So, you’ll probably have noticed that we’ve had a slight refresh on PermanentStyle.com. There is a new colour scheme, a new font, and various other little tweaks and updates.
The important thing to say first is that this doesn’t herald any change in attitude or direction. Permanent Style may have become a little broader in the past year - in style and contributors - but the redesign doesn’t herald any further change. I’m not sure why people always ask about this, but they do.
The other thing is that although we’ve spent many a boring hour checking functionality, loading speeds and something called ‘pixel peeping’, there will undoubtedly be errors hidden deep in the recesses of the PS archive. With over 2,500 articles there will be something, somewhere.
So please let me know - either in the comments or by email - when you spot a bug. The developer and I will change it as quickly as digitally possible.
And what are these various tweaks and updates, I hear you clamour? In brief they are:
- A new colour scheme, font and logo
- Various spacing tweaks to make the layout cleaner
- A new ‘Back to top’ button on the right-hand side, which should make it easier for readers to scroll back up to an article when they’re 100-comments deep
- A cleaner layout on the shop pages, with a smaller main image but more room for the text
- Zoom functionality on those shop images. Clicking on them now takes you into a window where you can see all the images in detail (useful when analysing tweed flecks)
I told you it wasn’t much. The main thing was a visual refresh, after 15 years with the previous logo. Everything online looks a little old after a while.
If you have any other suggestions on functionality, by the way, please do let me know. People tend to send them unprompted, but I should re-emphasise that this is always very useful.
Thank you in advance, and I hope you enjoy the new look. Normal programming will resume on Monday, at 9am sharp.
Hi! Love the new look, great fonts and colour schema 🙂 I notice that on mobile the cookies dialogue still has the old style with purple. Clashes slightly with the new sleek look. Cheers.
Hmm, thanks Simon. Would you mind clearing the cache on your browser and letting me know if it still happens?
That did it, thanks!
Oh good. Cheers for trying Simon
I have just seen the new logo and it seems a bit unbalanced. Nearly all of the P is visible but a large part of the S has been trimmed by the bottom right border. I suggest moving the S up and to the left so that it is closer to the S. It would be very useful if we could have a section that displays/lists the recently approved comments.
Thanks for your input Gary.
There is a section for that – scroll down the homepage until you find the ‘Active threads’ box. That shows the most recent ones, and if you then click ‘See all threads’ you can see all recent comments.
I like it!
Love the new font and colour scheme. Any news on the reversible suede jacket?
Cheers Oliver. The suede is delayed until the beginning of next year unfortunately. Problems with material availability…
If I may piggy-back on this thread, regarding upcoming products, what about the t-shirt restock? (which I believe were meant to arrive in October)
They too are delayed, sorry. We don’t even have a date for those at the moment.
Piggybacking the piggyback, would you have an ETA for the shawl cardigan too?
It should be about two weeks, again delays but it is coming
Is this the Valstar reversible brown suede jacket he is mentioning? Interesting, that explains why Valstar’s are not available anywhere and nobody has gotten any stock.
No, this is a new version of the jacket we are doing, not with Valstar.
Very nice update Simon, nice and clean. As you note, the image window in the shop is particularly useful.
Oh good, thanks Paul
Looks great, and very nice change after so long with the old look. Congrats.
Looks nice. FYI that clicking on the shop link prompts a login window when it opens.
Really? How strange, it doesn’t for me. You mean the link in the Menu?
Would you mind clearing your cache on the browser and seeing if it still happens? Thank you!
There’s the following image in the footer:
<img src=”https://preview.permanentstyle.com/wp-content/themes/ps22/img/logo-ps.png” alt=”Simon Crompton Logo”>
This looks to be the culprit for the login prompt.
Thank you Errol
Hi Simon, I am having the same issue, Sign In box. It appears if you try to click on any of the category drop downs. I have cleared my cache.
Site looks great.
Cheers
How strange. Thank you. I can’t seem to reproduce it, but I’ll get the developer to check what could be going on
Hi Simon, looks nice! One point I noticed immediately is the Other Active Threads section shows all post titles in caps, which as you’ll know in ‘internet-speak’ looks shouty and slightly off-putting. Perhaps it was always this way but I never noticed before.
Thanks Tom. Yes it was always that you, but perhaps in the new font it stands out more
Nice update. Feels much warmer now. The back to top button is especially useful, it’ll save much scrolling. The top bar always being present is good too.
Oh good. The latter was always there actually, but maybe it’s more prominent now, being brown rather than white
Yes you’re right, I must’ve used it as some stage for the search button. But certainly more prominent now.
Something I’ve been meaning to ask for a while – obviously you have your picture next to your comments but I’ve noticed other people having them. Is that do to with the connect to Facebook feature? Since so few people have pictures I do think it’d be useful if guest writers (especially frequent ones e.g. Manish Puri) could have theirs as it would make it much easier to see their responses in the comment section. (Obviously I’m not proposing forcing them to do so!)
Nice idea Aaron, yes I’ll see if other contributors can do that
I like it. I think you have well achieved what you wanted. A more modern look but to only such a degree that one would not immediately notice. Never – or better only slightly – change a winning concept.
One small remark: Have you thought about showing the newest comment in the comments section first in the default/basic setting? This would make it easier for repeated website and article users, like myself, to see whether there are new contributions in the always very interesting and informative comments section.
Thanks for the suggestion Markus. I assume you’ve seen you can switch it to newest first, with the button on the right at the top of the comments?
I think it might be a little odd if it was that way by default, as so many comments and threads lead on from each other. However, you can also subscribe to the post and then get an alert every time a new comments is added.
Yes, I have seen that. I also meant that the newest stand-alone comment could be first in the default setting. The answers and further comments to such original comment should of course list after the original comment. Otherwise this would be, as you rightly point out, confusing. My remark probably originates in the way (at least Austrian and German, but I also believe American and English) newspapers handle their comment section, always showing the newest comment first…… this makes it somewhat confusing doing it the other way around in the default setting.
I see, thank you Markus
So the old style wasn’t permanent!
(Sorry. Someone had to. Like the new look)
It’s so you! A tonal color palette leaning towards cold (unless my monitor is configured way out of whack), especially compared to the previous high contrast of white and dark blue/indigo. Love it.
Thanks Joseph – hadn’t thought of that!
Slight cockup on Firefox mobile here:
Hmm, great, thanks Claude, I’ll get that fixed now
Hi Simon,
I like the new refreshed look.
One suggestion regarding functionality is the addition of tags and/or search to the lookbook. It would make it immeasurably more helpful. I tend to use google images to search PS when I’m looking for inspiration (i.e. “suede jacket”, or “fatigues with knitwear”) as the lookbook isn’t structured.
Good point, thanks Noel. It is on the list!
Hi Simon,
A minor thing, but in mobile (Opera) the links to About and Shop the blog look like they should link somewhere, but don’t. They’re just static images and text.
Stuart.
Another nice spot. Thanks a lot Stuart
A dark colour-sheme would be really pleasing to the eyes. It is really simple nowadays to add this via css 🙂
Thank you
I would like to see dark colour scheme also (android dark mode), but I don’t think incorporating pictures is not that easy….
I noticed the change last night. It’s really subtle, as I was sleepy I questioned myself for a minute if something had changed. After browsing for a bit I was fully adjusted and questioned myself again if everything hasn’t always been like this.
I think the absolute most important change is that you have update that old washed out -About – picture of you at the bottom. It was a really stark contrast to more warmer and contrasty images that are included with the articles these days. Still that black rectangle in place now is still something I feel can be improved upon. Image for – Shop the blog – mixes with the background much better, don’t you think?
Yes, you’re probably right. I can’t think of another image I like as much for there, but I’ll swap it if I find one. Thanks for the suggestion
Hi Simon,
Tiny thing that you may know, but using safari on an iPhone pro 13 I believe the image on the shop for the products would be better if they fit the whole width of the screen
Thank you, yes we’re looking into this one
Looks fantastic! I work in IT (CIO for a software dev company) so reading these comments are hilarious as they sound like a normal day in my world.
When I load a page the hover over menus for guides, categories, brands and style work perfectly. When I scroll enough for those to reformat from under Permanent Style header to above it, then all those menus are either blank or half blank.
Tested on 2 different Mac computers using Safari browser, one of which had never loaded PS website before. Works fine on Firefox browser though.
Also subscribe button at top of the article does nothing. I’ve never used the function before, I guess it should prompt for email?
Thanks m, yes you should, and I can that behaviour on Safari. We’ll correct it now. Cheers for mentioning it
Hi Simon, good idea to update. In my experience a bit redesign of branding suggests a degree of continuous improvement to customers. Also in my experience it’s a good process for the team, again it’s continuous improvement, involvement / contribution and generates a sense of ownership.
I wouldn’t be overly concerned with a few ‘bugs’, it was ever thus. You have understanding and contributing readers, who are encouraged by your honest and engaging style.
Well done and all the best for the future.
Thank you Stephen
Great new look! May I ask what font the logo is using, and whether you’d be changing the text to a serif font to match the change?
The logo isn’t a specific font – it was designed for us.
No, no plans to make the text a serif font. Previously the logo was also serif, just upper case, and the text was sans serif.
This will absolutely trigger my OCD.
Nice redesign,Simon.
Love the new look, Simon!
Hello.
The related articles don’t show the dates anymore. Just to let you know.
Also, it would be useful to be able to search for articles on chronological basis.
Keep up the good work and thanks.
Hi,
Sorry, you mean the related articles at the bottom of an article? I can see dates there.
On search, you mean you’d like to be able to re-order search results by date?
Hi. I meant that it would be useful to search articles on date basis.
Oh I see, so enter particular dates?
We don’t have that, but you can use the ‘View all posts‘ or archive page, which is linked to at the bottom of the homepage. That shows you all posts by month, so you can scroll through
Thank you.
Hello Simon
Photos on the web shop don’t seem to display properly on Safari/iPhone. They are tiny. See attached.
OK, thank you Alex, I’ll check that out
Not a whole lot to add, but just want to say thanks for your site and your willingness to share your sartorial knowledge. I’ve just found the site a few weeks ago and I’ve learned an incredible amount. Cheers from the US, Simon!
Amazing, thanks Andrew. The nice thing about being a relative latecomer is there’s a huge archive there to explore. Enjoy the menu and the various guides and sections in there
Did the redesign comprise something like a semantic PS-Brexit in titling, too ? From “world leader on bespoke, craft and luxury” to “leading British website” ?
That’s actually an error! We did change it, but it shouldn’t be that. I’m getting that fixed now
Now he have “The journal of elegance, quality and craft”, signs of marketing-leadership vanished in favour of an understated title. Whichs fits better to concepts of elegance and the charakter of PS as an evolving, open, substantial and intelligent coffee-table-book. Great decision, to my opinion, considering that “leadership” easily finds expression elsewere (I guess), while not driving force here. Congratulations on achieving and taking the freedom to show this in headline !
Simon – very nice font/color design. A few points of feedback for the mobile version of the site – The back-to-top button is very useful. Could you add that to the mobile version of the site as well? A few folks have already pointed out the size of the shop images. But beyond the size, the zoom doesn’t seem to work either on mobile browsers. And lastly, the favicon image (that shows up as the icon when you bookmark the PS page) seems to be low-res. But all said and done a nice seamless launch. Congratulations and keep up the good work!
Thanks PB. Great on the other points, but the ‘back to top’ button doesn’t really work on mobile I’m afraid as it sits on top of text and imagery that way
Hey, Simon, the redesign is looking great. One thing on mobile that doesn’t seem to have been flagged yet: the instagram story widget isn’t loading any more – there’s just an empty band of beige where it used to be. As someone who isn’t on instagram, I find it quite handy 🙂
Thanks Josh, I hadn’t spotted that. So it definitely appeared before, even on a small mobile screen? Did you just see a single Instagram story then, and could scroll through the rest? I never really used that widget on a mobile
Hi, Simon, yes, that’s right: it would show the latest story and then allow scrolling through through to see the recent history. It had its own section as a break between the timeline of blog articles, just like the ‘recent threads’ component.
Thank you Josh
Here’s a screenshot to show the empty section break ?
Nice design update.
Absolutely love the new design, it is very representative of your personal style. The logo, color palette, and general organization. Props sir!
Thank you
Hi Simon. If I can offer some feedback, while I love the professionalism of the new redesign I have found a slight snag. In the “active threads” section, you have the title of each article appear in all capitals. This might just be me spending too much time on the internet, but I can’t help but read all-caps as someone shouting the words. I’m sure I’m not alone in this and I can’t help but feel it’s a bit of a mood-killer considering the otherwise mature presentation of the site.
Thanks Matt. It was actually the same on the site previously – the titles were in caps. But perhaps the font has made a difference, I’ll look at reducing it
Can I suggest incorporating a “Copy to Clipboard” button in the share pop-up window in the comments?
That would facilitate sharing on other platforms beyond Twitter and Facebook.
Nice idea Henry, thanks