Latest School Website Launches by Greenhouse School Websites

With the end of the year (and the end of term) fast approaching, we thought it was a good time to look back on some of the fantastic school websites that we have designed and launched in the closing months of 2018.

Hare Street Community Primary School and Nursery

First up we have a re-design of a website for one of our older clients. The new design’s colour scheme matches the school’s uniform; we chose to use yellow in the school’s name, their motto (Caring · Challenging · Respectful · Creative), and for the drop-down menus. Blue is the other primary colour of the website; the transparent blue header adds a pop of extra colour without restricting the size of the background photos. With the full screen pictures featuring lots of pupils in blue and yellow, the final look is bright and cohesive. The noticeboard at the right of the homepage slides out when first landing on the website, making it easier for parents to stay informed about goings-on in the school. The welcome section features a link to a short Welcome Video, adding a personalised touch. Below that are diary dates and latest news, vital information for visitors to the site.

 

Fairwater Primary School

The background of Fairwater Primary School’s website gave our designers the chance to get really creative, displaying the school with children playing in the playground. Houses, trees, a field and the local church can also be seen in the background, offering a new surprise on every visit to the website. The vertical menu was also a creative accomplishment for Olaia, with each menu option being displayed as signposts on a tree. This website is vibrant, using each of the seven colours found in the school’s logo throughout the website. The school’s name and the footer are both sky blue, the diary dates box is orange, the twitter box is pink, and the noticeboard is purple. Hyperlinks also show up as a vibrant purple. At the bottom of the website’s homepage there is an animated Attendance box, which is updated weekly by the school.

 

Mount Pleasant Primary School

Another skyline design from Olaia, which shows off some locations of note near to the school. These include Dudley Castle, Delph Locks and the canal, as well as the school itself. The scrolling notifications move along the canal in a bright purple text that stands out nicely. The latest news and diary dates box are tabbed, providing maximum information in a compact space. Below that, an animated button takes website visitors to the school’s prospectus. This school has a very active twitter, with their main account regularly retweeting tweets made by the teachers about what their classes are up to; featuring the twitter prominently on the front page makes the most of this.

 

John Stainer Primary School

 

The Quick links box on the homepage features important and popular links, including a link to the page about the School Dog, Charlie Brown. It could be argued that this is one of the most important pages on this particular website! John Stainer are incredibly proud of the multi-cultural nature of their school, with at least 32 languages spoken and 34 cultures represented in the school; a banner at the bottom of the website features the national flags of many of the countries that students are from. Google translate and a search bar are prominent on the top right of the website.
We also redesigned the John Stainer Community Primary School logo for the school’s website, bringing the school colour of red into the design, which had previously been black and white. You can see the logo in the top left corner, and it also features in the background of the website.

 

Below are some of the different mock-ups we made for John Stainer:

As part of the design process we discuss:

• The specific wording you’d like to use
• Any shapes you’d like (e.g. circle, square or shield)
• Colours, themes or elements that are particularly relevant to the school
• Any other logos that you like
• We then mock-up some concepts, and work up your favourite to a suitable print-ready file which you could give to your printers for stationery, or to your sign writers. We’ll also give you different size JPG versions for use in typical desktop software, and of course your lovely new website.

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Have you been thinking about your school’s identity? Do you feel it’s a little lost in a bland website design? We would love to apply our expertise to tease out some of your school’s core, principle strengths to shine through on a new website. It’s easy to make an initial enquiry and we can get the ball rolling with a quick chat. Want more inspiration? You can find more examples of our favourite website designs here and here.