Lino Tagliapietra
Drupal 9 & Shopify
Beautiful Simplicity
Lino Tagliapietra, born in 1934 in Murano, Italy, became an apprentice glassblower at age 11 before earning the title of “Maestro” when he was just 21. His unique pieces are present in some of the most prestigious museums throughout the world, as well as numerous galleries and private collections. Lino Tagliapietra has been visiting the Pacific Northwest since 1979 and splits his time between Murano and Seattle, Washington.
The Lino Taliapietra website was actually quite beautiful when we first met. However, the UX shifted from page-to-page, and there were some difficult to maintain aspects like full-screen 360-degree walkthroughs. Their team wanted us to help simplify the experience, feature the art more prominently, and create a platform that is incredibly easy to navigate and update.
Design
Hovie Hawk Design, one of our longtime design partners, was the perfect design partner for this project. He lived for many years in Milan, Italy, working in design studios there, and is very familiar with the aesthetic and approach that would resonate with Lino Tagliapietra’s audience: Italian beauty through simplicity.
This style requires an unrelenting focus on good design.
The Build
The new site is in Drupal 9, the latest version of the Drupal CMS platform. Drupal content types help to structure the data for the dynamic catalog and gallery.
We used the latest iteration of our base theme as the jumping-off point. This base theme uses Bootstrap.js as an underlying technology, and has a library of components that speeds development and makes it more consistent.
Interesting Features
We leveraged many front-end techniques that make this website unique:
- A dynamic footer which randomizes featured artwork on page load.
- The “Eyebrow”: Similar to breadcrumbs, but linkable text that becomes part of the navigation and sits above the H1 on a page.
- Using the media module, to handle sizing and caching of big, beautiful images of all different sizes so they display consistently.
- A fun javascript “zoom” feature if you hover over a large image to see some of the glass detail.
- A large, full-width navigation that drops down for easy one-click jumps to other areas of the site.
- A scrolling timeline, built as paragraph types in Drupal.
- Subtle body background images, with tan or white overlays.
Shopify
In addition to the main site, there is a Shopify store selling books, DVDs and other materials about Lino and his work.
We quickly rebuilt the existing Shopify side with a minimalist theme (not replicating the full navigation). This was a great use of Shopify for simplified store capabilities, while keeping their website’s branding and design consistent on a subdomain.
Lino Tagliapietra & Friends
In May 2022, Lino approached us for a site expansion project. The expansion was intended to feature additional Murano-based glass artists, dubbed “Lino Tagliapietra & Friends." This sub-brand was crafted to introduce new artists and offer additional artists a chance to showcase and sell their work.
The new addition required a modification to the existing Shopify store and a continuation of the clean design approach the current site currently showcased. This website will continue to grow and evolve, highlighting various one-of-a-kind art pieces.
The Lino Tagliapietra website launched in the early summer of 2021, preceding a documentary release in honor of Maestro Tagliapietra.