Redesigning the digital experience for a historic choir
A UX-driven redesign of the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh's website, built to help members, audiences, and donors actually engage, not just browse.
The 90-second version
The Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh has a long, well-loved history in the community, but their website wasn't doing their music justice. It felt outdated, hard to navigate, and gave new visitors little reason to take action, whether that meant buying a ticket, auditioning, or donating.
I led UX research and information architecture for the redesign, working alongside a visual designer and front-end developer at Dot Foundry. The finished site went on to win a Silver ADDY Award from the American Advertising Federation, recognition for the storytelling and design that grew directly out of the research foundation.
Within a three-person team, I owned the research and structural decisions that shaped the site. Specifically, I:
The visual designer and front-end developer then built the final interface (typography, layout, color, and interaction) on top of that structure. The award reflects the full team's execution, but the underlying navigation, content priorities, and user flows are research-driven decisions I made.
What users needed to hear, see, and find, and how that reshaped the site.
Despite strong programming and a loyal member base, the old site struggled with unclear information hierarchy, poor mobile performance, outdated or sparse content around auditions and events, and low engagement: donating and buying tickets were both harder than they should have been.
The guiding research question: What do users want to see when they visit, and how do they look for it?
I used a mixed-methods approach to triangulate behavioral data with direct user input: Google Analytics and Hotjar to study real traffic and behavior patterns on the existing site, a heuristic evaluation against established UX principles, a comparative analysis of how other arts organizations structured their sites, and 7 user interviews with prospective and current choir members, audience members, and board members.
For the interviews, participants completed real tasks (buying a ticket, finding a performance, looking up audition info) while sharing their screen, which surfaced both behavioral friction and the personal context behind it.
This led to the core design question: How might we help users quickly find what they need, whether they're attending, joining, or supporting MCP?
Based on these findings, I defined a set of UX recommendations that became the foundation for the redesign:
I led the creation of a revised content structure and wireframes for all core pages: translating the research findings directly into navigation, page hierarchy, and content priority.
Once the wireframes were tested and approved, the visual designer and front-end developer built out a modern, cohesive interface (typography, color, layout, and interaction) on top of that structure. The result highlighted the choir's story in a way that reflected the group's role in promoting art, culture, and community. That collaboration led to the site receiving a Silver ADDY Award from the American Advertising Federation.
The redesigned information architecture and content strategy shaped the final site, which won a Silver ADDY Award from the American Advertising Federation, recognition for storytelling and design that grew directly out of the research foundation.
What I really enjoyed about this project was figuring out how many different jobs one website was trying to do. Someone looking for concert tickets had very different needs from someone thinking about auditioning or supporting the choir. A lot of the work came down to understanding those different perspectives, and finding ways to make each path a little clearer without losing what made the organization feel like itself.
There's always more to the story.
Curious about the research, decisions, or what happened behind the scenes? I'd love to chat.
