2007 / August 12^th/ Absolut

When you think of vodka, what you think of? Crisp, Pure, Hip, and Sexy are words that come to mind for me. Absolut has done a magnificent job of this with their site Absolut.com. I’ve always loved alcohol sites: they serve very little purpose (mostly just drink recipes), and are all about living out the brand.

Depth

The first thing that struck me about this site is the amazing amount of depth in the design. With just the very slightest use of reflections and gradients, the whole site really pops. The use of a narrow field of focus also really makes the graphics pop.

Gorgeous Glasses

Another thing that really popped out to me on this site is the gorgeous photography/rendering of the glasses on black. I’m not sure how many of you have tried photographing transparent objects on black, but it’s no easy task. The black backgrounds really scream sex, and the glasses are crisp beyond belief.

Navigation… ?

This is the one part of the site that really turned me off. The whole thing is setup as a rotunda of various mini-sites. You have a set amount of time at each mini-site before it moves on to the next one (or if you click something in detail, it stops the timer). It turned out being really confusing and frustrating.

I like the idea of the rotunda, and lots of mini-sites: but I’m not sure the timer was a good idea. It took me a while to figure out what it was doing. Also, the Forward/Back buttons of the timer get confusing with the back buttons within the content.

Nitpicks

The other thing that irked me about this site was the forced gargantuan popup that was spewn on the users screen. The design doesn’t really require it, and I think the design would be have been far better with the flash piece simply embedded into the main browser window.

Also: the blurry, dirty reflection on the splash page was downright nasty! Ack! Someone get to that, please.

1. 

   eric johnson

   August 14^th | #

   i personally think the site is rather brilliant, and i suddenly have the urge to have a drink. i think the timed content navigation was a nice concept, as once the first couple went past, i sat waiting to see what the next piece was. and as you stated the photos were beautiful, but such is the case in all of their ads.

2. 

   derek h

   August 16^th | #

   meh, I thought it was okay. I’m on a 4Mbps connection and I had to wait a rather long time just to get going. I didn’t like how the first “Movie” loaded right after the main navigation loaded. I’m a big fan of flash full flash sites (and vodka for that matter) but I think they could have done better. Did anyone notice the pixelated light bloom behind the cover flow navigation? Is that the dirty reflection you were referring to Kyle?

3. 

   Marcel

   September 26^th | #

   When I open the second page after typing in my age nothing happens. The design looks good, but it is not really made for users I think.

4. 

   philippine web designs

   May 11^th | #

   the black background complements the clearness of Absolut and i like the site’s navigation

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