Red
Central
Sole developer for Red Central's bold, media‑led Gatsby and Contentful website, translating detailed creative direction into a responsive showcase for the studio's work.
In Detail
The designs were bold, image‑led, and detail‑heavy, so the implementation required careful front‑end judgement throughout. The work demanded close attention to layout, responsive behaviour, animation timing, and the handling of large visual assets.
I built the site with Gatsby, React, TypeScript, GraphQL, SCSS, and Contentful. Contentful gave Red Central direct control over site content and project pages, whilst Gatsby provided a fast, static front‑end well‑suited to an image‑heavy portfolio. CSS Grid and responsive image‑loading techniques helped preserve the visual quality of the studio's work without making the experience feel heavy.
Homepage
The homepage created an immediate, high‑impact introduction to Red Central's work and personality. Sequenced CSS animations brought the hero content into view before moving through stylised agency messaging, including 'Game Changing Creative' and 'The Pop Culture Geeks', followed immediately by the first examples of the studio's work.
Services
Red Central's services needed enough explanation for new visitors without losing the site's visual energy. An animated carousel paired service messaging with recognisable project imagery, allowing the studio to explain its offer whilst keeping the experience strongly image‑led.
Life at Red
The Life at Red page gave the studio a more informal space to present its culture and personality. Its hero imagery was editable through Contentful, allowing the team to refresh the page without developer involvement.
Work List
The Work page was built around large, image‑led project entries, making performance particularly important. Careful image optimisation and staggered fade‑up loading kept browsing smooth whilst preserving the visual impact of the studio's work.
Project Pages
Project pages extended the site's bold, image‑led visual language into a reusable structure for individual pieces of work. Red Central could combine project imagery and copy in different configurations through Contentful, giving each project its own character whilst retaining a consistent underlying system.
Contact Page
Red Central chose direct email addresses and telephone numbers instead of a generic contact form. That left room for a looping office video, giving the page more personality whilst keeping the route to enquiry simple.
- "
John Kavanagh is one of the most open‑minded developers I have ever worked with. His appreciation of great creative work, his enthusiasm and 'anything is possible' attitude is always a breath of fresh air. I worked with him on several successful projects in our days at McCann Worldgroup. Since then we have collaborated on many freelance projects and he's always been super efficient and effective, combining a great work ethic with immense talent. If I ever have a creative digital project which needed bringing to life, John is the first developer I call on."
