Speak the (legal) web
Tuesday, February 16, 2010 at 1:11PM Last night was the Liverpool leg of the Speak the Web tour. The tour is a series of web design and development events, but structured more like a gig than a traditional conference or seminar.
I am guessing I was the only lawyer there (although I abandoned the traditional suit and went undercover in my "cool" clothes so there might have been others doing the same).
I suspected it might go over my head, but I needn't have worried as the speakers pitched it really well and even the more technical parts about HTML5, jQuery and Cufon were accessible to someone with my level of knowledge (i.e. not much!).
The speakers were all great, but the highlight of the evening for me was the talk by Simon Collisson of Erskine Design:-
"The appliance of science… the pursuit of magic"
It isn't often (or ever really) that I look at a new site and am stunned by the design. However, Simon's personal blog at http://colly.com (which is laid out in the style of a Victorian gentleman's journal and "miscellany") struck me as one of the best pieces of site design I have seen.
It wouldn't really be quite the thing for a law firm, but it is worth a look as a piece of art in its own right.
Because of Despite Simon's apparent hallucinations due to a combination of prescription painkillers and lager I was riveted by his talk.
As a total novice I probably learned a lot more than a lot of the audience and there were a lot of "takeaways" (I will certainly be taking a look at the work of Jason Santa Maria and Jina Bolton in more detail).
From modernism and post-modernism to semiotics and humour (which shouldn’t just be reserved for 404 pages apparently) the common thread was what Simon is learning about bringing web design back to design fundamentals and delivering the "magic" through conscious application of design rather than adding visuals and effects for the sake of it.
In particular I was struck by one of his first messages:- "design to communicate", which seems to be something which a lot of law firm websites don't manage to grasp.
Simon is going to be putting the slides up on Slideshare (I will put a link up in due course) and I would suggest that any lawyers who have responsibility for their firm's web design take a look.
Driving home after the event I was left with three thoughts:-
- Could legal training events be made this interesting and accessible (or are we just more boring than web designers?)
- How could law firm sites benefit from taking this "step back" to design fundamentals? Have we really thought about what are we trying to communicate and how the design can help us to do it?
- What they need next year is a cool legal blogger to talk (and get free beer!)...
Peninsulawyer
First time I have used this "follow-up" entry feature on Squarespace.... a nice touch.
As mentioned in the original post Simon has uploaded the slides from his talk at http://www.slideshare.net/collylogic/presentations
Well worth a look
Reader Comments (4)
I hope Speak the Web decide to extend their tour to Scotland!
Take a look at LexCSS.com which is a showcase of lawyer website designs. The purpose of the site is to inspire the legal community to continue improving the design and usability of its websites. Some good ones there - especially the highest rated one ;-)
Thanks Brian - you should ask them! They are on twitter as @speaktheweb
I will take a look at the LexCSS site - sounds interesting
I think site design is important because communication and messages are what makes everything go tick tock.
Design, which is always subjective, has its place. But sites that "tell" will need to evolve into sites that "tell and do." Too much design tinkering and the good gets lost in the average.
Darn it! I was offered a last minute free ticket but dad duties deemed I couldn't take up the offer. Thanks for the overview ...sounded quite interesting.
I like colly.com too!
John