Smithsonian Women's Committee - Craft Show

Smithsonian Women’s Committee - Craft Show

Client Background:

The Smithsonian Women’s Committee (SWC) organizes the annual Craft Show, an event showcasing handcrafted works by renowned artisans. The Craft Show highlights unique and innovative works in various media, supporting Smithsonian programs and museums through its fundraising efforts. The SWC website serves as a central hub for promoting the event, connecting with artists, and engaging a diverse audience interested in arts and crafts.

Project Goals:

1. Integrate a dedicated video and media section to enhance visual engagement for website visitors.

2. Ensure seamless content management for artist profiles, artwork details, and event updates, allowing the SWC team to manage entries and presentations efficiently.

3. Optimize user experience by implementing responsive design elements that maintain visual consistency across desktop and mobile devices.

4. Improve accessibility standards to ensure all site elements, including modals and carousels, are user-friendly and compatible with screen readers.

5. Deploy an automated content import system for artist and artwork listings, streamlining yearly updates.

Challenges and Solutions:

1. Media Presentation and Video Integration:

• Challenge: Ensuring video files and images, such as the “smithsonian.webm” video, play smoothly across devices while displaying fallback images where video support is limited.

• Solution: Configured the website to use the smithsonian.webm video as the primary content with a fallback poster image. This approach ensures that users have a seamless experience regardless of device or browser capabilities.

2. Artist and Artwork Import System:

• Challenge: Importing a large volume of artist profiles and associated artwork images from external platforms like jurying.net, which requires data to be accurate and organized.

• Solution: Leveraged the Feeds and Feeds Tamper modules in Drupal to import CSV files for artist details and artwork listings, allowing SWC to handle annual updates with ease.

3. Content Visibility and Access Management:

• Challenge: Ensuring specific pages, such as administrative views or unpublished artist profiles, remain hidden from the public.

• Solution: Configured custom visibility settings and filters within Drupal to control content accessibility and maintain a consistent user experience across public and private sections of the site.

4. Responsive and Accessible Design Adjustments:

• Challenge: Designing the site to adapt visually on both mobile and desktop, particularly for elements like carousels, modals, and the footer.

• Solution: Implemented responsive CSS adjustments to ensure that key sections like the homepage hero, artist modals, and carousel elements render effectively on all devices. Focus indicators and ARIA roles were added for screen reader compatibility.

5. Automated Media Resizing and Optimization:

• Challenge: High-resolution images from artists could affect page load times, especially on mobile networks.

• Solution: Utilized the Uploadcare API to dynamically resize and optimize images, setting a maximum display resolution to balance load times and visual quality.

Deployment and Testing:

• Multidev Deployment: Incrementally deployed design and functionality changes across multidev environments, ensuring stability while introducing new features.

• Cross-Platform Testing: Conducted tests on both desktop and mobile devices to confirm consistent rendering of video, images, and text elements, particularly in the artist carousel and modals.

• Usability and Accessibility Checks: Validated that interactive elements meet accessibility standards, including screen reader functionality, tab navigation, and focus indicators.

Results:

• Enhanced Visitor Engagement: The Craft Show site now delivers a visually engaging experience with integrated media, artist profiles, and streamlined navigation.

• Efficient Content Management: The SWC team can easily manage and update content, ensuring an up-to-date presentation of artists, events, and media.

• Improved Performance: Optimizations in image handling and video loading contribute to faster load times, enhancing the user experience for all visitors.

• Accessibility Compliance: The site meets accessibility guidelines, with adjustments that ensure compatibility across devices and assistive technologies.

Value Added:

• Strategic Content Management: Implementing the Feeds importer and configuring visibility controls allow SWC to manage the yearly Craft Show updates seamlessly.

• Long-Term Flexibility: The responsive design and accessibility improvements provide a robust foundation, ensuring the site can adapt to future content and audience growth.

• Operational Efficiency: Optimized media handling and video integration ensure the site is visually appealing without compromising performance, supporting the SWC’s mission to promote and celebrate arts and crafts.