One of the more interesting books I read during my fascination with cultural decadence in my twenties posited that there is no progress or decadence, only change — change interpreted as good or bad.
Today I think we can all agree that change is a good thing. As we approach our seventh anniversary, Ivy Style has finally upgraded its layout, and it’s a pretty magical one.
There’s still a lot to be done, and we’ll be working out the kinks and putting on a coat of polish throughout the day. But here’s the main stuff:
Ivy-Style.com is now “responsive,” which is web-developer speak meaning that the site responds to whatever device you’re on and delivers the best-possible viewing experience. The site should now be easy to read and navigate whether you’re on a desktop computer of any size, a tablet such as Kindle or iPad, and even your mobile phone. I expect this will be greatly appreciated by millennials who are constantly staring at their cell phones, even when crossing the street against a red light.
The site now also has what’s called a magazine-style layout or “theme.” You’ll note that if you’re a first time visitor, or back from a long vacation, it’s much easier to browse content on the home page. Whereas before you had to scroll through reams of text, now you get a headline, image and excerpt, and decide whether you want to click and read. Of course, we’re biased here and think all of our stories — and the comments left upon them — are informative and entertaining.
And speaking of comments, we’ll now be able to foster an even greater sense of community through “gravatars,” or globally recognized avatars. Assuming you’re the type who’s man enough to stand by his words, you can go to Gravatar.com and in just a few minutes set up an account and upload an image. Then when you visit websites and leave a comment, your avatar will automatically appear next to your comment. You can already see a few examples by scrolling through the comments on our khaki project post.
I think that’s all for now. Stay tuned to this space as I’ll likely be adding to it throughout the day as we implement new social media sharing buttons and other things.
Stay buttoned-down. — CHRISTIAN CHENSVOLD
Looks great!
Great new format!
Mazeltov!
I’ll step in and take a bow just so I can show off my little Japanese smiley-face avatar.
And I’m posting to see if this Gravatar gizmo works.
You’re keeping the Viking Ivy look for the summer. Brave man!
Nice look. Minimalist.
What about the ads…will the advertisers be miffed that they are not as visible as they previously were?
On another note, that’s quite the hairdo. Got a name for it?
Best wishes with the new format.
Henry here, still testing Gravatar.
Possible bug: the “Latest Comments” do not link to the comments.
Feature request: preview before posting. You’ve needed this one all along.
The useful links to all 49 pages at the bottom seem to have disappeared.
The link to this post also seems to have disappeared from the home page: http://www.ivy-style.com/two-losses-frank-zachary-and-hugh-auchincloss-iii.html
Great job CC on the new site design.
Keep up the good work and thank you for all you do on our behalf!
Jim
@OldSchool
Fixing layout glitches caused different glitches. We’ll be working on it again today.
@Nippy
Minimalist? Ads are below Latest Comments, just as before. And there’s far more reason now to scroll down below the fold to browse the content.
I call the hairdo “kon-tiki,” but DCG says I look like an Annapolis lacrosse player.
@Henry
What do you mean preview before posting? For readers to preview their comments?
Congrats! It looks wonderful.
Great new stuff. Although as the father of an Annapolis lacrosse player, I cannot agree on the assessment of the hair. You have kind of a Donald Sutherland-thing going, though.
Now that the comments have shifted to your hair, you know the site is a winner.
I don’t know about your hair-do, but since we are now talking about you, try a rep tie the next time. The tie you are wearing looks like you are trying to match your curtains, which is weird to say the least.
Tie is actually a dotted knit, you just can’t see the dots:
http://www.ivy-style.com/knit-picking-the-brooks-brothers-dot-knit-tie.html
Great work on the site! Well done.
Hair? I just assumed you were trying out for the Mets. 😉
Looks good.
OK, we fixed the glitch where you couldn’t scroll back through the pages. But we lost the better-looking layout, so we’ll get back to that again late this afternoon.
Also as you’ve noticed comments are appearing here but the Latest Comments section is currently frozen, so we’ll have to un-freeze.
No gel = Maryland lax
Gel = Dutch politician
Over ears = classical composer?
http://www.peterubel.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/beethoven4.jpg
Yes, a preview function, so we only embarrass ourselves on purpose when posting.
Looking good!
Bravo Zulu on the new site; a maked improvement. I’ve always imagined your interior tastes to take on a more obstreperous aesthetic ala a mixture between the madly irascible writer and Denning & Fourcade. Something about the lighting gives the room a saturnine feel. However, interior decorating expectations be damned, your site continues to exceed expectations!
Things on the Internet aren’t always as they seem. That’s actually corner room with three large windows; the curtains were drawn in the photo lest I be backlit. It’s hardly saturnine with no reason to echo Goethe’s last words.
The mullet suits you. I love your dark man cave, very masculine.
-The Tradly Jazz Man, 1962
Another feature request: links to the previous and next articles at the bottom of each page.