Privilege Blog

In Which We Appreciate Our Surroundings

Well. Hello everyone. Here we are. If you’re on the blog itself, look around! If you’re in a feedreader, I invite you to come take a peek.

So now what? Well, the rest of this week will be devoted to presents. That’s right, presents for you all as thanks for reading. A housewarming party from me to you. I’ve got five or six giveaways lined up, and I’ll put up one or two a day until we run out. More information to follow.

Before we move on to presents, however, here’s a brief overview of the Privilege changes.

First, you will see that everything is, well, more beautiful. Thanks are due to Jamie, at Cactus and Quail. I discovered her design sensibility when reading about her wedding, detailed at desert fete. She has been an absolute joy to work with, taking my emotive but imprecise desires, and creating just the look and feel I wanted. Thank you Jamie. And, she is launching a design business, here, very soon.

Second, you will see that Privilege now has pages.

  • About Me allows me to pretend to offer my readers information, although of course I really just like the photo in which my hair whips about in the Swedish Breeze, Ray Bans reflecting the Swedish Sun. High WASPs have to disguise their desire for spotlight, remember?
  • Style Archetypes explains the Sturdy Gal, the Grande Dame, and the Artsy Cousin. To ensure we don’t have an Insider Talk problem. Inclusion is my highest aspiration.
  • Ask LPC allows your interesting questions to provide me good blog fodder. Again, rather sneaky, but that’s in the blood.

Third, and quite thrilling, there is now an ad on my sidebar. It’s for Beladora, Belle de Ville’s estate jewelry business. When I knew I would be redesigning, having asked you all if ads were a Done Thing, I thought immediately of Beladora and asked Belle if she’d be interested. She, to my great good fortune, said yes. So we will see how this works. The link right now is structured as an affiliate, i.e. commissioned, but I’m not sure yet what exactly I will do with any commissions. Perhaps more giveaways. This is a grand experiment, and whatever I do I will tell you. Thank you in advance for your forbearance.

Fourth, and finally, I want to thank the folks at Techsperience for implementing the redesign. This involved building a blog on WordPress, adding plugins, migrating subscribers and followers, and, most importantly, working many hours to bring the design ideas to the web as faithfully as possible.

I hope you like what you see. Feel free to comment and send feedback. Please, please, report any bugs or significant user experience issues to me. Once you’ve had a chance to look around and see what you think of the design, I’ll tell you what I was going for and we can see how close we got.

Onward to presents.

62 Responses

  1. it’s just beautiful, lisa, and suits you and your writing so well – congratulations on the transition! jamie, your work is gorgeous as always.

  8. Brava! The site is achingly gorgeous. Normally I resist blog re-designs, but this one is lovely, just lovely.

    Looking forward to many more pleasant visits here…

  9. Oh. Oh! It really is an elegant redesign. You and Jaime did an amazing job. It feels lighter, and airy, and altogether delightfully fitting. Congratulations.

  16. I love the redesign!

    Re: the style archetypes, which my taxonomical mind very much enjoys, are you familiar with Mary McCarthy’s novel The Group? Up until your blog, that was my point of access to the kind of slightly-decaying WASP culture you describe. I guess it’s like Sex and the City for the 1930s, with more wit and brain. Eight Vassar graduates (each standing in for a slight variation on the WASP archetype–the artsy one, the socially anxious one, the proper one, the tomboy) are set loose in New York in a decade of shifting standards and decreasing means. I enjoyed reading it hugely, not least because it was like an anthropological survey of a culture so foreign to me and yet so strangely alluring.
    Summary: readers of LPC, check out Mary McCarthy’s The Group!

  17. Oh, well, hello. My RSS feed got all mussed, and made it look like you’d re-launched the site four weeks ago, and I was terribly confused and then relived. It’s lovely, and I know what hard work this is. Cheers all round, clink, clink. But mostly here is to bigger and better.

  18. lauren – thank you so much. jamie, yes, it is.

    Jan – Thank you! And it’s fun to have your face here too:).

    Arachna – If I can make those who dislike change happy, I am doing the right High WASP thing:).

    Amanda – Indeed. Thank you.

    That’s Not My Age – Thank you! Scandinavian is high on my list, as you know.

  19. This is so elegant! (And I mean that in at least two ways. ;)) Congratulations to your designer, your web programmer, and, of course, to you for your own good taste. And it’s so good to see so much more of you on your page. This feels like a debut. I may stop reading you in my reader and just come over to your page every time I see your posts.

  20. I love the redesign–wonderful to see a site design that complements the quality of the content!

  21. YAY! Congratulations Lisa. So cool to see the fruit of our labor live and shared! I was so glad that you asked me to help you with this, and it has been a pleasure working with you.

    And I am so glad you all like the new digs! Thanks. ;)

  22. Clean, bright and graceful, congratualtions! And I applaud the association with Beladora. Would you be willing to add me to your blogroll?

  24. Very nice. I just have a couple of accessibility thoughts.

    Your top navigation depends entirely on images which have no alt attributes. This means that visually impaired visitors, those using browsers that don’t show images, and possibly those using mobile devices, will not be able to access those links.

    The same is true of the titles of the various blocks in your sidebar (although not of the links to Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr).

    I enjoy your work, and look forward to more.

  26. You always look so engagingly anxious in your photo that I feel like hopping on a jet to assure you that it’s all good. Very light, very classy. Dignified, if I had to go for one word.

  28. “Yet more beautiful”–certainly describes your newly
    designed blog. Congratulations.The header is great. Looking forward to my visits to your new home.
    BarbaraG

  29. I love everything about the new design. Is there a way to adjust how it displays on my netbook? It does not fit correctly.

  30. LPC, the new design is beautiful. I am curious though, why my Google reader doesn’t show the latest post? It shows the post from Sat but not this one.

  31. Congratulations Lisa!
    The new look is refined and elegant.

    I am keen to hear more about giveaways…
    Belladora is a tempting shop with such juicy jewelry…
    I adore vintage gems!

  33. I love it! Especially the archetypes. I know these types. I’d like to imagine I myself am either none or somehow a mix of all three, but guessing I am really just Sturdy Gal without a garden club membership.

  35. Oh Miss LPC, you know I am *loving* the new do! Your new digs, so to speak, are ever-so-elegant, just like you. It’s the perfect setting for your wisdom, insight and your ready wit.

    Congratulations!
    tp

  36. Welcome to your new web home!
    It looks just as I had expected: slick, elegant, sophisticated and totally bare of any unnecessary extras!
    It is exactly how it should be for you and for what you represent!!!
    My very warmest wishes,

    Anna

  37. Wow. Wow. oh wow. wowsa wow wow… Ok, you’ve rendered me speechless which is very hard to do. Gorgeous. Amazing. Classy. Sensational. Much like the blog’s owner!

  39. Your lovely blog is a Privilege, pun intended, and a beautiful one at that.

    Congrats, and best wishes.

  40. Congratulations Lisa! Your new blog is discreet, yet stylish; both adjectives I appreciate myself too. While the background is harmonious, You and your writing gets the main role, which is just how it is meant to be. I´ll most definitely be a follower of your blog in the future too.

  41. Adventures – Thank you. I hope you enjoy the wandering:). And return safely.

    Toad – Oh thank you sir. So appreciated.

    Louise – Achingly gorgeous. There is nothing I could have heard that would make me happier. Thank you.

    Becca- Thank you! Jamie is so talented.

    Caroline, No – Thanks. I was hoping for coherence. Thanks.

  42. Mouse – Thank you! Oh you of impeccable taste and creativity.

    Delia – Thank you so much for everything. I hope giving the Archetypes their own pages helps everyone.

    Lana – Thank you so, so much.

    Marcela – Thank you!

    Bumby – As always, you are too kind.

  43. minerrva – Thank you. I read that book, but I was so young I barely remember it. My aunt went to Vassar:). I should clearly reread it. Thank you for the reference for all of us.

    Meg – Oh the RSS bit is very confusing. Thank you. Bigger and better.

    Staircase – Thank you so much. A debut. I refused to go to dance school, so no debutante ball for me. Perhaps I should have worn my white dress and gloves for this launch:)!

    Jen – Thank you. Coherence. I really appreciate your comment.

    Jamie ! *dances in circle with arms overhead!

  44. Duchesse – Yes, the blogroll is supposed to rotate each time you come to the site and show more people. I thought there was also supposed to be a MORE link, but I might be confused. In other words, I never meant to drop you! I will talk to tech people in the morning. There were bound to be glitches.

    Stephanie – Oh, I can watch the movie too! And thank you.

    Katja – Good point. We will work on this. My apologies for missing this.

    Belle – We are very happy to have you here.

    Mise – I am, in fact, engagingly anxious. At least it appears I am who I show myself to be. And that is very encouraging. Dignified is also good. But showing up as myself is maybe even better, especially in this context. Thank you.

  45. Rachel – Thank you. Thank you so much.

    BarbG – And does that eggplant color count as navy? I think yes.

    Kerry – This appears to be a problem all around. It may take a few days to fix, but we will do our best.

    Susan – Apparently it will catch up.

    Leslie – I can spend so much time just browsing Beladora for fun:).

  46. Vicente – Thank you! Thank you for coming on over and thank you for the kind words. I’m honored.

    Elizabeth – *shakes hand* I too am Sturdy. I don’t have a garden club membership either, but I try to make up for it by mowing my own lawn:).

    Miss Janey – Oh that’s just what I wanted. To keep the elegance but without exclusivity.

    TPP – Thank you. Thank you for all your support all this time. It means so much to me.

    Anna – I like your aesthetic so much, and I really appreciate your words.

  47. Entertaining Mom – Thank you so much!

    Abbie – Lovely pun. I thank you very much.

    Mette – Thank you. I believe you see exactly what I intended, exactly what Jamie did for me.

    Hill house – Thank you so much. Elegant and welcoming, as any house might want to be.

    THANK YOU ALL! IF I MISSED ANYONE, IT’S BECAUSE MY EYES GET WORSE AND WORSE! Thank you!!!!

  50. Hi Lisa! Techsperience did a good job, no bugs to report! :-)
    I admit I prefered the old simple blogspot-flavour, it seems more intimate and direct to me. A designed website to me puts content on “display”. Like a company’s products, which seems contradictory to the intimate contents bloggers share. BUT: In market research groups I always tend to be the one with an akward opinion, so I am sure, the huge majority loves the change, as the former comments prove. Ask LPC is super new rubric. There is only one thing I struggle with: something is different with the text, I don’t know if it is the colour or the font. I notice it is not as easy to read as the old layout. Did you change something about the text-style? Or are the columns wider than before? Or is it just my nostalgia? :-) Obviiusly I am not the best adapter to anything new around.

    I am curious how the photos will look in the new design!

  52. This new site is really nice. I appreciate the fact that it is easy to read and isn’t overwhelmed by graphics. I poked around in the tabs and enjoyed being reminded of the style archetypes.

    Job well done!

    Darla

  54. Clap, clap, clap! I absolutely love it. Now, can someone send me a whole boatload of money, so I can do some damage at Beladora?

    Well done, Lisa and Cactus & Quail!

  56. Congratulations on your lovely new home! I would love to drop some sort of neighborly cookies by (of course I would call first), but my electronic warmest wishes will have to do.
    Best,
    Collen

  57. Terri – Thank you. Those are some pretty great adjectives.

    Paula – I am having some adjustment myself. Seeing my thoughts in sans serif feels quite different from seeing them in Georgia, serif and all. The readability issue I believe is partly because its new, and partly because of the lightness. I am asking you all to return next week and tell me if the color is still causing readability issues. If so, I’ll try to figure out a solution. And to put in a picture, I believe you need a WordPress profile. To go http://www.wordpress.com and see what you find. Otherwise I will see if there’s another method when I get home next week.

    Darla – Thank you so much. I am happy to have you poking around.

    Buckeroo – High praise. Thank you.

    Patsy – Ha! Thank you for the ovation, Cactus and Quail are brilliant, and when my ship comes in I will obviously send a boatload your way.

    Golla – Thank you very much.

    Colleen – Hey! I’m holding out for the cookies!

  59. Dear Lisa, thank you for the background info. Truly a funny insight this offers to me: I needed to notice the difference on your website to figure out, the font I chose for my blog isn’t working at all! Too small, to dense. Now I switched to a font with serifs. In the late 90’s we were told “Verdana” is the ultimate web-font. And now I pick Times New Roman and Georgia. Wasn’t this a no-no? No question I will return to your website! Not just next week but every single day.

  62. HI! First time commenter on your blog (which I love, by the way). Jamie did a GREAT job with your blog redesign, and you do a great job w/ content! xxoo

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