Target: Interior Designers+architects Project: Movable Type Blog

LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT US:

Design Arts Seminars is a continuing education provider that administers home study courses, study tours and seminars across the country to licensed interior designers and architects. We were established in 1992 when continuing education first came into existence .

Our clients have come to expect first-class service and educational programs, and as such, we have a very loyal clientele. We have long been known for our old world flair (our founder was from Cuba and our current Director is from France.)

Staff wise, we are a small group, young and fresh-minded and always thinking progressively. Our clients have come to depend on us for more than just our product and consult us regularly , thus, it is important to maintain their interests throughout everything that we do. We have positioned ourselves in the high end/luxury side of the market and our clients certainly expect nothing less.

Our website: http://www.designarts.net

Our logo is attached

HERE IS WHAT WE NEED:

We need a fresh, sleak blog design (for the Movable Type platform) that is able to attract the newer, younger design professionals who already are adept with the social media phenomenon of today while still catering to our established, older clientele. The design should be simple to navigate through, however intuitive. It should be very clean but also unique and strive to be creative as the target audience is designers. The color scheme should appeal to luxury consumers (think of Chanel, Bulgary, Italian/French design) while still being a bit playful (think Hermes) In our minds, here are the key adjectives that the color choices and design at large should reflect: reliable/professional + luxury (old world flair with contemporary edge to it) + playful (it is a blog after all!) + accessible (both figuratively and literally)

Color choices will play a big part in communicating this message.

OUR TARGET AUDIENCE IS:

Our target audience ranges from young, new design professionals (the majority of whom are interior designers and architects) who are into the social media scene to older professionals who might tend to be less technologically savy. We want to appeal to both groups and hopefully have a blog design that will ease some of our older clients into the blog/social media world.

We want to maintain the high class feel our clients have come to expect from us while also bringing them a design that has a certain unique flair (though still maintaining a clean overall look.)

WE LIKE THESE DESIGNS:

Please see attached PDF mock-up. We took elements from different blogs we really liked, links to original sources are noted in the file. It is important to note that it is the indicated elements that we like, not necessarily the designs at large of these blogs.

WE ABSOLUTELY MUST HAVE (or we don't want to see) THIS IN OUR DESIGN:

Must have:

-Elements that integrate with other social media outlets (easy ways to share entries/content with facebook/LinkedIn/Delicious/Twitter etc.)

-A style that is readable by all, old and young alike, but still creative enough to maintain designer's interest

-A design that can be fully integrated on the Movable Type platform

-The ability for the blog design to be integrated with Movable Type's community profiles feature

Don't want to see:

-Designs that are too messy/confusing or difficult to read

-Bland designs that lack inspiration