As part of Grant Design Collaborative’s strategic rebranding initiative for Decca USA, the firm recently redesigned the website for Decca Hospitality, the company’s segment focused on high-end custom furnishings for the world’s most prestigious hospitality companies. www.deccahospitality.com
With the commercial furniture industry’s foremost manufacturing technology, talent and materials, Decca Hospitality holds a unique position in the hospitality furnishings world as a catalyst for bringing designer vision to reality. Whatever a designer or architect can imagine, Decca can fabricate, so creating an aspirational website that encourages exploration, inspiration and engagement was vitally important.
Establishing the right tone for a foray into the world of Decca Hospitality from the very start was a key strategy for the new home page. It was important to make guests feel as if they’re stepping into a high-end suite crafted by Decca. Therefore, a full-screen interior photo featuring custom Decca furniture greets users as they enter the site.
From there, Decca’s narrative unfolds via one continuous scrolling page, walking guests through the process in a simple, strategic manner. Because Decca Hospitality’s work is completely custom—a portfolio of made-to-measure pieces—they must articulate their proposition clearly. Communicating Decca’s capabilities and story through images, not words, was the key since designers are visual learners. By using the power of design thinking and programming prowess, Grant’s designers and developers achieved the goal in a simple and responsive format.
With the structure and choreography firmly in place, the site also needed to take advantage of some crucial features:
Image Formatting & Resolution
It was important to have crisp, properly formatted imagery throughout the site. In addition to beautifully composed images, the photos had to be sized accurately for display on all devices. Rather than marginalize images to fit a variety of large and small applications—and compromising image integrity—each photograph was optimized to fit its unique space in the site. For instance, it was important that wood grain details be visible in the veneer samples, and upon implementation, one user commented, “I feel like I just touched the veneer!”
Blog & CMS
A content management system and blog were implemented to offer Decca the opportunity to make content edits as necessary and, through the blog, to provide commentary and announcements in a more immediate and interactive manner. With an integrated blog, social media and content marketing strategy, Decca Hospitality’s new website was also designed and developed to achieve impressive SEO results.
