Katerina Machaira · 2022
Katerina Machaira — a portfolio the designer edits herself
A portfolio site for a UI/UX designer in Athens. Next.js on the front, Strapi behind it, so she publishes and reorders her own case studies without a developer in the loop.
- Role
- Full-stack developer
- Client
- Katerina Machaira
- Year
- 2022
- Stack
- Next.jsReactStrapiVercel
Problem
A designer's portfolio is the product they are judged on, and it changes constantly — a new case study, a reordered project list, a rewritten intro before an application goes out. Every one of those edits going through a developer means the site is always a little out of date.
Solution
Next.js for the site and Strapi as a headless CMS behind it. Case studies, images and copy are content entries rather than markup, so adding a project is a form she fills in. Static-first rendering on Vercel keeps the pages quick on a phone, which is where most of these links get opened.
Outcome
Three case studies live, and she has published and revised content since without needing me. The site has been her working portfolio through a job search rather than a thing she has to ask someone to update.
Placeholder body. The frontmatter above is real and already drives the card, the summary block and the meta description — this section is where the longer story goes once you write it.
The brief was ownership, not features
The functional requirements were small: a homepage, an about section, a list of case studies, a contact block. The requirement that shaped the build was that she should never have to ask me to change any of it.
Why a CMS and not Markdown
Markdown in the repo would have been simpler for me and useless for her. A headless CMS costs a bit more setup and moves the editing surface to somewhere she can actually reach, which is the whole point of the project.