all worth it. Thanks for the wonderful project Nick.