Website & Store · Web Design · E-commerce
forbes.design
One site that does two jobs: shows the work and sells the goods. Designed, built and shipped on Shopify.
The Challenge
My portfolio and my apparel store were pulling in different directions. The store theme was built to sell t-shirts, not to tell the story of 14 years of medical, automotive and consumer product work. Visitors landed on bio text and promotions before they saw a single project.
The goal: one site where the work comes first, the shop still sells, and every page feels like it came from the same hand.
Information Architecture
I gave the site two clear jobs. The portfolio shows the work: a work-first homepage, category indexes, 16 case studies built on one reusable template, and focused About, FAQ and Contact pages. The store sells the goods: Detroit and Michigan apparel with print-on-demand fulfillment.
One header ties them together, with the logo, navigation, search and cart on a single row.
Site map — one site, two jobs
Design System
Instead of styling page by page, I built one shared layer for type, color, spacing, corners, buttons and motion, then applied it to every portfolio page at once.
A black canvas so the work carries the color. Big, mixed-case headlines. Rounded media with no hairline borders. Facts and numbers on soft panels. Sections that fade in as you scroll, and stay still for visitors who prefer reduced motion. One switch turns the whole layer on or off.
The design system — type, color, shape, motion
Brand & Homepage
A new circle FD mark, redrawn as a crisp vector so it stays sharp on any screen. A compact, single-row header. A homepage rewritten around one idea — complex problems, simple products — with the projects front and center, a quiet line for the shop, and one clear call to action at the bottom instead of competing buttons.
How It Was Built
I design in the browser and build with AI as a pair-builder. Custom Shopify sections power the case studies, the portfolio grid and the project showcases.
Every change happens on a copy of the live site: build, preview every page type, measure, then publish. Customers never see a half-finished page, and the previous version is always one click away.
Draft-first release process
Outcome
A portfolio that leads with the work and a store that keeps selling, on one platform I can update myself.
It's also proof of a service I offer. If your business needs a website or an online store, this is the kind of work I'll do for you.