Coastal Creative — Agency Website & CMS

The challenge

Coastal Creative is a boutique design and advertising agency that had been running on a Squarespace site for four years. As their project portfolio grew and the team expanded, the limitations became painful: no way to create rich case study pages, no consistent component library, and a site that looked dated compared to the brand work they were producing for clients.

They needed something that reflected the craft of their work — and that their team could actually maintain without calling a developer every time they wanted to add a project.

What we built

We designed and developed a custom Next.js website with Sanity as the CMS, built around a component system that balances editorial freedom with visual consistency.

Shipped features:

• Portfolio grid with filterable project categories and animated hover states
• Structured case study pages with a flexible section builder (hero, text, image grid, full-bleed media, pull quotes)
• Team page with Sanity-managed bios and headshots
• Services overview with anchor navigation
• Blog with tagging and estimated read time
• Contact page with a server-action form routed to their project management inbox

We also delivered a component inventory document so that any contractor they hire in the future can work within the design system.

How we worked

Coastal Creative has strong design opinions — they came in with a visual direction already sketched out. We ran a fast one-week design phase (mostly working with their existing moodboard) and moved to build quickly.

Because the Sanity schema was designed collaboratively with their content lead, they were publishing their first real case study two days after we handed over the keys.

Results

The site launched six weeks after kick-off. Their team was self-sufficient on content from day two.

Three months later, the agency reported that several new business pitches referenced the website directly — potential clients had done research before the first call and arrived already familiar with the agency's work. One client explicitly said the case study format gave them the confidence to sign without a lengthy proposal process.