The Great American Lobster Fest held at Chicago’s Iconic Navy Pier is Green Curtain Events' most detailed and complex website. They needed a new website design as the old website produced page errors, outdated plugins, and needed new brand coloring. The site needed to show customers the new festival location at Navy Pier near The Beer Garden. They were very specific on which photos to use, where to place ticket links and music/food banners, and they wanted it to mimic the design and feel I created for WingOut Chicago.
It took a few different designs and meetings to get the correct red color for the header and the footer sections. The same is true for main photos used. For the info page we kept some of the information from the prior website but ended up cutting twenty percent of the information. For the iPhone version, I tried cramming a lot of information onto the homepage so the viewer sees a lot of information in one take. Most of their clientele view their festival sites from a smartphone. I edited the website up until the day before the festival as Green Curtain Events had last second changes as vendors and menus changed. I made edits made in the following categories: text, food menu lineup, partner banners, and musical lineup. There are red ticket buttons on each page under an image before each email list sign-up section. Spam protection, hCaptcha, is used throughout the site to protect them from robot spam and unsolicited messages. Custom CSS was used throughout to make <a> tags colored red and hyperlink out. Also, the website showcases GA4 tracking analytics and Facebook Pixel custom code for marketing purposes. The creation of this website was all in the editing.
Al O’Connor of O’Connor Properties migrated to the U.S. in the eighties from Ireland. He runs a family owned and operated real-estate company offering apartments for rent in Chicago’s near North Side including Ukrainian Village, West Town, Logan Square, and Avondale. Al reached out wanting a website to increase business, have tenants easily reach out to him for maintenance, and have a one stop shop for customers to apply for rent.
This was a very challenging and rewarding project as Al didn’t have a logo, photos, or an online rental application form. When creating Al’s logo, I really thought about his Irish heritage and used a light green color for his company name backed by a gray slate blue color. I included the slate blue background in the navigation and footer. Also, I went to six different apartments and took photos with my high quality digital camera. The main opening photo expands the length of the computer screen so the viewer can get a close perspective of his building. The green flowing summer city trees really match the logo nicely. I created the downloadable PDF form making it easily fillable. The website has helped Al better manage his current tenants and he has seen an increase in sales due to the online personal rental application form.
Green Curtain Events, one of Chicago’s largest events companies needed a new clean sleek looking website for WingOut Chicago. Their prior WingOut website wasn’t spaced evenly, margins were off, and images weren’t sized proportionally. The new event at Gallagher Way next to Wrigley Field needed to be showcased. We had multiple meetings to discuss page layout, navigation, ticket layout, color, and photos to be used. The goal of the website is to get the user to click on the ticket link to purchase tickets for the event.
Since Green Curtain liked the prior design from the old website, I stayed true to the old design form but cleaned it up making it look professional on all device sizes. Over eighty percent of their customers view websites from a mobile device so it needed to look great on smart-phones. I cleaned up the margins, padding, and added a ticket link to every page. They love the WingOut Blue color and this is showcased in the navigation and footer. The event is sponsored by Gallagher Way and I made sure their logo is clickable to their website. I added custom CSS to make the text green inside the contact section of each page and used two sets of scrolling photos on the food page to showcase the unique wings offered. Also, there is a Google Map for festival location and the website has Facebook Meta code in the header section. Overall, the site is more consistent with more pages and opportunities for customers to purchase tickets.
Matt Chandler founder of Blue Line Run Club, one of Chicago’s largest run clubs, reached out and wanted a website based on Blue Line’s mission statement: The Blue Line Run Club is a supportive and inclusive community that welcomes runners of all ages, abilities, and distances. Their goal is to build social connections that support both the individual as well as the community through running. Matt wanted a website to showcase running photos, include a calendar with running events, and have the site be a hub for local athletes to connect.
For website colors, I stayed true to Blue Line’s logo. I used different shades of blue throughout the website to mimic Chicago’s Blue Line train along with cool vibrant colors to mimic Lake Michigan. I went through hundreds of photos Matt sent me and picked the best ones that suited Blue Line Run Club and portrayed the energy of what his run club is all about. There were code embeds for his Instagram/Strava accounts and a whole page is dedicated to his Google Running Calendar. The navigation is sticky and remains throughout the down scroll. This was based off of ESPN’S website. Over ninety percent of the photos are located on the home page and I kept an even gridded number of two and four photos across. On smaller devices, it breaks down to one photo per column. Matt and I spent a lot of time figuring out how many pages he wanted and the names for each page. Also, there is a contact page and email list sign-up form throughout the website. In the future, he is looking to turn the website into a small e-commerce store where he sells products.
Chicago Taco Fest or Tacos Y Tamales Festival is Green Curtains Events largest festival. Like WingOut Chicago, the prior website needed help. The goal of the festival is to give back to Pilsen’s Arts & Community House. The prior website wasn’t spaced evenly, margins were off, and images weren’t sized proportionally. We had multiple meetings to discuss website layout, color, and design. Green Current Events also wanted Mailchimp integration within the email list sign-up form. They wanted to showcase old and new photos, clean up text, and have a contact page.
Since Modelo sponsors the event, Modelo based colors are used. The dark shaded blue defines the navigation and footer background. There is a bottle shaped golden hover color mimicking Modelo for each page on the navigation. WingOut Blue is used on this website right above the footer section. This blue color is from the WingOut Chicago logo. A lot of time and consideration went into choosing and ordering event photos. There is even a scrolling Modelo photo section. I chose a wavy, almost cursive looking font to mimic Spanish feel. There is spam protection and hCaptcha on the email sign-up form and contact page. The donation section for each page is colored green to mimic corn; the source of tacos and tamales. On the partners page there is an in-depth question form and partners logo section. Custom CSS is used to color phone numbers and make email addresses green. This matches Green Curtain Events. The website is responsive and looks great on all device sizes.
Chicago Bluesman Brian Lupo badly needed his website updated. His prior website was out of date, not secure, certain links didn’t work, his music calendar wasn’t up to date, and the site wasn’t responsive. He wanted a new biography written, a new music calendar, a way to showcase his musical roots through photos, an email list sign-up form, and a contact page. Also, he wanted to showcase his new album, Into the Sun. Brian has worked with and shared the stage with Koko Taylor, Buddy Guy, Jimmy Johnson, Omar Coleman, Big James, Eddie Shaw, James Wheeler, Vance Kelly, Toronzo Cannon, Mike Wheeler, Willie Kent, Lindsey Alexander, Bob Stroger, and Joe Moss.
The first thing I did was rewrite Brian’s biography. This shaped and set the tone for the entire website. He really wanted to showcase his musical upbringing from his early 290 Sport & Juice Bar music days in Chicago. He sent over three hundred photos to me and this was a real undertaking. His opening website photo consists of a cool purple border color matching the purple light shine on his head during a live performance. The purple color is used throughout and is the hover color over the header and footer navigation. I chose a deep blue color for the header and footer background that matches his Blues sensibility. On the music page, I chose his best YouTube songs to go along with the album write up. Throughout the pages before the email list sign up section, there’s a scrolling collection of photos highlighting Brian’s biggest musical moments. The calendar plugin allows Brian to keep his musical calendar up to date. Also, there are links to his Spotify, Facebook, and Apple iTunes pages.
Famous Blues musician Jesse Graves (born October 31, 1949, Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania) real name Michael Floyd, wanted a website to showcase his musical history through pictures, press, and video. Jesse played with and opened for Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Taj Mahal, Bonnie Raitt, Tom Waits, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee, Little Feat, and The J. Geils Band. Jesse released his debut record in 1972 on his own label, Gazebo Records.
Jesse’s scrapbook was very scattered and all over the place. What made this website difficult was finding the best photos to use from his old collection. He wanted a very basic website. The website consists of four pages; a home, pictures, press, and contact page. The main images on each page really needed to match Jesse and his unique style. Great time and consideration went into playing around with different images until I found the best one for each page. I chose a wavy, unique grave-like font to match his style. There is also a contact page.
This website is based off of a one-hundred-and-ten-page book I wrote called Flowers For Chicago Blues: A Grave Tour. The book has yet to be published. For the website, I cut the book in half and didn’t use all of the photographs and biographical artist information. Since the website is all hand coded, I knew I was going to need a lot of HTML pages, a CSS page, and embed JavaScript.
I chose an all-black background creating a nice mat for all grave pictures and the grave picture collage homepage. I wanted the site to be simple yet elegant and not have a hamburger menu on mobile devices. The goal is for the user to complete the whole tour before being able to go back to the homepage. Using JavaScript, the end of the tour brings up a dialogue box allowing the user to go back to the homepage. The purple buttons provide nice contrast to the white text and all black background. I used a very spooky text for top page headings and JavaScript to delay the Muddy Waters and John Belushi images. It is a very simplistic old school looking website that gets the job done.
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