Role: Web Designer & Developer Timeline: ~2 months, Late June 2025 - Early August 2025 Client: Zanolee Grant, Bay Islands community archivist

The Bay Islands Archives is a digital repository preserving and sharing the history of the Bay Islands of Honduras. The client, a community archivist and researcher, wanted a site that could act as a home for stories, media, and records of the people of the islands. A tool for people back home to engage with their history while making it accessible to future generations.

I was hired to bring this idea to life from design to development: a clean, responsive website, a CMS for managing archive entries, filtering systems, and an interactive map connecting stories to specific locations. The biggest priority was functionality. The site needed to work seamlessly on mobile devices and remain simple enough for less tech-savvy users, since much of the audience would be islanders accessing the site on their phones.

This was a milestone project. My first return client. I had worked with her a year earlier, and the fact that she came back confirmed people trusted my design eye and ability to get things done. This was the project that pushed me into freelancing for real.

Zanolee began the Bay Islands Archives to address a growing concern: much of the community's history was being lost or scattered. After 12 years of research gathering photos, videos, texts, and interviewing multiple Bay Islanders, she had collected all this information. It only made sense to create a home for it, allowing others to access and contribute.

I had only ever done UI/UX design before, never built a website from scratch. While I was confident in my ability to design the site, my client wanted advanced features—a CMS, filtering/tagging system, and interactive map—none of which I'd implemented before.

This was also my first time handling an entire web project for a paying client. I was stepping into new territory in every direction: design, development, hosting, and ongoing maintenance.

The real challenge was turning a polished prototype into a living, functional site while teaching myself the tools and frameworks as I went.

The strategy balanced functionality and design. The archive needed to feel professional and visually appealing, but the audience required simplicity and clarity above all.

My favorite detail was splitting archive entries into two types. Instead of forcing all entries into one rigid structure, the site could adapt to the content—whether one important photograph or a gallery of videos and images.