Section-archive realignment — swap generic list for compelling grid
2026-05-15 · sketch · proposal for visual + IA realignment of dare.co.uk’s section pages
Dan’s idea: the rich archive grid view (currently at /<section>/archive/) is materially more compelling than the simpler “generic list” root view. Realign the IA so visitors landing on /methods-of-business-design/ get the compelling grid by default — not the simpler list. Apply the same shape to the newer sections (/cinema/, /architecture/, etc.) built this morning.
TL;DR
- 3 sections (methods / culture / field-notes) currently have two views: simpler root + rich archive
- 7 sections (cinema / architecture / photography / books / people / brands / observations) currently have only the simpler root (built this morning)
- Proposal: promote the rich archive view to be the canonical section root across all 10 sections
- Mechanically: content swap (rename/replace) at root level;
/archive/URLs stay as redirect aliases for backward-compat - For the 7 new sections: build the rich variant first, then promote
- Implementation: ~30-60 min for the swap; ~2-3 hours for the new variants
Visual contrast — why this matters
Current root view (the “generic” we’re replacing)
https://dare.co.uk/methods-of-business-design/
Two-column card grid with title + section label + date. Functional, scannable, but information-dense without curatorial signal. The reader gets a chronological list and has to do the work of figuring out where to start.
Proposed root view (promote archive/ to root)
https://dare.co.uk/methods-of-business-design/archive/
Curated “Featured · highlights” strip at top (Dan-picked, image-led). Filter chips by sub-category (Industrial Design / Methods / Narrative / Psychology / User Interface). Sort controls (Newest / Oldest / Title A-Z). Then a dense thumbnail grid — every post is an image card OR a coloured text-only card (when no body image exists). Much more like a magazine archive than a list.
The 7 new sections built this morning
https://dare.co.uk/cinema/
These were built this morning using the methods-root pattern as the template. Same two-column-card-with-date layout. Functional but not magazine-grade. Worth upgrading to match the proposed new canonical pattern.
The realignment plan
Phase 1 — promote archive to root for the 3 main sections (~30-60 min)
For each of methods-of-business-design, culture-means-thriving-teams, fields-notes-from-business-design:
- Rename the current root:
index.html→simple-list.html(preserves the simpler view at a different URL for anyone who liked it) - Move archive:
archive/index.html→index.html(rich grid becomes root) - Add
_redirectsrule:/<section>/archive/ → /<section>/ 301(preserves old links to archive URL) - Optionally: keep
/archive/returning the same content by symlinking, so both URLs work for transition period - Update any cross-references in nav (top nav already says “Methods / Culture / Field Notes” — those should now resolve to the archive view; verify after swap)
Phase 2 — build archive variants for the 7 newer sections (~2-3 hours)
Sections: cinema, architecture, photography, books, people, brands, observations
For each:
- Build a
<section>/archive/index.htmlmatching the methods archive structure: - “Featured · highlights” strip (Dan picks 3-5 standout articles per section) - Filter chips by sub-category if any exist (e.g., cinema by decade, photography by location) - Sort controls - Full thumbnail grid with image-card OR coloured-text-card per article - Once built and reviewed, do the same swap as Phase 1
Generalisable build pattern via ~/bin/dare_section_archive_build.py (new tool — extension of today’s dare_section_indexes_build.py). The new tool:
- Reads each article’s body image (first
<img>) for the thumbnail card - Falls back to coloured-text-card when no image
- Reads sub-category metadata from each article’s JSON-LD or front-matter
- Asks for a
featured.jsonper section listing 3-5 hand-picked slugs - Emits the cream-themed archive layout
Phase 3 — nav consistency check (~10 min)
After Phase 1 + 2, audit every page on dare.co.uk for nav references to section root URLs:
<a href="/methods-of-business-design/">should still resolve correctly (now to the archive content)- Cross-references in articles should still work
- Any breadcrumbs should match the new IA
Implementation options for Phase 1 (pick one)
| Option | What | Pros | Cons |
|---|---|---|---|
| A. File rename + redirect | Rename index.html → simple-list.html, move archive/index.html → index.html, redirect /archive/ → root |
Simple, no duplication, clean URLs | Old archive URL doesn’t show archive content directly (it 301s) |
| B. Content swap, both URLs serve same | Copy archive content into root index.html, leave archive/ as-is | Both URLs work, no redirect needed | Duplicate content (Google may pick one as canonical) |
| C. Symlink | index.html is a symlink to archive/index.html |
One file truly authoritative | Symlinks don’t always survive deploy pipelines cleanly |
Recommendation: Option A — cleanest IA, the simpler-list view stays accessible at /<section>/simple-list/ for anyone who wants it (or for an A/B test) but the canonical URL is the rich grid.
Risk assessment
| Risk | Mitigation |
|---|---|
External links to /<section>/archive/ URLs break |
301 redirect handles them; Google ranks transfer cleanly |
| Page load is heavier (more thumbnails) | Archive view is already in production for 3 sections — performance is acceptable; can lazy-load below the fold |
| Sections without enough articles to fill a rich grid look sparse | Books has 10 articles, brands has 6 — these may need a simpler layout variant OR more articles before promoting |
| Sub-category filters need data not currently in JSON-LD | Add an articleSection or category tag to each article during the build; defer if sub-cat filtering isn’t load-bearing |
| Featured-highlights strip needs Dan’s editorial picks | Hand-curated featured.json per section; small editorial pass |
Sequencing — what gets built first
Order by leverage × ease:
- First: Phase 1 swap for the 3 main sections — biggest visual upgrade for least effort, archive content already exists
- Second: Phase 2 build for
cinema(84 articles — plenty to fill a rich grid) - Third: Phase 2 build for
people(44 articles) +architecture(42) +photography(35) - Fourth: Phase 2 for
books(10),brands(6),observations(8 per memory) — these need either more articles OR a sparser layout variant - Last: Phase 3 cross-reference audit
What “done” looks like
- Every
/<section>/URL on dare.co.uk serves the rich archive view - Every section has a curated “Featured · highlights” strip
- Filters + sort work consistently across all 10 sections
- The 7 new sections shipped this morning are upgraded from “functional” to “magazine-grade”
- The simpler-list pattern survives at
/<section>/simple-list/for anyone who liked it (or for A/B comparison) - Top nav (Methods / Culture / Field Notes) takes visitors directly to the compelling grid
Open questions for Dan
- Featured-highlights curation — how many per section? 3 looks Dan-curated, 4-5 starts to feel like a list. Recommend 3
- Sub-category filters — cinema by decade? photography by place? architecture by movement? Or skip filtering entirely on the smaller sections?
- Coloured-text-card colours — palette per category? Or single accent (DARE red) for all? Current archive uses sub-category colour-coding
- Order of the Phase 2 builds — cinema first (most material) or photography (most visual)?
- The 7 new section pages — do we promote the existing simple ones now (Phase 1) OR wait until Phase 2 completes? If we promote now, the “improvement” sits behind the click; if we wait, the IA is inconsistent for ~2-3 hours
Why this is the right move
This sits inside feedback_canonical_site_header — culture-archive-style header is the approved pattern for site-wide rollout. The rich grid IS the canonical pattern; the simpler list was a holding state for sections that didn’t yet have it.
It also compounds with the agent-discoverability work shipped this morning. Agents (Claude / ChatGPT / Perplexity) reading /cinema/ get an immediate sense of the section’s depth + curatorial voice. The rich grid signals editorial quality at every entry point.
The 20% of upside above the simpler list isn’t visual polish — it’s the curatorial signal that the section has been thought about, not just listed. That’s the difference between an archive that earns citations and one that gets skimmed.
Generated 2026-05-15. Screenshots: cropped tops of live production pages. Implementation deferred until Dan confirms answers to the open questions above.
Linked artefacts
- dare_video_audit_2026-05-15 — separate audit run today; the dead-video fixes are independent of this realignment but pair well (clean up both layers as part of one sweep)
- dare_agent_discoverability_shipped_2026-05-15 — the agent stack ship that makes archive quality matter even more
feedback_canonical_site_header— the design pattern this realignment standardises across the site~/bin/dare_section_indexes_build.py— this morning’s generator; would be extended for the rich variant