I still need to correct one style issue (the washed-out photo of me appears above, not below, the text on the page), but here it is, so far (with filler text). There are no active links on the page, but the three photos to the left will be links to featured sections (textiles, travels, blog), and the nav bar on the right will be the other links (the actual links are still TBD; the text is just a placeholder).
Still not sure how I feel about the new design. My mom says she likes the original homepage better – this one is too busy. I think I tend to agree with her – I’d prefer something more pictorial than text-oriented. I have an interesting idea for photos in a spiral on the screen, with the links in the photos and the final (biggest) photo being of me, but don’t know if it will fit in with the rest of the design’s “look and feel” – I will try playing around with Photoshop this evening and seeing whether I come up with something I like.
Nonetheless, I’m encouraged. This was not easy to implement – I had to learn a LOT about CSS positioning in order to get it to work. So I am learning a lot, which is the main thing.
Next step: explore new design options in Photoshop, and talk to some of my developer friends about whether a content management system like Drupal would make site updates/rearrangements easier.
Congratulations.
My feeling is that maybe having the compact menu on the left and the photos on the right would be a more natural flow: you start with business on the left if you’re wanting to navigate quick, but drift towards pretty on the right . . .
I dig the hazy picture on the bottom, though. A more iconic tiger.
Cheers,
-danny