Case Study

Motherlode Website Design & Development

Industry: Custom Apparel & Screen Printing
Location: Park City, Utah
Launched: 2023
Platform: WordPress & Elementor

Services

The Client

Motherlode is a screen printing studio that has been bringing fully customized apparel to Park City, Utah, and the surrounding area since 2015. From its shop on Bonanza Drive, the team prints tees, hoodies, hats and bags for local businesses, brands, events and families, using screen printing, direct-to-garment printing, embroidery and vinyl, and brings a portable press to events for live printing. Motherlode also designs and sells its own Park City apparel and teaches hands-on screen printing workshops.

The Challenge

Motherlode has been printing custom apparel in Park City since 2015, for local businesses, events, families and visitors. Its old website was a stock Shopify store theme that opened with "Shop Our Designs" and a grid of T-shirt and hoodie categories. That works for selling souvenir tees, but it buried the work that keeps the shop's presses busy: custom screen printing for other people's designs.

Custom orders also raise a lot of questions. Customers want to know the minimum order, what the shirts will cost, which blank to pick, what files to send and how long it will take. The old site had little room for those answers, so most of them ended up as phone calls and emails, and the studio's own character, the local, slightly irreverent shop on Bonanza Drive, barely came through.

Our Approach

We rebuilt the site around one main action: starting a custom order. A "Start a Custom Order" button sits in the header of every page, and every page ends with the same call to action. The Custom Screen Printing page walks through the ordering process in four steps and explains each printing method, from screen printing and DTG to embroidery, vinyl and live printing at events, with real minimums and price ranges.

The design gives Motherlode a look as distinctive as its prints: a bold retro serif, the brand's gold yellow, rounded photo frames and real photos from the shop and around Park City. It all runs on WordPress and Elementor, so the team can add new projects, client logos and workshop details on their own.

Hover to scroll the page.

What We Built

Behind the retro look is a site built to turn ideas into orders. Choose a feature to see it on the live site.

The custom order form asks only what the shop needs to get started, including contact details, a preferred way to get in touch (phone, email or in person) and a free-form description of the order. It's one click away from anywhere on the site, through the header button.
The Our Work page shows recent projects for local businesses and brands in a gallery visitors can filter by tees, hats and bags. It links straight to Motherlode's Instagram, where the newest work shows up first.
The Past Clients page shows how much of the local business community already wears Motherlode prints, with logos from Backcountry.com and Wasatch Brewery to DoubleTree by Hilton and Vail Resorts. For a new customer, it's a quick way to see the shop is trusted.
Every order starts with a good base garment, so we gave the shop's favorites their own page. Tees, long-sleeves and hoodies from Bella Canvas, Comfort Colors, District and Independent each get a photo and a short, plain-spoken description to help customers choose.
Motherlode also teaches screen printing, and the workshops page sells the experience as a date night, a family activity or something new to try. It covers the price, what happens in the one to two hour session and how to prepare artwork.
An FAQ accordion handles the questions the shop hears every day, from bringing your own blanks and one-off photo shirts to file formats, cost and design help. Customers get answers right away, and the team spends less time on repeat questions.

The Results

client logos on the Past Clients wall: 37client logos on the Past Clients wall
projects in the filterable portfolio: 14projects in the filterable portfolio
recommended blanks, each with its own write-up: 9recommended blanks, each with its own write-up
printing methods explained, with minimums and pricing: 5printing methods explained, with minimums and pricing

A site with the shop's personality

The retro type, gold yellow and playful touches, like store hours that list Sunday as "Snowboarding or Skateboarding," make the site feel like the shop itself. Motherlode now looks like a local studio with its own style, not a generic merch store.

Custom orders up front

Custom screen printing, the core of the business, is now the main path through the site. Every page leads to the order form, so visitors who are ready to order never have to look for the next step.

Fewer back-and-forth questions

Minimums, price ranges, turnaround times, garment options and file requirements are all on the site. Customers arrive at the order form already knowing what to expect, and the team spends less time answering the same questions.

Fast, and easy to keep current

The site scores 98 for performance in Google Lighthouse on desktop and works just as well on a phone. Because it's built on WordPress and Elementor, the team can add new projects, client logos and workshop details without a developer.

Performance

Accessibility

100

Best Practices

100

SEO

Google Lighthouse (desktop), measured October 2026.