week 1
Discovery in Manhattan.
On-site workshop at your office or ours. Brand, audience, IA, competitor audit, design direction. Half day minimum; two days for flagship projects.
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§ · location · nyc web design
Web design agency, New York.
A design-led web agency serving NYC brands from our Manhattan office. Editorial aesthetic, Core Web Vitals green on launch, WCAG 2.1 AA baked in. Eastern Time, same-day response Mon-Fri 9-6 ET.
§ 01 · nyc design context
Editorial standard. NYC audience.
New York brands ship to an audience that reads The New Yorker, sees Bloomberg terminals every day, and has been desensitized to the ad creative of every DTC brand since 2015. The design bar is higher than anywhere else in the US — not because NYC designers are better, but because the audience has seen more. Our NYC web design work leans editorial by default: real typography, restraint on motion, product photography that looks like it belongs in a magazine rather than on a pitch deck. The Core Web Vitals and WCAG 2.1 AA floor is non-negotiable; the visual ambition lives on top of that floor, never instead of it.
§ 02 · who we design for in NYC
Four brand archetypes. One design bar.
DTC fashion and apparel in SoHo and DUMBO. Brands raised on Glossier and Everlane's original editorial era, now outgrowing Shopify's starter themes. Need custom theme work that matches brand-book rigor without losing Shopify admin speed. Photography-forward PDP, strong lookbook sections, press coverage surfaces.
Beauty and wellness spanning DTC and retail. Brands operating in both Sephora and direct channels. Site needs to serve retail buyers checking store locator plus DTC customers navigating subscription. Dual-flow navigation without clutter.
Hospitality and lifestyle. Hotels, restaurants, wellness studios, private clubs — sites that need brochure content plus a booking flow. Editorial photography frequently supplied by the client; we design typography and layout that does not compete with the imagery.
B2B SaaS and professional services in Flatiron, Hudson Square, Midtown. Marketing sites where the design has to look credible to a Series B investor or a Fortune 500 procurement lead. Readable, typographically serious, no illustrations of smiling people at laptops.
§ 03 · how we work with nyc brands
In-person discovery. Weekly demos.
weeks 2-4
Direction + system.
3 design directions for the homepage and one interior template. Review on-screen together (not PDF sent to inbox), chosen direction refined into the design system.
weeks 5-10
Build with weekly demos.
Every Friday ET: working demo of real code in a real environment. Response SLA: same-day for review questions Mon-Fri 9-6 ET.
weeks 11-14
Launch + 90-day recovery.
Tuesday ET launch (never Friday). Rank and CWV monitored daily for 2 weeks, weekly after that. Day-90 written recovery report closes the project or transitions to retainer.
§ 04 · looking for a web design agency near you in nyc?
Why NYC brands find us first.
Looking for a web design agency near you in New York? Most NYC searches for "web design agency near me" or "web designer New York" surface the same 20 or so firms. Our work shows up in that set because our NYC case studies are real, our CWV performance is documented, and we have been designing for Manhattan brands since 2017. The proof is on the work, not in this paragraph. Ask any reference we send you to pull up their PageSpeed Insights score and their WCAG audit report; both are always in the green.
NYC resources we lean on. The New York City metro map when planning in-person sessions, the NYC Economic Development Corporation for industry cluster context, and the NYC fashion week calendar for launch-timing decisions with fashion brands.
§ 05 · questions
Five answers.
Do you have a team in New York?
Yes. We staff senior designers and engineers on Eastern Time, with regular in-person strategy sessions in Manhattan. Most discovery workshops happen on-site in SoHo, Flatiron, or DUMBO depending on client office; build and iteration work happens remote with weekly recorded walkthroughs. Response SLAs run Mon-Fri 9-6 ET for non-urgent work and same-day for emergencies. For brands outside the metro, the working hours and cadence still align with ET.
What NYC brand categories do you specialize in?
Four categories drive the bulk of our NYC work. DTC fashion and apparel brands rebuilding from Squarespace or early Shopify themes. Beauty and wellness brands operating at the Sephora and Ulta retail tier alongside DTC. Hospitality and lifestyle brands (hotels, restaurants, spas) that need brochure-plus-booking sites with strong editorial photography. B2B SaaS and agency brands in the Flatiron and Midtown corridor needing modern marketing sites. All four share the same requirement: design that matches the editorial standard of NYC media without sacrificing Core Web Vitals or accessibility compliance.
How does NYC pricing compare to regional agencies?
Our pricing runs consistent with mid-market NYC design agencies — competitive against Manhattan boutiques (Gin Lane, Ueno, Red Antler archetype) and priced below the top enterprise agencies (Huge, R/GA). Full redesigns scope to the project requirements rather than a rate-card; a 10-14 week NYC DTC redesign typically lands in the five-figure-to-low-six-figure range depending on IA complexity, custom theme work, and SEO preservation scope. Every quote is scoped against a written requirements document with a change-request process.
How do you handle SEO preservation for an NYC brand redesign?
Three-phase plan that protects against the 30 to 60 percent post-redesign traffic drop most agencies cause. Phase one: full Google Search Console URL inventory, top-500 keyword ranking export, and on-page audit of every ranking page before any design work starts. Phase two: during build, every ranking URL carries title tag, meta description, and H1 forward verbatim; 301 redirect map built for every changed URL; CWV budget enforced so launch-day performance clears Google's ranking threshold. Phase three: daily rank monitoring for 90 days post-launch plus written recovery report at day 90.
Can we meet in person in NYC?
Yes. Discovery workshops are typically on-site in Manhattan — your office, our NYC workspace, or a neutral location like the Ace Hotel or Industrious Midtown depending on team size. We also run quarterly in-person design-review sessions for retainer clients. Most week-to-week work happens via weekly recorded demos plus Slack; same-ET working hours keep the cadence tight without unnecessary meetings.
§ 06 · book the manhattan discovery
Eastern Time. In-person on request.
30-minute scoping call on ET. Written scope and fixed-price quote in 48 hours. In-person discovery in Manhattan available for flagship engagements.