Waiting for Good Things

Enlarge Image Image Gallery Kate Will

Just last week, I finished a two-and-a-half-year long book project on garden tractors; now I am really anxious to see it in print. It’s just the latest in a long line of big projects where patience really pays off, and I still get fidgety to see the final product sooner than it ever seems to come.

It was worse when I was a child. I remember chafing (in an annoying way, no doubt) while helping my dad re-side our house; it seemed there was so much measuring to be done and so many trips to the lumberyard that we would never get done. I liked going to the lumberyard with my dad well enough, but it was that sense of accomplishment, of finishing, that I was after. 

About a year ago, we embarked on a project here at Grit that we dreamt might happen a lot quicker than it did. Everyone was excited to imagine the final outcome. And though it all seemed pretty straightforward, at least on paper, the project turned out to be a bit more complex than I could have predicted. No, we weren’t making any big changes to the magazine; we were embarking on a complete redesign of our Web site, www.Grit.com.

I recall that it was Tim Swietek, our director of information services, who was among the few to caution us that rebuilding our Web site from the ground up was no small task. Grit’s web-savvy associate editor, Jenn Nemec, agreed. They were right. It was a huge task, and, in our case, one that required the cooperation and consensus-building skills of a diverse group of really smart, passionate and creative people. Everything you see, from the visual design elements, to content placement, to subscriber resources, to brand positioning was thoughtfully placed to help make surfing www.Grit.com an enjoyable and productive experience – for YOU.