WEBSITE DESIGN : FEATURED SITE : LUCCA DESIGNS

A small specialty shop now has a big presence on the web with the help of the design and sales teams at Internet Chicago.

Lucca Designs, a specialty store in the quaint little tourist town of Long Grove, Illinois recently worked with Internet Chicago to create an online presence for their already successful home and garden decor shop. The outcome is a beautiful translation of the various themes transformed into a welcoming website full of the same charm you can find at Lucca's store.

Even though Lucca Designs' new website is relatively small and seemingly simple, there were some major design challenges that the teams at Internet Chicago faced. For instance, how do you portray that quaint specialty store feeling via a website which is normally a very impersonal means of advertisement? First, our staff studied the focus and themes of the shop, as well as what the target audience liked about their beloved Long Grove shop. What they discovered was that Lucca Designs is all about the warmth of decoration and all of the "little details" that give character to the store. The team decided to mirror that warmth of character and charm so that now those "little details" can be found throughout Lucca's new website. For instance, the headings for each of the product groupings add a slight touch of whimsy. Instead of blandly labelling items "pots and vases", a group is themed with the heading "A TALE OF TUSCANY". Another group of fountains becomes "THE WATERS OF TIME" because of their nod back to the Baroque and Renaissance periods.

The home page was yet another design challenge, as all home pages are. The question is posed: how do we draw in a new set of clientelle using that same charm of the store through a website? Answer: first, graphically excite the users. The eye-catching touches such as the 3-dimensional butterflies which appear to be sitting on your monitor enhance that "garden feel". These little touches were not mere coincidences. It was a conscious effort to make users forget that they are sitting behind a monitor and start them thinking about embellishing their own gardens and homes. Second goal: make navigation easy to understand in order to draw customers beyond the entry page. Many websites get a little too, shall we say, "froo-froo" when they design boutique sites to the point that the site is no longer functional because users are lost in the middle of whistles and bells (sometimes literally, "Ack!"). An easy to use side menu was created with little "peeks" of Lucca's products giving users a glimpse at what was in store ahead of them with just a click of the mouse.

The successful launch of Lucca Designs' new website has drawn much praise in just it's first few days. Would you like these same successful results? If you are in need of the same sort of care and attention to detail that Internet Chicago has given such companies as Lucca Designs as well as hundreds of other sites worldwide, please don't hesitate to contact us! Our sales and design departments look forward to giving you the web presence that you have been looking for. Whether it's your first time on the web, or if you are in need of an update to your current website, please call or e-mail us today! (630) 582-0204; email: sales@internetchicago.com. We look forward to hearing from you!