Identity Kitchen » freshly baked brands

What wordpress looks like to us

Ellen — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 17:34:00 +0000

This is the first in a two part post about the launching of one of our favorite brands yet, Partridge Lane Studio. Formerly, Allen Hyslip Photography. Allen came to Identity Kitchen with a soup to nuts revamp in mind. He had decided on the name Partridge Lane, which we loved. He wanted a brand that felt personal, emotional, warm, caring and from the heart. He had done his research and knew he wanted a custom wordpress site. He like many photographers was worried about the future of flash (see Steve Jobs letter here). He knew he wanted to letterpress his key pieces and add a custom price list, that can be emailed or printed. Alleluia! Our ideal client!

Allen continued to be an absolute dream to work with. We wanted to give him a special signature brand that he can build his business with and will have the longevity that kind of investment (time and money) deserves. We’re going to work a bit backwards and showcase the custom portfolio WordPress site first. We really pushed the envelope in terms of what a WordPress BlogSite can look like, using only HTML and CSS. We have always felt that it should look as good, if not better than their flash competition. But the functionality… oh, the open and search engine optimized functionality.

Marty Thornley and I had been toying with a retractable menu for a while and Allen was the perfect client to develop it for. We strive to make our custom sites, just that, completely custom, and therefore different from every other photography studio site. The retractable menu allows for extra real estate so you can display your photos. Which is, in fact the point. This is the home page.

The next thing we added was a NO FLASH pop up Gallery that can be updated easily and indefinitely with an unlimited number of galleries that can be displayed anywhere on the site. Therefore, his site can grow with his business.

Because the entire site is powered by WordPress the portfolio sections, the galleries and the blog are all one cohesive system – all editable from the same backend. Plus, because it is a portfolio site first it is portraying the best view of your business. The well known SEO benefits of the blog will draw potential clients not just to your chronological blog but also to your main site. One seamless marketing effort.

The backend is one of my favorite parts. Easy to update, unlike many other CSS sites. The dashboard areas have been tabbed so social media, home page and blog photo galleries can be easily updated.

As with all our sites, we used a combination of amazing WordPress plugins, including a trio of SEO plugins that are freely available and highly recommended for any WordPress site.

The first on is the famous All in One SEO Pack, the most downloaded of all WordPress plugins.It is very powerful and does too much to explain here. But follow the link to get it and find out more.
The second is SEO Friendly Images, a great plugin that adds ‘alt’ attributes to each image in your blog posts, all behind the scenes, just install and let it work.
The third was developed by our own Marty, especially for photographers, called SEO Image Galleries. as an alternative to flash based image galleries. It is all CSS and HTML based and loads every image with SEO information.

Here is a look at the SEO Image Gallery backend:

Finally, the BEST part (did I mention there is NO FLASH). The site looks EXACTLY the same on the iPhone. It is not a duplicate or a mirrored site, it is not a paired down site it is the same site. Exactly the same on all mobile devices. One site to manage so you can go back to that thing that makes your business money…shooting!

View the site live here. Interested in getting your own WordPress custom portfolio site, like Allen’s? Contact us here. In the next few months will be launching affordable WordPress portfolio sites at PhotographyBlogSites.com, with many of these same bells and whistles. Check back for updates, we are currently in Beta Testing.

Have we taken branding a bit too far?

Ellen — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 17:59:46 +0000

Hideous photo taken with my iphone which I believe had both flour and butter on the lens ;)

Studio Diana – a very inspired Brand

Ellen — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:38:01 +0000

Because we have the pleasure of knowing Diana Adams and her daughter Justine Ungaro so well, we were particularly inspired when re-creating their brand. Diana Adams has been running an uber successful photography studio in Old Town Fairfax, and spent 15 years as one of DC’s top wedding photographers. In 2003, Diana’s daughter Justine joined the studio taking over wedding business with Jenni Green, allowing her mother to focus on her first love, portraits. The studio was a-changin’ and needed a fresh and more modern brand lift, to be inclusive of the new talent, but also needed to honor the outstanding business Diana’s gorgeous work had established.

This was some of the inspiration we received to help us understand what resonated with them. Notice, the rooms and fashion. You can start to feel their look starting to brew. The final brand felt very much like a magazine, including the layout of their site.

Words to describe their style, work and brand:

sophisticated
classic
fashionable
a little sassy
1960’s
subtle
friendly
boutique hotel
european
spunky
crisp
fun

We decided to keep the moon shape (for goddess Diana), as it had been a recognizable representation of her business for over 20 years. We then streamlined the type giving the moon more importance as it now replaced the O. We also created a separate Weddings and Portraits logo. Below is the before and after.

Their extensive custom portfolio blogsite was custom designed with their collective needs in mind. Author driven blogfeed with silhouettes taken from the inspired photo shoot by Nicole Wolf of Sota DZine. It includes separate sections for weddings and portraits and multiple galleries for each photographer. They also include a “People We Love” section, so their brides can experience their extensive wedding expertise when visiting the Studio Diana site. Visit Studio Diana here.

We are honored to be a part of their new brand. Beautiful digs for some gorgeous ladies. On a side note, since launching their new custom portfolio blogsite last month, they have booked twice as many weddings as the same time last year. And that is just the beginning.

Botox For Our Brand

Ellen — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 02:19:55 +0000

Well, you know the story of the shoemaker’s children. Identity Kitchen has been in massive need of a facelift for quite some time now (I mean THIS IS LA). While we are working on our new magic blogsite, full of bells and whistles and some stuff you’ve never seen before in WordPress, we decided to launch our brand botox. We cleaned up our own logo a bit, giving it a little more “kitchen” feel, and updated our tagline to include a little more of our studio personality (eh..hem, that is humor, not sarcasm).

We have completed so many fabulous projects at such a rapid rate this year, I’ve not even been able to blog about them. So we’ve photographed them –thank you Justine –and posted them on the website and we’ll go back and feature them one at a time on the blog. We also posted some really wonderful testimonials…aw shucks guys. Check out the new site here.

Purple is the New Green

Ellen — Thu, 28 May 2009 22:28:52 +0000

Working on Tricia B’s identity has been such a soothing experience. She is so wonderful to work with and open to new ideas. We created a look for her that was a bit French Provence, thus the lavender. When she said that environmental issues and elevating her brand are a priority, we thought letterpress and this amazing flower paper. Since we used the lavender motif in her logo we decided to print her gift certificates on this beautiful (and great smelling) flower paper. That way once her clients use them she can give them back to be planted in their garden. A beautiful flower patch can be a sweet smelling memory of their session together.

Thank you Tricia. And thank you Carrie for the amazing job, can wait to see your beautifully exfoliated hands.

LA Stylist Mom Site Design

Ellen — Tue, 26 May 2009 18:55:17 +0000

That’s right we actually do work for clients that are not photographers…WHAT??!! LA Stylist Mom is a blogsite started by the fabulous fashionista B, who worked as a stylist for recording artists, television, and editorial for over 10 years, before becoming a Mom herself and helping dress the rest of us who have also joined those ranks. Great friend to Identity Kitchen and the UnBride, design work for B was and is a pleasure and inspirational. Check out her blog daily for fantastic fashion tips. We designed both her identity and blogsite, programming was done by the amazing and ever patient Marty Thornley.

PS: Check out her cute twitter feed.

http://www.lastylistmom.com/

An Expensive Pair of Jeans

Ellen — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 06:10:21 +0000

I had the absolute pleasure of working with Amy Lynden, and helping her develop her brand. Amy is a fantastic photographer with a successful portrait business in Northern California, that is about 1/2 families and children and 1/2 seniors. She wanted a brand identity that spoke to her seniors a bit more. She wanted something that felt urban and unique. Like “an expensive pair of jeans that everyone has to have”. The final logo was a grungy taglike mark and we also developed a secondary A to work as a watermark. They offer a nice juxtaposition to each other.

The best part of this project has been seeing where Amy took everything. I supplied her with the two logos and colors and business card design and she developed her packaging, her website and blog. Thank you Amy!

Modern + Organic Brand = DIY Marketing

Ellen — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 08:17:55 +0000

I think the identity we did for Kim Seidl is one of my new favorites, and what she did with it is a DIY lesson to us all. Kim is a fabulous wedding and portrait photographer in San Diego. When we talked about rebuilding her brand she wanted a look that was hip, clean and modern yet organic and creative. This was to reflect her work and target her audience and ideal customers, who are highly educated with upper middle class incomes.

The look we were going for was West Elm but a little more creative in feel. This is the logo and business card design we created.

That together with a pattern design gave way to this delicious blog designed by Kim herself. A few key well designed pieces can give way to a plethora of marketing materials once your logo, supporting typefaces, pattern and color palette have been designed. Making the most of your marketing dollars is a way to come out ahead even in an economic downturn. Amazing job Kim! I can’t wait to see the rest.