British-born design director Craig Ward is many things: an artist, an author, and a pioneer in the typography industry. He uses Squarespace to present all of his projects—from client briefs to art for sale—and establish expertise in his fields.
What is your name and what is your title?
Craig Ward - Design Director / Creative Director / Typographer / Head of Art depending on who you ask....
What kind of work do you make?
Variously I work on branding projects, murals and installations, art direction for ad campaigns, custom typefaces, album covers and music videos.
Why Squarespace?
I coded my first few portfolio sites myself but shifting web standards and responsive requirements meant it became difficult to keep up being as coding wasn’t my creative focus.
As a designer, how do you use Squarespace to design your website?
I keep it simple - my work is very varied so I opted for a simpler template that sits back and let’s the work come to the front.
What type of content (and formats) do you share on it?
Mostly images but video where applicable.
As a visual artist, tell us how you use the gallery pages.
I’ve worked with several of my clients many times so my gallery pages are a place to document those projects, mostly chronologically. I was using a full screen format for a time but I found myself reformatting images, extending edges etc to fit the horizontal format so I was able to find a layout that worked with all my images, portrait and horizontal.
What are some of your favorite functions and features?
I really like the ease with which I can add in a new project. When I coded my own sites I would hold off on updating the work for up to 6 months but now I’m able to keep things much more up to date.
How does your website get you exposure and work opportunities?
I guess the same way as everyone’s does — I’m pretty good at sharing my work on social media and it’s helpful knowing that I’m able to display the work in a professional manner and not worry about images not displaying or fonts not loading in on certain browsers. Random borders appearing etc. I don’t miss any of that!
What do you sell on your website?
Original artworks, prints, typefaces and occasionally free high res images for people to use as they wish.
What do you like about selling through Squarespace?
The process is very clear and it’s rare that an order goes unfulfilled unless I’m extremely busy.
What are some of your favorite / most-used online store features?
The postage calculator is a godsend. So often I would undercharge for postage and shipping and end up eating the cost which was pretty defeating. It’s nice to know that weight and size are all factored in to shipping wherever in the world it’s going.
Do you track your audience and sales?
Occasionally. Sales I just keep an eye on for fulfillment.
What else do you use the analytics for?
It’s always interesting to track the ebb and flow of site visits - seasonally speaking - and also I like to see which of my social accounts people are clicking through from as it’s helpful to know where to focus my efforts when sharing work online.
Share your passion with a beautiful website.
