Website Redesign
Search Engine Optimization
A full website redesign for the internet's largest encyclopedia of African American and Global African history.
BlackPast.org is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and the largest online encyclopedia dedicated to African American and Global African history on the internet, receiving tens of millions of visits every year and housing over 7,000 entries written by nearly 1,000 academic and independent historians from around the world. Founded in 2007 by University of Washington historian Dr. Quintard Taylor, the site is an essential reference for students, educators, researchers, and the general public. 621 Studio was engaged to redesign the site's visual identity and user experience, modernizing a resource of enormous cultural significance without disrupting the content infrastructure that millions of readers depend on.
Modernizing a nearly 8,000-page educational resource on a nonprofit budget without breaking what millions of readers already use.
BlackPast.org had grown over nearly two decades into one of the most visited history reference sites on the internet, but its design reflected that age. Category pages were cluttered and difficult to navigate, the search function was expensive to maintain relative to the nonprofit's operating budget, and the overall visual presentation didn't reflect the depth and credibility of the content inside it. The challenge was meaningful: redesign a high-traffic, content-heavy site, and simplifying navigation and modernizing the visual experience without disrupting the thousands of article pages, primary documents, timelines, and specialty features that define the resource. Every decision had to be made with a constrained nonprofit budget and the needs of a global readership in mind.
A cleaner, more credible site built for the resource's next chapter without starting over from scratch.
Michael Hancock led creative direction for the redesign, establishing a visual identity and layout system that gives BlackPast.org the editorial authority its content has always deserved — clear typography, a more intentional hierarchy, a mega menu to enhance navigation, and hero design options that honor the gravity of the subject matter. Category pages were restructured and simplified to reduce friction for readers navigating a 7,000-entry encyclopedia. On the technical side, the existing search function was replaced with a more cost-effective solution appropriate for a nonprofit operating budget, delivering equivalent functionality at meaningfully lower recurring cost. SEO strategy informed both the structural decisions and the category page architecture, ensuring the redesigned site was built to maintain and improve the organic visibility that drives the majority of BlackPast.org's 60 million annual visits.
in detail.
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