Mama D's Italian Kitchen: Website Redesign Project

Before/After

Project Scope

I hold a handful of things close to my heart: family, friends, and FOOD.

Back in 2012 while living in Newport Beach, I had the privilege to serve at this iconic restaurant, which provided me with new friends who eventually became family to me. So naturally I jumped at the opportunity to redesign their site. Not to mention, I wanted to add restaurants to my website wheelhouse along with small businesses and artists, so it was a perfect match.

The challenge with the Mama D's site was trying to make the site as simple to use as possible while displaying all the necessary information their guests would need in one place (and to find very quickly, I might add... hungry people are always in a hurry). Their menu and the pictures of their food/interior speak for themselves, so my goal was to keep the design out of the way while creating that (personally familiar) "Italian family kitchen" vibe.

Here are the tasks I had at hand when beginning the project:

Completely redesign the client's old site from scratch

Migrate the site to the Squarespace hosting platform
Re-route the current domain to the new host
Create a mobile-friendly version of the website

Incorporate an online ordering system

Simply connected the domain to an external 3rd party, DoorDash.

Incorporate a "modern, clean, minimalist" feel

"De-clutter" and reorganize the information to make the site as easy-to-use as possible

Maintain the Mama D's brand within the redesign

Make the website "feel" like the restaurant's interior feels: warm, welcoming, friendly, homey, and food-centric.
Find a simple, flat color scheme & contrasting, yet complimentary typography

Create a custom catering price quote form

Streamlines the process for guests to inquire about catering their events by immediately posing questions that determine the cost
In turn, streamlines the process for the client by eliminating the back and forth emails and providing them with one email that answers all the questions they need to ask to provide a quote.

Incorporate social media accounts

Instagram feed, which updates whenever the client posts from their account
Mama D's is known for their ridiculous amount of raving Yelp reviews, so linking their Yelp account was a must.

Set up custom e-mail addresses for owner/managers

A professional email address in the restaurant industry is a must, so I set the guys at Mama D's up with "name@mamadsnewport.com" addresses to throw on their business cards

Mobile View