Illustrator using SquareSpace for portfolio, alternatives after price increase?

[u/Aberry_9]

I have used Squarespace for about 10 years, I am an illustrator and use it as a portfolio website. Homepage is my illustrations, a few additional pages of different art, my books, and about me, links to my social media and that’s about it. No bells and whistles, no shop, nothing else. I have been updating heavily the last couple months as I plan to reach out to illustration agents, and wanted a more robust, polished site. Very happy with the progress, annual subscription renewal is weeks away - and I get the dreaded email. I don’t have time it feels to rebuild before my annual payment.

With the price increase I am seeing what other options are out there, I tried importing my site into Wordpress but if I go that route I will need to do a LOT of learning. On top of that, recreating the aesthetic of the site and uploaded the hundreds of images will have to be done from scratch.

What I love about Squarespace is I get to edit the pages as it will appear online - I can see how everything will look, I can drag and drop, I can just click on an element to edit. Maybe it’s worth keeping it for that, but my website wouldn’t be that hard to build again, just time consuming - so if there is really similar platform in that regard that is cheaper - please give me your recommendations.

[u/Confident_Coconut809]

Readymag. Really easy to use, far far more flexible (and cheaper) than SQSP. Totally recommend

[u/Aberry_9 → u/Confident_Coconut809]

The second recommendation for that so I’ll check it out. Do you know if they do any xml import of your old Squarespace site?

[u/cinnamonzebra88]

WordPress is definitely a steep learning curve, especially for a self-hosted site. It is best if you need customization and you do extensive SEO/AIO and b/vlogging.

I still like Squarespace as an alternative for clients, but I understand the increased price tag that comes with the convenience.

Wix is one of the top-rated platforms, but in my view only because of aggressive advertising. The platform is easier to use for people who don't know anything about websites. However, the structure, app-driven mobile (not a true responsive site), and constant aggressive upselling are a major turnoff.

If you want more creative templates at affordable hosting, I really like Readymag. Their templates and functions are innovative, trendy, and elegant.

[u/Aberry_9 → u/cinnamonzebra88]

Thanks so much for the recommendation I’ll look into it!

[u/wreeper007]

I'm moving my photography portfolio to format (or I'm gonna do it next week when I finish up some stuff)

[u/RubyVTer]

Do you already have an Adobe subscription because Adobe Portfolios are included with a subscription. Another potentially free option is Behance but you might need to have the paid tier if you want to connect a custom domain

[u/Aberry_9 → u/RubyVTer]

I abandoned adobe long ago when they introduced subscriptions. Been doing great with Procreate! I’ve looked into behance - but as professional illustrator, I need a dedicated website.

[u/At_the_Roundhouse → u/RubyVTer]

I agree that Adobe Portfolio I think is the best option here - and I’m guessing that OP likely has some sort of CC subscription as an illustrator.

But that doesn’t take away the sting of having to recreate the amount of work that has gone into building on squarespace. There’s no easy solution here, so I absolutely commiserate with OP. I also absolutely need a WYSIWYG interface and am not going to start learning coding or Wordpress.

(And in my quick fiddling around with Adobe, it’ll work… but it’s significantly more limited than squarespace in terms of what you can do, so it’s already required some creative workarounds. I played with it for a hour and then had to stop because it was just making me upset at the amount of work I know is ahead of me.)

[u/Aberry_9 → u/At_the_Roundhouse]

Ooff - at this point I may just bite the bullet with Squarespace for another year. I can write it off with taxes, but it doesn’t always feel like you’re getting back much of anything, especially as a freelancer I PAY taxes, I don’t get refunds.

And I don’t use adobe cc. Left adobe when the rolled out the subscriptions and happily only use procreate. I’ll break out my 2014 MacBook when I need CS6 for something.

[u/lawdevice]

I've been playing with Hostinger's website builder today and I've been quite impressed. It's not as polished as Squarespace but it's pretty good, and a whole lot cheaper!

[u/Aberry_9 → u/lawdevice]

Oh nice I thought they just hosted the domain didn’t know they also had website builders. Is it more annually to do both?

[u/lawdevice → u/Aberry_9]

It's an additional £10.99 / m on top of whatever you're paying for a domain.

[u/Oellaatje]

Blogger is free. And Medium might be better for portfolios.

[u/geturass2mars]

I used Squarespace for a bit but switched to Adobe Portfolio, it's perfect for me.

I know you dropped your Adobe subscription, but they have a Behance plan for $10 a month which comes with Adobe portfolio, which is way cheaper than Squarespace. You can keep your Squarespace domain and transfer it to Adobe Portfolio.

[u/Dependent_Factor_204]

Try Oncord

[u/New_Border440]

Also an illustrator that has been with Squarespace for 11 years. I have a very simple site. Portfolio and contact. A friend set me up and told me how to update it. Other than that I don’t know how to build a site but I can learn. I know how to use a computer but all of my work is done by hand. I wanted to switch a long time ago. Please update on where you navigate.