Website, Brand & User Experience Design - In Kyle's Chair

Skill Summary

WiX Website Development Platform, Brand Ideation, Google Suite of Products, UX/UI Design

Project Description

Kyle Gibas, a professional hair stylist in Victoria, BC, reached out to me asking if I could help him create a website for his new business. Because website design is my bread and butter, and because Kyle is a close friend of mine, I eagerly agreed. This project involved both the planning and prototyping that come with creating a new website, while also requiring the added layer of establishing an overall brand identity.

Kyle’s website can be found here: https://www.inkyleschair.com

Branding

Developing a brand from the very beginning is not something I get to do very often. Historically, when I have been brought onto a project, all of those preliminary discussions and decisions have already taken place, so being able to work on something like this was very exciting.

I have had the pleasure of knowing Kyle since 2012 and therefore had a generally good idea of the aesthetic choices he would prefer. Anyone who meets Kyle quickly sees that he is a bubbly, enthusiastic, vivacious (and a little bit campy) person, and I wanted his brand and website to properly reflect that. During my initial competitor analysis, I noticed that the vast majority of hair stylist websites in Victoria were quite similar: beige, brown, and soft colour palettes with very little personality or uniqueness on display. As Kyle’s favourite colour is pink, I knew it had to become the primary brand colour. I initially planned to keep the palette somewhat retro, with bubblegum pink serving as the primary colour and black, white, and grey acting as tertiary accents. However, it needed a bit more dimension, so I decided to introduce a yellow-orange tone to balance things out.

I probably agonized over selecting a primary font more than anything else. To complement the retro-inspired colour palette, I knew I couldn’t go with something overly modern. I wanted a typeface that felt flowy while still being easy to read. After what felt like years of scrolling through Adobe’s font catalogue, I finally landed on something that we were both happy with.

UX & Website Development

The actual build-out of this site was fairly straightforward. Based on my planning and prototypes, I knew I wanted something visually striking yet exceptionally straightforward. I spent a considerable amount of time creating customer profiles and thinking through why someone would specifically click through to a hair stylist’s website.

The conclusion I kept coming back to was that if a potential customer is clicking off Instagram and onto the website link in a stylist’s profile, they likely liked what they saw on the social media account but are not yet 100% convinced they want to book with that person. With that in mind, the website needed to showcase as many high-resolution examples of Kyle’s work as possible while remaining simple and intuitive to navigate.

Google Suite Implementation

As with all of my website buildouts, I included a free Google Business (and associated product) setup. I created his accounts for Google Search Console, Google Business Profile, and Google Analytics. Later in the year Kyle has expressed interest in running some paid advertisements on Google and Facebook; so I’ll amend this post if that ends up happening!