It’s been 10 days of rebranding and 76 hours of designing, but I’m happy to finally present to you The New Armenyl.com! I decided to relaunch the design and brand of this website to mark its 5 year anniversary. Yes, 5 years! I can’t believe it either. The creation of this website and what it has come to be has been an incredible journey, from almost not creating it at all, to hiding it from everyone for years, to almost completely deleting it two years ago because I believed it had failed.
Armenyl.com was built on one philosophy “create your own happiness” wise words and my most cherished gift from my grandmother. Just like when she said this to me, years before, I was dispirited and lost in November of 2013. I had applied to my zillionth job after moving back to the states from France (and shifting career goals to magazine publications), and nothing was picking up. My life was in a dark place.
I decided to “revamp” my resume by including my Tumblr page which was then, more or less, my photography portfolio. But then, I started to think it was hurting my chances having “.tumblr” in my URL, so I considered paying to remove the .tumblr portion. That’s when the idea of creating a website was born. I didn’t think it would be anything beyond a resume portfolio, so I didn’t want to give it an important name like “Armenyl.”
What’s in a name?
Armenyl is a brand name I created in my pre-teens and have held onto for almost 20 years. I dreamed big, big dreams for the name and the last and most ridiculous thing I could do was use it for something as plain as a portfolio site. I brainstormed for days trying to think of another name, but it kept popping up. And one day while I sat on my bed to pray about it, the crazy idea came to me: what if you finally create Armenyl? Not the visual resume mess! but the actual Armenyl I dreamed about as a teen?! What if I finally live out my dream? I realized that I had just been waiting for some random, probably never-going-to-happen, time to create Armenyl. There was never a set timeline; it was just a dream floating in the air.
When your dreams scare you…
Like all big dreams, I panicked in fear at the thought of making it happen. That day I argued with God for hours. I said it wasn’t time. I called my mom to ask her if it wasn’t just the most ridiculous thing she’s heard! She didn’t think so! Why not? And if not now, then when?
Creating a path through Armenyl
By the last week of October in 2013, I finally made the decision to scratch my first idea of just creating a simple online portfolio and finally create ARMENYL. I was terrified and excited! The idea of creating my own world through pictures and stories was so exciting. I wrote a 33-page notebook about all my plans for the website and, reading it over now, I smile at all the list dreams of there that I have now made a reality. How I wanted to push myself to create a magazine website that speaks on all my favorite things using my photography. I went from wanting to work at a magazine to creating the magazine itself! Armed with web development skills from college, graphic design lessons, also from college; and, of course, the photography I had been trying to showcase, I set out to create a website that would be a reflection of all my skills coming together. The rule? No crazy idea was off the table. If I thought of something crazy like photographing myself in a field of sunflowers in front of dozens of people, we are doing it, if I wanted to create a cinemagraphs to share my ideas, on it! What about the street style documentaries I loved to see on my favorite websites? I am taking the pictures AND writing magazine-style articles about them. This website was self-taught but, best of all, self-made! Every single detail by heart and with soul. By October of 2016, I believed it “The greatest gift creativity ever gave me was in its teaching that nothing is impossible” I had a dreamed up a world and Armenyl.com would come to be what I created it for : a world I created to explore the extents of my gifts and talents.
The Rocky Road
A week before my site relaunch, a very famous style blogger shared news about her site’s 10 year anniversary, and a few others were sharing 1 year and 2-year anniversaries, and “there I was,” I thought “a failure.” A stark difference in success between their popularity and mine. People were picking up thousands of followers all over the place and I was barely anywhere near those numbers. Me, who started years before, who hoped to get opportunities with brands from this site, was nowhere near them. Two years ago, I grew so frustrated with the “success” of the website that I almost deleted it. The place I created to bring me joy was now causing me so much anxiety.
The day I decided to delete it, I cried like a mother being separated from her child. It was so hard. I couldn’t do it, and I realized it was because it felt like I was betraying myself and betraying this innocent thing, that was never created to be a quintessential blogger success. It was even ever created to be a blog for heaven sake!
It was created to become a world where I pushed the creative envelope and explored my gifts. A world I created through visual stories
But, somehow along the way, I had lost focus of that out of desperation. Desperation not only to meet financial needs but also for validation. To be approved by likes and followers that I was doing something right. When the site was not even created for them. It was created to a place of my creative expression and I had forgotten that. When you try to create posts similar to what is popular just to, in my case,—innocently—show brands that your skills are not only current to what’s in trend but that you can also easily adapt, the lines can get blurred and you can easily go from being yourself to copying others. By trying to show that I too could write articles like my favorite fashion websites or photograph(edit) like this other Instagram photographer, all in the name of a “resumé push” I lost my voice. I lost my voice in the captions and filter trends. I was chasing what was winning while piling dirt on and covering up my core story. And it all came from an innocent place, innocent promoting if you will, to give this site a chance out there.
Dusting off the dirt to see my reflection
While reflecting on new goals for the site last week…
I realized the only chance I could give this site was to find myself again and go back to the initial story of Armenyl. A place where I dream up ideas and create them, a place where I hope to bridge cultures through photojournalism, and rewrite stories of people and places that have been stigmatized by stereotypes, where I share our beautiful world, but most especially, and this is the core of Armenyl, a place where I push to see the ends of the gifts that God has put in me until I have exhausted it completely and have nothing more to say. But, in order to get back there, I have to start from a place of loving what I do wholeheartedly and doing it to serve, inspire, and make a positive difference.
THE NEW ARMENYL
The new Armenyl is driven by purpose and backed by an act of service to the world around me. I want to, most of all, create with meaning from now onwards, and use this tool, my gifts, in a way that touches, educates, and empowers others. I haven’t fully figured it all out yet, but I have some exciting ideas so far and the new site features and layout has been designed to accommodate these new dreams.
I started the new site with a completely blank white screen website and created every single block and page from scratch. I obsessed over details like spacing, even in pixels, between sections, choosing the right articles to show and whether they should be slides, all small squares, the wording for all the titles, fonts, colors—absolutely nothing was left to chance in the 76 or so hours I sat at my desk to create it. Even designing a separate mobile site inspired by apps I love like Instagram and Pinterest. I created a mood for how I wanted every category on this site to feel like and what I want it to say to you, it has been the most detailed website design yet with each page and section offering a unique feel and experience.
New features
My favorites so far are the travel and beauty page. Love, Armenyl is another page I love! It is broken up between my visual diaries and self-portrait photography as well as a new section called sincerely,. Another new section called Faces highlights my street portrait photography (in case you didn’t know, this genre is where I started my photography journey) and of course lots more ways to view my travel postcards. Not forgetting the street style photos most of you visit my site for is now bigger (literally!) and better! There are so many more features, and I encourage you to explore your heart out and send me any suggestions you want to see below!
What are your favorite features? What could be better? What isn’t functioning properly? I want to hear them all as I push to create a site that entertains, inspires, and empowers you. Please don’t be shy in the comment section! For this particular post, I really need to hear from you! Say something even a simple hi, so I know who my old and new audiences are and create with you in mind and also I don’t feel like I’m talking to the air all the time! (just this once haha!) and if you love it please tell all your friends!
Thank you!
To all my old visitors who have been around from the very beginning Thank you! I know you are mostly family I bother excessively about checking out my website but I am so grateful for you. Special thanks to my mom for always pushing and challenging me and for all you continue to do to help my dreams come true. My dad, brothers & cousins for always supporting and listening patiently to my “new strategies” every time in our fake business meetings lol! I say it all the time that Armenyl.com is a one-person team, but really you are my team. Thank you of course to all my new readers especially those I’ve gotten to meet this year, I am so happy to have you join me on this journey! Thank you for promoting and believing in me!
Thank you above all to God, for the gift He put in my heart and the power and courage to get here and move to greater heights.
P.S I just found out my first ever published post on my website was actually also on this day 5 years ago. It was and still is my prayer.
With all my heart,
