Case study: British Library Events
A bespoke Tessitura-integrated event listings website for the nation's library
The British Library is the UK’s national library, holding one of the largest collections of printed material in the world. They also host exhibitions and run hundreds of events every year.
The Library's large programme of cultural, learning, business and research events and exhibitions attracts a wide audience of around half a million visitors annually. The programme includes four major exhibitions, over 500 one-off events, learning visits, tours and courses.
Supercool were commissioned to create the British Library's What's On website.
A user-focused website
This project involved multiple phases, deep integration with Tessitura, and extensive user testing. In fact, we ran user-testing sessions at every stage of the project. This allowed us to thoroughly stress-test our ideas, and ensure that users were at the heart of every decision.
Accessibility considerations
As a result of findings from user-testing, we built some nifty accessibility styling into TNEW.
If a user has configured their general device settings to 'Dark Mode', all of the TNEW views they access are presented as a specific 'Dark Mode' design. Respecting people's pre-selected preferences where we can is an important part of accessibility.
The website's very easy to navigate, so it's very easy to find the information you're looking for. The search function works really well too, and the booking process is straightforward.
User testing participant
Nifty TNEW imports
To help the British Library team, we built a custom import that pulls Events and 'Seasons' from Tessitura directly into the CMS. This streamlines content admin, saving time behind the scenes.
In addition to helping the Library team, we also found another way to help website users.
A 'Season' is how the Library defines a group of events within their annual programme, with each Season being part of a specific financial year. Although they're important to the Library as an organisation, Seasons don't really mean anything to users. (Because their defining factor is the British Library's financial year – not something an online ticket booker is likely to know or be thinking about!)
User testing showed that events belonging to different Seasons being apparently randomly split up across financial years was confusing.
So, we devised a nifty way to configure the import to combine Seasons. Now, when Season activities run across more than one financial year, the website simply combines them; displaying them together rather than splitting them up. This makes much more sense for users!
Happily ever after …
The end result is a website that seamlessly integrates with Tessitura and TNEW – providing a platform for the British Library team to showcase their impressive programme of events, exhibitions, learning opportunities and more.
An events website that's super-easy to use – for the British Library team and their ticket bookers alike: events.bl.uk
In terms of usability, it's excellent I would say.
User testing participant