IPC has a well established redesign process for its magazines. I was asked by my manager Andy Cowles if we could apply this process to the redesign of an existing website. Together we discussed a number of options for how the magazine development process could be adapted to  developing a website.

Designing an experience that supports your brand is more than just designing the look and feel of a page. Developing a process that captures and values all the elements of the web design process is essential. For example understanding the site content, developing its Information architecture, supporting the commercial requirements, to creating grids and final layouts.

Working from one brief, two teams produce competing ideas to be tested by user groups. This is an iterative design process with regular testing. In the case of magazines the testing is often to test if the designs meet the requirements of the brand proposition. With a web development process there is also the opportunity to test the sites functionality and usability. The best can be taken from both teams and folded into one team delivering final designs to an agile development team.

Understanding the brand position in the market allows you to develop the correct brand expression.I have made a brand concepts collage as an example.

Each page design is the built up of several layers of requirements, each layer informs the other, and when put together creates a complete page design.

The process is a new experiment for IPC media.It combines the ‘two studio’ approach of magazine development with a web development process. Where two competing teams redesign one magazine. IPC is trying to find the best way to combine an established magazine development process with a web development processes. The illustration is of a hypothetical website to show that processes.