Overview
Interactive Knowledge was excited to partner with Reynolda to build a modern online experience for the entire Estate. Tasked with combining three separate entities: Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Reynolda Gardens and the Reynolda Village Shops and Restaurants, the implementation of a new content strategy and updated technology helped to maximize the new site’s potential. The virtual version of the “Reynolda Experience” put a focus on inclusivity, community, deliberate exploration, and destination experience.
The goals
In 2020 the Reynolda Estate underwent a rebranding and combined the Reynolda House Museum, the Reynolda Gardens and the Reynolda Village into one Reynolda Experience. The primary goal for the website redesign was to unite three previous sites into one cohesive interface, offering visitors a true ‘estate’ experience and encouraging them to spend the entire day. There’s no more effective way to help a user “see themself” at Reynolda than through photos that both capture the offerings and tone at Reynolda, and show visitors engaging in activities that are available to guests. We incorporated active photography that shows users a beautiful enriching place they want to go and exactly what they can do when they get there.
The front door to the entire site was designed to be an immersive yet intuitive experience. Full-screen visuals introduces visitors to the brand, invites them in, and offers clear options for where to go next. A flexible slideshow and featured content section allow content managers to highlight the most timely and relevant content in the most visible areas of the homepage.
The IK Approach
The front door to the entire site was designed to be an immersive yet intuitive experience. Full-screen visuals introduces visitors to the brand, invites them in, and offers clear options for where to go next. A flexible slideshow and featured content section allow content managers to highlight the most timely and relevant content in the most visible areas of the homepage.
In addition to searching the website’s featured stories, press releases and events, the search was also fully integrated with the online gallery collection allowing visitors to access additional informative content as Artist information and viewing objects from the collections themselves. We’ve heard over and over from our museum clients that one of the most requested features for their websites is to make it easy for visitors to find artwork and we were able to accomplish that.
‘What’s Blooming’ in Reynolda Gardens’ horticulture event callout was created to highlight what was currently blooming across the Garden to help visitors make the most of their visit. Reynolda Gardens are one of the most popular destinations in the estate and our callout helps to highlight the vast and unique offerings of the gardens.
Event and exhibition calendar was seamlessly integrated with the online ticketing agent. Events are automatically imported into the backend allowing the client to edit as needed. On the frontend, users are able to see all the information in one place with an easy link to buy tickets for the occasion.
The results
Reynolda has been a client with Interactive Knowledge since 2011. We’ve created several award-winning digital projects in partnership with them. We designed and developed the previous version of the Reynolda House website and it was awarded ‘Best of the Web - People’s Choice’ at the 2014 Museums and the Web conference. In 2018, we created a mobile application titled, Reynolda Revealed. This bilingual tour of the Reynolda House and Gardens won the Gold Technology Award at the Southeastern Museums Conference. We are very pleased with the current version of Reynolda.org and look forward to continuing this very rewarding relationship.