Website redesign for an arts non-profit based in Boulder, Colorado

This project began in the User Experience Research course at the University of Colorado Boulder. After the course concluded, our team was invited by the Boulder County Arts Alliance to continue the project pro bono, to further developing and implement our design proposal.

My Role

Project Manager
UX Researcher & Designer

Length

March 2024 - December 2024

Tools

Figma
UserInterviews.com

Background

Boulder County Arts Alliance (BCAA) is a Colorado based non-profit providing workshops and grant opportunities for local artists and consumers. BCAA wanted to evaluate the attractiveness of their website in addition to its usefulness and navigability, and were particularly interested in how the design of their website impacts attracting and retaining members.

My Responsibilities

At the beginning of this project, I was part of a 4 person team conducting UX research. The research portion began in March 2024 and lasted until May.

3 team members continued working with BCAA to implement our research as part of the UX design phase that ran from June 2024 - Dec 2024.

Starting Jan 2025, I will continue working with BCAA as their sole brand designer leading on the creation and implementation of brand guidelines.

User Research

Our team conducted user interviews with 5 Colorado residents to understand the navigability of BCAA’s website and uncover potential pain-points. Each interview consisted of a 45 minute virtual session where users were asked to navigate to specific pages on BCAA’s website and provide their initial reactions.

Through our interview process we gained these insights:

Users found the amount of text on the page to be overwhelming and not easily readable.
Multiple menu bars and site structure made website navigation difficult and took multiple attempts to find the pages users were looking for.
Certain pages lacked sufficient information for users to understand their purpose or contained outdated information.

Competitive Analysis

After conducting interviews and observations, our team conducted a competitive analysis to understand the structure of BCAA’s competitor’s websites. We wanted to analyze overall website functionality, visual design, and usability.

Functionality + Features

Met Expectation:

BCAA offers a plethora of functionalities and features for art patrons, artists, and Member Affiliates.

Did Not Meet Expectations:

Some functionality and informative structures preceded visual and aesthetic design. Some features were broken and did not work.

Usability Heuristics

Met Expectation:

BCAA uses some modern navigation elements such as dropdown menus, filters, hover.

Did Not Meet Expectations:

Stylistically outdated and clunky placement of user interface interfered with usability of site

Visual Design

Met Expectation:

Informative content structure. Some images and visuals were used.

Did Not Meet Expectations:

Color variety and contrast impaired visual aesthetic, lack of visual elements such as images and animations, and typography styles make some pages overwhelming

Information Hierarchy

Throughout our research, we discovered a main pain-point for users was the way BCAA’s website was structured.

In order to define the hierarchy and improve website navigation, our team restructured and layed out the main sections of the website and what each section will comprise of based on meetings and feedback from BCAA’s stakeholders.