The past few weeks haven’t seen a lot of visible action on Fridge to Food. There are a couple of reasons for this. I have been working on Fridge to Food’s little sister — Farm to Fridge — and at the same time working to give Fridge to Food a facelift. I’ve gotten a number of comments from people that the current design is not intuitive. I’ve also gotten comments to the effect that the dark color scheme is oppressive or depressing. So I’m working to remedy both of those issues.
The problem is, I’m not a designer. I’m a developer through and through. I can make things work and I’m very good at it. But making things look good? So. Very. Not my area of expertise. The design you see before you today was the result of a long and slow iterative process. During which I would make a design and say “How’s this?” And people would respond “Meh…” Then I’d do it again and say “How about this?” And they would respond “A little better.” So on and so forth until I landed here. Clearly, that process is continuing.
In the course of it, I think I wandered away from my original intention for the site. Originally, I’d wanted something very clean. With out a lot of extra flash and shine. I’d wanted the focus on the recipes and the images. I was trying to build a TasteSpotting++. So, with this new recent redesign I’ve tried to move back to that idea. The problem is, I still have all these extra features that I want to use. That whole “++” part. And I don’t know where to put them with out ruining the clean and not flashy asthetic of the site. But also make them intuitive and easy to use.
I might be in over my head with this one. Luckily, I’ve got the help of a couple of awesome people. Hopefully, with their feedback, I can find my way to the surface.
