In November 2014 the brand new website of Hands On! finally saw the light! Meet the two people behind the design and the technique: Marit van der Meer and Michiel Vergunst. We asked them about this special project.
Marit, how long have you been a graphic and exhibition designer?
I graduated in 1988 from the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. Since then I have always done both graphic design and exhibition design.
Can you tell us something about the look and feel of the website?
I became a member of Hands On! last year. ‘Children in museums’ is quite a sparkling, cheerful theme, and I noticed that the design for Hands On! didn’t quite match that feeling. When I was at the conference in Stockholm I offered to design a new logo and style for Hands On! The idea behind the website is: primary colours, primary shapes. Cheerful but never childish.
What is your main goal for the new website?
I would love if this website could really become a platform for meeting and exchanging ideas. That is only possible if we all customize our member pages! That way we can show the world which expertise we have. Also: I hope that the website will show the diversity of our members. When I went to the conference Stockholm last year, I thought I would be the only one who didn’t work at a museum. But it turned out that Hands On! has a lot of members who are independent professionals. That was great to find out!
What do you think of the result?
I think it looks great! And it will become even better once we upload the photos from all our members. So: please keep sending your photos to secretariat@hands-on-international.net.
Michiel, how long have you been a web developer?
I’ve been a web developer for 15 years, since graduating in Amsterdam as a multimedia designer. When I started out, html was brand new…
Can you tell us something about the structure of the website?
The website is built in WordPress. We chose WordPress because it is an internationally known system and is continually updated and improved. To work efficiently, we decided to base the design on an existing template. I worked together with Marit: she visited our office before she started designing. Last but not least: the website is responsive. That means you can read it on all kinds of devices: from a computer to a phone and a tablet.
How long did it take you to build the site?
I worked alone on this project. It took me about 80 hours in total.
What did you enjoy most about building this website?
The most fun for me was keeping things going while working with so many different people. And also: the design is inspiring, so building it was gratifying!