New website-new work!

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 3:44 pm

Well, I finally got all of my new work up and on a revamped site to boot. Please go look and let me know what you think!

Same address http://www.sanctuaryglas.com

Thanks, Lisa

Kitty · Post by **Kitty** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 4:14 pm

i like it!

Barbara Muth · Post by **Barbara Muth** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 5:07 pm

Lisa, I have to say, I love what you do with your pattern bars. Kudos.

Barbara

Steve Immerman · Post by **Steve Immerman** » Sat Jul 19, 2003 11:02 pm

Lisa,

I absolutely love the way you have your work displayed with the sliding bar of thumbnails. Very elegant. Did you have someone else construct the site for you?

I did find the small, gray, text kind of hard to read, and it took me a minute to figure out how to go to trays or sculpture once I was in the bowls section. At my screen resolution (1280 x 960) I'd have preferred larger text.

Your work is beautiful as well.

Very, very, nice.

Steve

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 12:29 am

Thanks all!

Steve, I took your suggestion and enlarged and darkened the text a bit to hopefully make it more readable. As to the designer, it was my wonderful husband who does this all week long and was nice enough to work on it for the last couple of weekends with me.

It's all done in Flash, which is his forte, and that is why the navigation is self contained and the back button on browsers doesn't work. It can be a little confusing for back button users, like myself, but we tried to make it as clear as possible with the link buttons.

Thanks again to all for the compliments and suggestions.

Lisa

Jackie Beckman · Post by **Jackie Beckman** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 9:15 am

Lisa -

Your site looks great. I love your work, always have. You have a super grasp on how to use color, which I can't help being drawn to.

One problem . . .

Where are your fantastic looking critters?! Pattern bars are really fun, and your use of them is exceptional, but I miss those little guys - they had such personality! They were a direction I hoped to see take off for you, really, as they were entirely "Lisa Allen." I hope you haven't abandon the idea. I can't stress enough how different and well done and very much recognizable as "you" they were. Even before you posted this new site, I was looking at your old site the other day, searching for new critters.

I really think you should revisit them at some point. In my opinion, they could be a very distinct line for you . . . even greeting cards, t-shirts and prints as well, if you're interested in that sort of thing. I see them as a very high end gift shop sort of line, but I can imagine them everyplace. I can hear people running across them and saying, "Oh! I love those - I see them wherever we travel . . . " They are the type of line someone would want to build a collection of, and wait to see what new little personalities you come up with each year. I can tell by looking at them that they are time consuming to make, but raise your prices on them a little - you had room to do that, then market the heck out of them.

I'm not trying to take anything away from the beautiful work you've been doing with patternbars lately. I repeat - I love your patternbar pieces too. Actually, they compliment the critters, as your pallet is the same in both.

Your site looks just great - good job!
Jackie

Ross · Post by **Ross** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 9:35 am

Lisa... I think your new site and your work both look wonderful. I must confess that I miss you "critters" as well. Perhaps there's a spot for them as a separate category. If not... maybe you could add a hidden phrase somewhere which would take us to your "critters" so that we can watch your new developements in that area as well!

lauren · Post by **lauren** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 11:09 am

i love the new site! it showcases your work very well, navigating between each section was very easy (i really like that)

only issue is, and it's not even a huge one cuz i got used to it (but still not a huge fan of it) the direction the slide presentation moves when the arrows are clicked i feel should be switched. the slide heads to the right, but i'm viewing the next piece in back of the one i just viewed. so i vew your pieces going back, when i'm pressing the arrow to go forward. like i said, not a huge deal but it doesn't feel natural and i kept forgetting and viewing things twice and yada yada.

it looks great

peace
- l

Kitty · Post by **Kitty** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 3:19 pm

this probably says more about my lack of attention to detail than your website design. ahem! when i looked at the site yesterday, i just clicked on the pieces, and checked 'em out. i didn't notice the gray arrows that moved the work along. (i also thought the gray was rather light.)

i tried those arrows today, and find that they move the pictures along at warp speed ... perhaps a little slower would be easier on the eye?

i like the way the site focuses on the bowls, plates and sculpture. maybe it's good to retire the critters for awhile.

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 5:03 pm

Jackie Beckman wrote:Lisa -

Your site looks great. I love your work, always have. You have a super grasp on how to use color, which I can't help being drawn to.

One problem . . .

Where are your fantastic looking critters?! Pattern bars are really fun, and your use of them is exceptional, but I miss those little guys - they had such personality! They were a direction I hoped to see take off for you, really, as they were entirely "Lisa Allen." I hope you haven't abandon the idea. I can't stress enough how different and well done and very much recognizable as "you" they were. Even before you posted this new site, I was looking at your old site the other day, searching for new critters.

I really think you should revisit them at some point. In my opinion, they could be a very distinct line for you . . . even greeting cards, t-shirts and prints as well, if you're interested in that sort of thing. I see them as a very high end gift shop sort of line, but I can imagine them everyplace. I can hear people running across them and saying, "Oh! I love those - I see them wherever we travel . . . " They are the type of line someone would want to build a collection of, and wait to see what new little personalities you come up with each year. I can tell by looking at them that they are time consuming to make, but raise your prices on them a little - you had room to do that, then market the heck out of them.

I'm not trying to take anything away from the beautiful work you've been doing with patternbars lately. I repeat - I love your patternbar pieces too. Actually, they compliment the critters, as your pallet is the same in both.

Your site looks just great - good job!
Jackie

Hey Jackie-

First of all, thanks for the compliments, means alot coming from someone whose work I greatly admire.

About those critters, I really struggled on whether I wanted to include them. I do think that they go well with the newer work, but I haven't done them in so long and only have 4 or 5 left from the original batch.

This new website is meant to be an online portfolio for a mass gallery mailer that I am sending out as soon as I can get it designed and back from the printer. And, I want the interest to be in the newer work. I can't imagine getting much interest in those guys from galleries anyway and even if I did, I don't think I have it in me to go back and start making multiples of any of them.

I think that is what I like so much about the pattern bars, they all come out so differently, even if I use the same colors, so each one is it's own individual self. No matter how many I make, it still doesn't feel like production work and that suits me (read short attention span)

If I included the critters, it would only be to pad the site to show a larger body of work and I am not sure if that is a good enough reason, especially since most of them have been sold already and I'm not motivated at this point to make more.

I may be way off on this line of thinking and it was truly tough to shelve them, but those are my thoughts.

Lisa

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Sun Jul 20, 2003 5:14 pm

lauren wrote:i love the new site! it showcases your work very well, navigating between each section was very easy (i really like that)

only issue is, and it's not even a huge one cuz i got used to it (but still not a huge fan of it) the direction the slide presentation moves when the arrows are clicked i feel should be switched. the slide heads to the right, but i'm viewing the next piece in back of the one i just viewed. so i vew your pieces going back, when i'm pressing the arrow to go forward. like i said, not a huge deal but it doesn't feel natural and i kept forgetting and viewing things twice and yada yada.

it looks great

peace
- l

Ha, funny you should point that out. I said the same thing to Buck and accused him of a fra fillipo lippi navigation on those arrows. Since we put our first quiz up which included our friend Fra Fillipo Lippi, we continued to have him as a choice on each quiz that followed just to be funny. Inevitably, someone would choose that as the answer for a beard or a band name (actually, quite a few people picked it)...... and from that point on, anything we do around here that comes out a** backwards, we call it Fra Fillipo Lippi move and the navigation in my opinion is one of those. So I am taking your advice and we will get that fixed asap. Thanks for pointing that out and helping me to convince Buck!

Lisa

Cindy next door · Post by **Cindy next door** » Mon Jul 21, 2003 4:25 pm

I LOVE the green and black bowl!

I didn't even notice the arrows until I read it in the posts. I went back and tried it. Didn't even know there was more to look at. Glad I went back since that's when I saw the green and black one.

I didn't try the back button, but then just clicked on the titles. I'd love to see the sliding pictures a little bigger.

Congrats!

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Mon Jul 21, 2003 6:47 pm

Cindy next door wrote:I LOVE the green and black bowl!

I didn't even notice the arrows until I read it in the posts. I went back and tried it. Didn't even know there was more to look at. Glad I went back since that's when I saw the green and black one.

I didn't try the back button, but then just clicked on the titles. I'd love to see the sliding pictures a little bigger.

Congrats!

Thanks Cindy! I really appreciate all of the suggestions, really helps me make it a better, more user friendly site. Making the sliding pics larger is next to impossible at this point. I am hoping that they work well enough as teasers to just get people to click on them and then they can see them at a size that is more viewable. One thing I can do though is darken the arrows so that they are more visible. I could put a "click to scroll" title between the arrows, but I wanted to keep it as clean and minimal as possible. Maybe just darkening them will do the trick.......I'll get on that.

Thanks again, Lisa

Jackie Beckman · Post by **Jackie Beckman** » Tue Jul 22, 2003 8:34 am

Hey Jackie-

First of all, thanks for the compliments, means alot coming from someone whose work I greatly admire.

About those critters, I really struggled on whether I wanted to include them. I do think that they go well with the newer work, but I haven't done them in so long and only have 4 or 5 left from the original batch.

This new website is meant to be an online portfolio for a mass gallery mailer that I am sending out as soon as I can get it designed and back from the printer. And, I want the interest to be in the newer work. I can't imagine getting much interest in those guys from galleries anyway and even if I did, I don't think I have it in me to go back and start making multiples of any of them.

I think that is what I like so much about the pattern bars, they all come out so differently, even if I use the same colors, so each one is it's own individual self. No matter how many I make, it still doesn't feel like production work and that suits me (read short attention span)

If I included the critters, it would only be to pad the site to show a larger body of work and I am not sure if that is a good enough reason, especially since most of them have been sold already and I'm not motivated at this point to make more.

I may be way off on this line of thinking and it was truly tough to shelve them, but those are my thoughts.

Lisa

Hi Lisa,
I'm not sure the critters would fit into your current focus on the galleries either, so if that is where your attentions are with your site, then I agree with your decision to leave them out for now. I still do think that they are very unique and well done though, and I hope that at some point in the future you opt to revisit them. Maybe not as part of this particular site, or even Sanctuary Glass, but as an entirely seperate line, even with it's own name. Is it because they are so time consuming that you are sick of making them right now? If so, I can sure understand that. I just hope it's not because you don't realize how great they are - really. Maybe one day you'll feel like bringing them out of retirement. Great job on the new work too -
Take care,
Jackie

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 11:44 pm

Whew....BIG storm here Monday. 80-100 mph winds, giant trees snapped in half everywhere, 70% of the city still without power. We are in the lucky group of folks that sill have power, but we have been mighty busy feeding, housing and doing laundry for lots of friends and family.

Jackie, the critters were alot of work for what I could charge for them around here.....kinda soured me on making more after I got the original batch out of me. I may revisit them when I get better at marketing myself.

Ross, thanks for the compliments and critter inquiry. I will probably put them up under http://www.sanctuaryglas.com/critters.html in the next few days. That way they will be accessable, but not thru the main site.

Thanks again to everyone for all the posts.

Lisa

Bonita (Nita) Crawford · Sun Jul 27, 2003 5:10 pm

Lisa,

Add my name to the list of people who love your work!

May you have galleries clamoring for your work - if they're not doing
it already.

Nita

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 12:17 am

Bonita (Nita) Crawford wrote:Lisa,

Add my name to the list of people who love your work!

May you have galleries clamoring for your work - if they're not doing
it already.

Nita

Thanks so much, Nita! No galleries clamoring yet.....but Buck and I are working on a mailer that will get sent to as many galleries as I can get addresses to in the next week or so. Hopefully there will be clamoring....

How's your husband? I thought I remembered a post that mentioned he was having some trouble. I hope he is home and doing well.

Lisa

Bonita (Nita) Crawford · Tue Jul 29, 2003 12:25 am

Lisa,

Thanks for asking about Bill. They did have to shock his heart but
one shock was all it took. When my best friend found out I slept
with him in his hospital bed wearing silky pink p.j.s, and cuddling
next to him all night she said she thought I had reved his heart
up a bit so one shock would do it. They had told me it might take
two or three shocks.

He's a bit weak but feeling much better than he has for quite some
time. We've spent the last 3 days resting and watching old movies,
as well as reminiscing about what a wonderful life we have had. We
have relived many experiences. What fun.

Good luck to you!
Nita

Paul Tarlow · Post by **Paul Tarlow** » Sat Aug 02, 2003 10:26 am

Hats off to whoever does you Flash development -- its very good.

And I love the piece you have on the sculpture page. That is so cool. How big is it?

Lisa Allen · Post by **Lisa Allen** » Sat Aug 02, 2003 11:34 am

Paul Tarlow wrote:Hats off to whoever does you Flash development -- its very good.

And I love the piece you have on the sculpture page. That is so cool. How big is it?

Thanks, Paul. I am so lucky to be married to the Flash designer! I would have had a hard time affording what I got otherwise.....one of the perks of marrying a web designer.

The sculptural piece will end up being about 20 or so inches when finished. Each piece will be 12", but where they connect, I will lose some height. Hopefully the finished piece will replace the image in the next few weeks. We have had a lot going on around here lately and glass has taken a bit of a backseat.

Lisa