Case study · House of Mews Rescue
Giving a cat rescue complete control over its website
The problem
Adoptable pets came in through a third-party embed, but the rest of the site was static and outdated, so events, “Happy Tails” success stories, and everything else could only be changed by editing code.
What I did
I wireframed a new structure with dedicated, easily scannable layouts for pets, events, and Happy Tails stories, then built it as a dynamically managed site the staff can update themselves.
The result
[The change you can point to — a number if you have one, an observed behavior if not.]
Context
House of Mews Rescue is a Northeast Ohio nonprofit providing fostering, adoption, and long-term medical care for stray cats and kittens.
This was a full website redesign, moving the rescue from a mostly static, outdated site to a modern, dynamically managed one. Adoptable pet listings already updated automatically through a third-party embed; the redesign gave staff that same independence for events, Happy Tails success stories, and the rest of the site, without touching code.
Constraints
No budget. As a small rescue, House of Mews puts every dollar toward the cats. The new site had to cost less to run than the old one, not just less to build. I donated my time, so the build was free, but ongoing hosting and tools had to fit a nonprofit’s budget.
Non-technical maintainers. The site is maintained by the rescue’s owners, volunteers in their 55+ age range who are comfortable with email and Facebook but not code. Apart from a third-party embed for adoptable cats, every update to the old HTML/CSS site needed a developer. The new one had to let them update adoptable cats, events, and announcements on their own.
Constantly changing content. Adoptable cats come and go weekly. If updates depended on me, the listings would go stale, and stale listings cost adoptions.
Finite volunteer support. I wasn’t on retainer, so the site had to keep working without me. My role after launch needed to be “call if something breaks,” not routine maintenance.
What I learned
[How you found out what was wrong: conversations with staff and volunteers, a review of the old site, comparable rescue sites.]
- 01[Finding — stated as what users did, not what they said.]
- 02[Finding]
- 03[Finding]
Key decisions
Dedicated layouts for pets, events, and Happy Tails
I began with a set of wireframes establishing the new site’s structure — dedicated, easily scannable layouts for adoptable pets, events, and Happy Tails stories, built so the team could update each of these areas themselves going forward. The wireframes below show that structure taking shape.
[Decision 2]
[Repeat the before / after / options pattern. Two or three decisions is plenty.]
Outcome
- [Metric][What it measures]
- [Metric][What it measures]
- [Metric][What it measures]
[No hard numbers? Describe observed changes — e.g. how often staff now update the site, adoption inquiries, volunteer sign-ups.]
What I’d do next
[One honest paragraph: what you’d test, change, or measure with more time. Reviewers read this as judgment.]