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New look for STLtoday.com
Not so very long ago, after noting the praise given the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for the design of its Saturday tabloid edition, I said:
Now let’s apply this clear, whitespaced, organized approach to STLtoday.com. Please?
Apparently, today is that day. The P-D unveiled a massive revision of its online analogue in a soft launch wherein more changes will be incorporated over time. The result is a website free of the clutter and constraints that hobbled its previous incarnation, one that highlights new media elements adopted by the paper over time.
Here’s the look:
And here’s the comment I left at the redesign introduction post by Kurt Greenbaum, the P-D’s director of social media:
Well. Didn’t expect to see this today.
As someone who has bemoaned the cramped and cluttered older design here, I think the new layout is several steps in a better direction. I’m reminded of the front page of the Saturday tabloid edition of the P-D, which has been praised by newspaper design experts. Indeed, STLtoday.com is now much more reminiscent of a…newspaper. Which is a good thing, I think. There are some issues, of course, but I consider the new look an overall improvement.
A few quick notes:
Ah, blessed whitespace. I feel as though I can breathe again. Much cleaner.
People who dislike the scrolling pictorial on the front page can stop it by clicking the pause button.
I’ll agree with those who think the main body type is too large. Readers can adjust that using their browser menu, or by clicking Control-Minus or -Plus on their PC keyboards (Command key instead of Control for Mac users?). Reduced just a step, the type looks fine. You could change the type size, or provide a way for the reader to do it.
More on the type: It renders differently - and more attractively - in IE than in Firefox.
Fat footers! All the kids are using them these days. Actually, it looks good. I have to say this, though, as others have: That is one big, honkin’ RSS icon.
The “Email this - Share this - Print this” logos and links: Much more modern and improved over the old arrangement that served the same purpose. Those old, clunkier links are still visible at the bottom of any given story, but I’m guessing that will change…?
I need to think about the Belt and the central tabbed modules. They feel like a substantial divide in the middle of the front page, and they have the effect of pushing news/entertainment/business/sports well below the fold. Perhaps splitting the difference here would help: keeping the Belt where it is while moving the tabbed sections to the right column. Maybe?
Time to stop hogging the comments section. Changes of this scope deserve more time and thought, but for now I’ll just commend you for making the kind of substantial change that the site really needed.
More to come on this, as the changes really are sufficiently far-reaching that more than a cursory glance in required.
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Wow.
Thanks for writing about this. The eye damage was the main reason I stopped reading Stltoday. I’ll check it out more now.
Even my net-design ignorant mother took one look at their site in the Lumiere Place days and complained about the assault on her eyes.
I agree with your letter pretty much all around. Great redesign. Still room for improvement, but wow, so much better.
I was looking for a cached version of the previous edition of the website for comparison’s sake, but couldn’t find a recent one of the front page. I’ll look some more, because the contrast with the old layout is worth a study.
As you said, room for improvement, but they’re off to what I think is a good start. Thanks for the comments, hanna!
P.S. - I’m looking at the site using Firefox/Mac for the first time - much better than in Windows so far as the type is concerned, since Mac browsers display fonts at a smaller size than PCs. Sweet.
Kurt Greenbaum — not Greenwald.
Hey Phil!
Thanks for the feedback on the site. We still have whole lot of work to do ironing out lots of glitches with our CMS functionality and the design (such as the major font and spacing issues I think you are alluding to), so please bear with us in the meantime.
Following the site polishing, we’re going to have a summer full of new functionality upgrades to the site, so this is just the beginning of a massive evolution (which the site has needed for a long, long time).
Thanks again and please feel free to let us know if you have any other thoughts after the dust settles.
Cheers,
Will Sullivan
(Interactive Director @ the P-D)
(Nerd in Chief @ Journerdism.com)
@Gabe: Corrected, and thanks.
@Will: Thanks for stopping by! I look forward to seeing the new features and tweaks to the new format. I think this will catch the eye of a lot of people like hanna, who stopped reading the site before but now will be interested enough to return. Good luck!
My brief encounter with the Post-Dispatch was on one of my trips to Iowa for a job with a plane change in St. Louis (lovely airport by the way, but that’s a post unto itself) and I remember an editorial which made me applaud.
That was several years ago.
@Kona: That Lambert Field is all that many people see of St. Louis just breaks the heart - but yeah, that’s another post.
Wish you could remember the topic of that editorial!