web work
professional websites
the following portfolio showcases websites that i built through my full-time jobs over the years. these stood out as some of my favorites.
i do not own the files or any accounts affiliated with these websites.
author resources website (via hachette book group)
author resources for publishing
(2020 - present) lead developer . technical contact
HBG author resources is a website that helps guide contributors through the publishing process. this sets up people with information (FAQs, tips and tricks, publicity info) to prepare them for all that comes with publishing their new book(s).
i designed this site with my former manager. we wanted to keep it clean and modern and within the same style as our HBG site (for the most part). we did change some fonts, but overall, we kept it in line with being just a smidge off of the HBG branding for consistency purposes.
services:
website design, wordpress child theme, content maintenance, technical contact
HBG imprints (via hachette book group)
imprints/publishers
(2019 - present) technical contact
one of my tasks at work is to be the technical contact for all marketing teams of the imprints that i'm assigned to. over the years they've fluctuated with new hires, but for the most part, they've stayed the same.
i am currently the technical contact for the following imprints:
- little, brown and company (little, brown and company, back bay, LB spark, mulholland books, voracious)
- little, brown young readers (LBYR, christy ottaviano books, LB kids, LB ink, requited)
- orbit (orbit, redhook, run for it)
- running press (running press, RP kids)
- workman (storey, timber press, black dog & leventhal)
past imprint assignments:
- hachette nashville (center street, faith words, worthy publishing, worthy kids, ellie claire gifts)
- da capo (da capo, hachette go, hachette books)
- hachette audio
- running press (rp minis, rp studio, moon, avalon travel, rick steves)
- basic books group (basic books, seal press, public affairs, bold type books)
services:
graphic design, content/landing page structure assistance, maintaining titles and author information and images, UX best practices, web accessibility, content updates, troubleshooting, website support, CMS training, content migration, author site designs, author website maintenance, technical contact
workman imprints (via hachette book group)
imprint/publisher (migration, maintenance)
(2022 - present) technical contact
when HBG acquired workman back in 2021, we were tasked with migrating all of their websites into our one website.
workman was used to having their own separate websites vs how my job handles imprint content (within the HBG site). it was a massive undertaking to bring over all of their blog content and page content. i don't recall if they were utilizing wordpress or not, but there was some type of issue where we couldn't just export > import the content. it was quite daunting and took a few months to get everything fully imported.
i volunteered to take the very earthy storey and timber press imprints under my imprint responsibilities. i've been their technical contact since 2022 and enjoy working closely with their marketing teams.
services:
migration, imprint/content maintenance, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
samkean.com (via hachette book group)
author website (maintenance)
(2021 - present) technical contact
sam kean's website is one i've maintained over the years, alongside a wonderful marketing coworker named lauren. i can not take credit for designing this website, but i have contributed quite a number of updates - content, CSS/style changes, structural and some code tweaks here and there. i've jumped in for troubleshooting outdated code refactoring and i've most recently contributed to some featured content automation.
services:
content management, code maintenance, website maintenance, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
rp mystic (via hachette book group)
vertical website - magical/mystical products
(2022 - present) lead developer . technical contact
(2022) rp mystic is part of the running press family, offering magical and mystical wellness products and books. they used to showcase products via the RP imprint page, but they were looking to utilize specific branding. we built a full website that the marketing team keeps updated on a regular basis.
(2024) rp mystic needed a website refresh after building their site a few years back. i brought them into the new block editor and freshened up the stylesheet, based on newly provided design ideas. the hardworking content team and artwork truly brings everything together.
i'm honored to be an ongoing part of rp mystic, continuously working closely alongside a wonderful marketer.
services:
website design, WordPress child theme development, block editor conversion, code refactoring, code maintenance, CMS training, website design refresh, responsive design, web accessibility, sass, website maintenance, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
brain quest (via hachette book group)
educational products
(2022 - present) lead developer . technical contact
if you've never heard of brain quest, here's some info! the company that i work for bought the publisher that owns brain quest, and when they joined our company, we brought them into our CMS.
alongside migrating the content, we also gave them a fresh website theme. i designed the first two drafts, then in the final design drafts, i requested that the in-house brain quest illustrators/graphic designers contribute to the site imagery (banners, icons, special logos and such), because of how familiar they are with the products. the illustrations made all of the fun colours just POP! it was a super fun collaboration.
services:
website design, wordpress child theme, responsive design, web accessibilty, content migration, heavy css customization to work alongside gutenberg blocks, graphic design, sass, website maintenance, CMS training, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
novelsuspects.com (via hachette book group)
vertical website - crime fiction (maintenance)
novel suspects is a vertical at HBG that features true crime, crime fiction, thrillers, mysteries, etc. - over the years, i've had a hand in maintaining the NS website. code, content and helping out the marketing team. i've built a rapport with the people who run the website, and while i'm no longer the point of technical contact, i still collaborate with them whenever necessary. most recently, i implemented new ecomm features to the NS site that didn't exist before.
services:
content management, code maintenance, website maintenance, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
thenovl.com (via hachette book group)
vertical website - YA books (community)
(2020 - present) lead developer . technical contact
(2020) NOVL was built on squarespace, and had to be converted into a WordPress website and moved into our website's ecosystem. we mimicked a lot of their original theme, but made vast improvements and customized a lot of new features. we implemented better web accessibility wherever possible.
i've added images showcasing an unused theme that i designed below under the "site images" section. ultimately, they wanted to stick with the theme they had on squarespace.
(2023) NOVL needed to be converted from classic editor/custom modules over to the gutenberg block editor AND had to be reformatted for a new parent/child theme. this took extensive conversion work because of how custom we had to base the site around our former content modules, taxonomy overrides, content overrides, etc. - it was almost like rebuilding the site!
(2024/2025) the company decided to enable ecomm on our websites. i had to enable it and i added our new site-wide, customized cart/currency choice elements. this also entailed reworking the header.
services:
squarespace to wordpress conversion, content overhaul, wordpress child theme, heavy module customization, content maintenance, website development, WordPress block editor conversion, heavy css/blocks customization, sass, enabled/implemented ecomm elements
other site images (unused drafts, archives)
elinhilderbrand.net (via hachette book group)
author website (maintenance)
i've jumped in to contribute to elin hilderbrand's website tons over the years. elin is the queen of beach reads and since she is published under little, brown, i had the honor of maintaining her site for years.
most recently, i implemented new ecomm features to elin's site that didn't exist before. over time, i've contributed to content updates, code maintenance, structure/site changes, creating landing pages and editing title pages.
services:
content management, code maintenance, website maintenance, troubleshooting, website support
sistersfirst.com (via hachette book group)
book website
(2019/RETIRED SITE) jenna bush hager and barbara pierce bush wrote two books - one about being sisters and one about becoming sisters. one book was about their upbringing in the white house with their grandfather and father, and the other was a fictional, illustrated book for children about a little girl gaining a sister.
i'm not quite sure who designed this website, but the developer that was tasked with building it out originally wasn't hitting the mark, and wasn't implementing user-friendly UX. i stepped in and took over the project per my manager. i removed some over-the-top UX decisions, added a sticky nav and refactored/rebuilt the styles and page from scratch before launching the one page site.
services:
wordpress child theme, code refactoring, UX improvements, sass, jQuery additions, content management, responsive design
"catch and kill" landing page (via hachette book group)
author landing page
upon releasing his bestselling new book, i was asked to create a landing page for ronan farrow with select press and event information covering "Catch and Kill" for marketing purposes. we kept it as clean and simple as possible, and kept it cohesive within the LB imprint theme.
while i admittedly agree this isn't visually amazing, i was honored to have any small part in it.
services:
custom, enhanced landing page (wordpress)
HSB (via hachette book group)
authors // public speaking
this website is a service in which my job provides so that authors can be hired for public speaking. this was a site that fell in my lap from years of neglect and no maintenance or content updating. my former manager and i revived it, we migrated all of the old content into a cleaner and more updated layout, and brought it up to speed with best practices and for SEO.
the site ended up being extremely basic, because no one was really spearheading the project. we didn't have any internal input other than our design's approval. we kept it very simple and were hoping content would fill the pages of this website, but the team that was hired never really took hold of content.
after months of trying to have the team restructure and refresh the homepage and engage users with content (ie: blog posts, which i pointed out were good for SEO), a homepage slideshow and CTAs to further content, i gave up on hoping the marketing team would take control. since the stars of the websites are the authors, i created an engaging, reusable template for each author page -- this would require specific content elements (image, bio, social media, video if possible, articles, etc.). the speaker pages were the only pages that ever really updated on my tenure.
my former manager and i came up with a new, refreshed template we wanted to apply to the existing site pages to refresh it a bit and fill content empty areas with visual elements, but it was refused. their team instead settled on hiring an outside web person to design/"build" a flashier new site, which i had no hand in (it's a bloated/drag and drop builder site), so i linked to an archived version of the website.
services:
website design, website build on WordPress, WordPress block editor conversion, reformatting styles, code refactoring, CMS training, website design refresh, responsive design, web accessibility, sass, website maintenance
jamespatterson.com (via hachette book group)
author website (maintenance)
while i did not design/build the james patterson website (my very talented friend sarai did), i have been tasked to occasionally maintain his website over the years -- both code and content.
during the build phase, i had just started working at HBG and i was pulled in and tasked with migrating all of james's movie reviews onto his new website. there were HUNDREDS to be reformatted and migrated over. it was teeeeeeedious, but fun! james's personality really shines through in his movie reviews - my biggest takeaway: james LOVES madea movies, lol.
i had also helped migrate tons of the books featured on readkiddoread.com, james patterson's personal initiative to get kids reading.
services:
content management, code maintenance, redirects, troubleshooting, website support
other site images (unused drafts, archives)
todd parr (via hachette book group)
author website
(2019 - present) lead developer . technical contact
(2019) todd parr is a brilliant, funny and caring children's author. i was paired with todd early on as a content manager for his existing website, and then we moved him over to a wordpress website via our CMS at work.
i have been dealing with todd directly through the Little, Brown Young Readers imprint at work, and I couldn't be more pleased as an intro to working with authors. i can't say enough about this kind author.
when i was first given todd's property to work on, it very much SCREAMED me. i am a very colorful person, just as todd is. i knew working on his website was going to be fun, and i wanted to ensure that we kept that playful vibe when coming over to our CMS. i made sure that there were bits and pieces of over-the-top flare (his various headers on internal pages as well as a featured carousel slideshow on the homepage, featuring custom backgrounds) and we also ended up creating a custom video player module we will most likely end up using for our global site. i ended up rearranging the page flow a bit, and we minimized and reorganized content so that users could easily find what they were looking for.
services:
static to wordpress site conversion, wordpress child theme, custom media module, graphic design, content maintenance, website development, CMS training, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
malcolm gladwell (via hachette book group)
author website
(2019 - present) lead developer . technical contact
(2019) not only is Malcolm Gladwell a New York Times bestselling author, but he is also included in the TIME 100 Most Influential People list. to have this on my roster here is humbling and i feel extremely fortunate to have had the opportunity to build this website. this website was assigned to me at work through Hachette Book Group and the Little, Brown and Company imprint.
i kept the design as clean and minimal as possible, aside from the pops of blue/green from the cover of "talking to strangers" and the talk bubble backgrounds.
services:
wordpress child theme, responsive design, graphic design, website design, content maintenance, website development, technical contact, troubleshooting, website support
whoisbarrysonnenfeld.com (via hachette book group)
author landing page
my job published a highly entertaining memoir with/for film director/cinematographer barry sonnenfeld (um, hi, addams family values is one of my favorite childhood movies!!!1), and i was graced with creating the landing page for it. while it's only a one page, enhanced landing page, i am honored as a fan to be the one who created it.
barry wanted it to look like an old (vintage) resume, so we were going to create key areas with hand-drawn aspects and also add a video content area. for now, this is the placeholder page. i tried to keep it clean and minimal, sort of like it was laid out like a resume (even adding a paper texture to the background), but still reflecting the book cover shapes and colors for cohesive purposes. once content fills up, it will reflect the "resume" look a bit more.
services:
wordpress child theme, custom/enhanced landing page
grunberger interiors (via loudegg.com)
interior decorator
(2019) addition of custom press content module.
(2018) claudia was looking for a full website to showcase her interior decorating portfolio. i customized templates/content management so she could easily log in and add new information, testimonials, projects and images to her gallery.
services:
website design, website development, responsive design, wordpress install
client testimonial:
"It is not often that I take the time to write a review about someone, that is, unless I find that they did an outstanding job for me. Jessica definitely belongs in that category. She recently designed the website for my interior design business. I am a tech novice, and found the mere idea of creating a website very daunting and intimidating. Jessica guided me through each step of the process with unlimited patience and skill. She helped me decide on the overall layout and structure, writing fonts, as well as colors and other design elements. She spent countless hours going through every minute detail with me, as well as teaching me how to edit the site independently for the future. She was an absolute pleasure to work with, and I must say that I really looked forward to our editing sessions together, despite my poor computer skills. The results speak for themselves. I consider my website to be one of the nicest interior designer websites that I have seen - I had spent extensive time researching others in order to see the competition. It looks very professional, and is easy to navigate and very pleasing to the eye. I have received numerous compliments and would highly recommend Jessica's services to anyone." - claudia grunberger
anne robin (via edit.com)
calligraphy website
(2011) through my former employer, i built anne's calligraphy website on wordpress from a provided PSD file. i really enjoyed this beautiful, non-traditional layout.
this theme work is no longer in use, the URL reflects an archived version online.
services:
WordPress build from client-provided PSDs
camp woodmont (via edit.com)
sleepaway camp
when we received camp woodmont's original website, it was aesthetically outdated and pretty disorganized. we converted it into a fully redesigned wordpress build, to bring them up to date, reorganized the flow of content and set the website up for self-maintenance.
this theme work is no longer in use, the URL reflects an archived version online.
services:
mania hair salon (via edit.com)
hair salon
this was a fully customized wordpress build from various client-provided PSD's.
this theme work is no longer in use, the URL reflects an archived version online.
services:
cancun wood flooring (via edit.com)
flooring company portfolio
while not the most aesthetically enticing item in my portfolio, we improved this website that was built on yahoo site builder, which was AWFUL, slow and annoying to get into for maintenance. every section and piece of content on the website had to be converted and i rebuilt the entire site. i brought everything over into a static website, so that the client would be able to edit everything via our company's custom website editor.
the website has since switched over from our static website, so work is no longer in use. the URL reflects an archived version online.
services:
carlisle classic homes (via edit.com)
construction/remodeling
(2011)
services:
WordPress install/build, setup for website content self-management
geothermal science, inc. (via edit.com)
geothermal consulting services
(2011)
services:
WordPress install/build, setup for website content self-management