Here the Cool Atlanta bloggers profile a cool spot to get coffee under the “coffee shops” umbrella of the main menu. They felt that coffee shops were important enough to have a whole thread dedicated to the best ones of the city. The black and white picture layered by the fancy blue words create a very nice, and elegant look to the page, leading one to draw conclusions about the quality of the restaurant.
Here an Atlantan shares her experience visiting a market in Atlanta. She writes a blog post and illustrates it with a photo of her which enhances the visual aspect of the site. The pictures of these people and places together show the true depth of the city better than sentences and paragraphs can.
This portion of the site profiles a citizen of Atlanta and her style. Clicking on the picture takes you to a gallery of pictures featuring the subject. The site offers a theme of connectivity as Instagram and Facebook links are offered on the side of the main focus. Also links to other areas of the site are accessible from this page.
This graphic organizer shows a list of acts for a music festival in Atlanta. Clicking anywhere on the graphic links you to the webpage of the band you clicked on. This feature makes the site very informative and simple to navigate. The style of the font and the page in general creates a very southern and comfortable feel.
This is the front page of the website that welcomes “Atlanta” to the blog. You can see a portion of the downtown area of the city from the view of the picture. The picture doesn’t show the more typical view of the skyline because they are trying to establish a website for the people who are a part of the community, not just tourists.
Coolatlanta.blogspot.com is hip, modern tour guide to one of the coolest cities in America, Atlanta. Furthermore, just like the city itself, the blog could be perceived to be a number of other adjectives besides simply “cool”. The blog meets you at the front with a huge grayscale photo of an ariel view of a section of the city with the words “HELLO ATLANTA” plastered on top of it in white bold font.
Once you enter the site you’ll notice abundantly more white space with the focus meant to be drawn to the center of the page where most of the information is displayed. From new restaurant reviews to profiles of some interesting people of the city, the middle area of the page contains most of the information the site has to offer. The posts scroll down in chronological order, which sets an organized precedent for the rest of your experience. There is a horizontal main menu bar at the top of the page that separates posts based on content, like “coffee shops”, “events”, and “music”.
The spacious set up of the website invites visitors to comment. The minimal nature of the site also makes it easier to identify what the creator of the site wants you to focus on throughout each page. Under the events tab, there are graphic organizers complete with pictures and captions instead of the same block articles most blogs use. Features like this make the website seem to flow more easily. Clicking on any part of the graphic organizer links you to the corresponding website for more information on the event.Overall, the website is very easy to navigate and very informative. The digital space implies that the site is for people who already are somewhat familiar with the city of Atlanta due to lack of maps.
All in all, coolatlantablog is a trendy site for anyone looking to try something new in Atlanta. The built environment of the site itself promotes interaction on the site as well as in the city as they introduce people of the city and tell about their lives. The site is more of a blank canvas that is added to frequently, which is parallel to how some would view the city of Atlanta itself.