TechCrunch has launched its first redesign in five years

Nicole Wilke, head of product at TechCrunch, writes about the tech news site’s redesign, its first in five years.

Wilke writes, “We kept the aesthetic clean to the point being somewhat sparse. We created adaptable areas of the site designed to hold different kinds of modules that we can use to promote our initiatives now and in the future, without going back to the cluttered house from whence we came. We chose the route of fewer, but better, ad placements. Instead of loud, obvious design choices we stuck with fluid interactions and small, fun flourishes.

“One example of these subtler types of touches is the button you can use to get back to our main feed while reading, which doubles as a progress indicator as you read through a story, and indicates when you’ve finished.

“Another is the dropcaps we are using to open our feature articles. They’re an actual alphabet written in the same style as our 8-bit ‘TC’ logo. We hope this type of thinking will elevate our content without overwhelming it.

“A driving principle behind the design was that it should always be effortless to get back to our main feed of the things we’re talking about now. That gave way to the pageless opening and closing of articles, that snap shut when you’re done with them and put you right back where that content belongs in the broader ‘firehose’ of content we publish.”

Read more here.