An editorial portfolio for an NYC photographer.

The brief: feel like a magazine, work like a funnel.

Jesse came to me with a Squarespace site that was beautiful but slow, hard to update, and converting maybe one inquiry a month. He wanted something that felt closer to a print monograph than a typical photographer template — but still ranked locally and made it obvious how to book.

The constraint: he had to be able to upload a new shoot in under five minutes without calling me.

A custom WP build with editorial bones.

I built a custom WordPress theme with ACF Pro for image grouping, full-bleed gallery layouts, and a typography system pulled straight from print design references. Performance was a hard requirement — Jesse's audience scrolls a lot, on mobile, on subways with bad signal.

• Custom WP themeStripped-down install, no page-builder bloat, every block intentional.
• Image pipelineLazy-loaded WebP with srcset baked into ACF — works on subway data.
• Booking flowNo popup, no calendar embed — one focused form below the fold.
• Local SEOSchema, GBP cleanup, and neighborhood landing pages for BK & Manhattan.
• 5-min upload flowDrag, tag, publish — Jesse uploads every shoot himself, no calls to me.
• Performance budgetSub-second LCP locked in by a CI step on every PR. Stays fast forever.

Inquiries doubled in the first quarter.

The site shipped in March 2024 and started ranking for "[neighborhood] photographer" queries within six weeks. Booking inquiries doubled by the end of Q2 — and Jesse's been able to upload every shoot himself since launch.