Web Design
Nottingham Varsity, 2025
A central hub for fixtures, results, teams, and event details, highlighting the NTU vs. UoN rivalry
Timeline:
November 2024 - January 2025
Tools:
Figma
Role:
Web Designer
In keeping with the city’s sporting heritage, NTU and UoN come face to face every year in our annual Notts Varsity sporting series. This two-week celebration of sporting talent is a classic tale of local rivalry dating back to the first Varsity football event in 2001, and brings together students from both universities to compete at the city’s top venues.
The previous Notts Varsity website, built on WordPress, lacked a modern and user-friendly design, making navigation and accessibility challenging. As a result, we were tasked with a complete redesign to create a more engaging, intuitive, and visually updated experience.
Previous Design Situation
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Outdated and unappealing design: The old website had a cluttered, visually outdated layout that lacked modern UI practices, making it feel disconnected from the vibrant and competitive spirit of the Varsity series.
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Off-brand and inconsistent visuals: It didn’t align with the current brand identity of the Varsity event, resulting in a disjointed experience that didn’t reflect the professionalism or energy of either university.
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Limited functionality and poor user flow: Important actions like purchasing tickets required users to leave the site and visit an external platform, creating friction and reducing engagement.
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Not mobile-friendly: The site wasn’t optimized for mobile devices, which impacted accessibility and usability for students who primarily browse on phones or tablets.
Lo-Fi Wireframes
New Design
Outcomes
The new website received overwhelmingly positive feedback from both the universities and the student community. Users appreciated the clean, modern design that brought a fresh and professional look to the Varsity series—something the previous website lacked. The updated layout and visual identity aligned perfectly with the event’s energetic and competitive spirit, making it feel more current and engaging.
Students especially responded well to the newly introduced features, such as the countdown timer, fixtures and results section, and integrated ticketing—all of which made the site more interactive and convenient. These enhancements not only improved usability but also helped build anticipation and excitement around the event, leading to higher engagement across the board.
Learnings
One of the key takeaways from this project was the importance of adaptability in collaborative workflows. The initial design was created with WordPress limitations in mind, as the plan was to implement the site using that platform in collaboration with another team. However, due to unforeseen changes, we had to pivot quickly. The implementation ended up being done from scratch by a developer on our team who wasn’t originally involved in the project.
This shift challenged us to stay agile, communicate effectively, and ensure the design remained flexible enough to transition smoothly into a custom build—all while staying on track with tight deadlines. It was a valuable experience in balancing design constraints with real-world changes, and reinforced the importance of clear handovers and contingency planning in cross-functional projects.
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