New Web site Design

[lau3]

I like numero cuatro Gary.

Milt

[williama]

Definately number Four. With Three not too far behind it.

[webitect]

Those would be my bets at the track...I think that #1 feels more refined, despite the Disney-esque feel that people have been mentioning. I tend to relate castles more to a refined royal feeling, mystical in nature...the idea of a castle relates well to jewelry, a refined beautiful object fit for royalty forged from crude, raw material. Also, my opinion might be swayed if the copy for the home page were re-written to match the nature of the business. Jewelry says, professional, pristine, fancy, whereas the copy says normal, average and (the first line) arts and crafts show. No offense meant by this Gary, just my honest opinion.

Chris [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_cool.gif[/img]

[Clements]

1st #4 - Classy. Represents quality and taste, what I'd want if I am going to buy custom jewelry.

2nd #6 - Still on the classy side and bold colors. Makes me feel like there may be something different or exceptional in the jewelry design. Almost like an upscale magazine add.

3rd #8 - Kind of bland, but at least not "Webby" looking.

*******************

Things that distracted me: I expected to see a castle, but those I saw were too much on the "Disney" side. Perhaps a castle is not appropriate, what with all the electronic games (dungeons and dragons stuff) that use castles in their game designs.

I am not sure what type of jewelry is being produced. I expect the whimsical fonts in some of the web designs were choosen because they look wire-like. If this represents the style of the jewelry then its okay, but if the jewelry is more sophisticated then this font could turn off certain potential customers. Perhaps a font with an internal flat bevel and a "polished" silver finish would be better.

John

[AjIsCoool]

But i think no. 8 is the best
It has a "eye relaxing colors" and design

good luck

[Wolfgang]

And here are the results of the Austrian Jury: #4 is the way to go. !!

Wolfgang

[Squeaky]

Same here. No4 by a long way. Just seems more integrated and Classy.

huge Regards
Dave

[Su Lawrence]

Wow you do work hard, nice designs Gary!

I like the colours of 8 and the navigation page background, the subdued grey tones I think match well with what I can see of her work and make me think of silvery jewellery. Also the colours of 3 with the jade gems and grey and the 'name plaque'. The jade and pale grey go well together. Love the necklace in 7 which is more my kind of thing than the square bracelet in 4, 6 etc.

Overall I Like the layout of 4 best, which is more unusual. But the grey colours are a little dark for my taste, maybe slightly lighter colours something like in no 8 or 3.

I like the use of the 'gem' mouseover buttons on the initial navigation page. Very clever the way they match the background tileset.

BTW I know you probably know this anyway and I realise these are just to show us the designs here. But in the finished web if you use a background tileset and have antialiased gifs which have part of the background in a shadow for example; you might consider preloading the background tileset so that it loads first. Then the gifs don't appear with the 'tileset-coloured' shadow on first loading against a plain background. Just a minor thought.

Very good work again Gary.

Regards

Su

[ivan louette]

Combining 3 & 5 or 4 & 8 (more classical) should be my choice !

I like very muche the castle jewell in 5 and the use of the font in text in 8 (which one is it?)

Friendly,
ivan

[joroho]

I think Ross states my position best (I knew I liked that man). Numbers 2 and 4 convey the image of professional jewelery best while the others struck me as a little too cute.

.joroho.