Over recent months I’ve been speaking to various members of the team about how Wholegrain builds Humane Web experiences for our clients. Our MD Chris discussed how the agency is pushing the boundaries for ethical and sustainable web design. Bailey shone light on how we enable sustainable digital transformation. Tod showed how we put users first through our Discovery process. Chânelle talked about the joyful challenge of designing Humane websites.

This next conversation is with one of our senior developers. Tommy is our Technical Delivery Lead overseeing our coding standards, tech stack and much more.

This ended up being a more open ended conversation than some of the others in the series. At times it felt like a meditation on web development and coding, a calm and insightful conversation all at once.

Balance and board games

Our call started with me jealously coveting some Tintin wall art in the background of his office. It becomes clear that the simple artistic style of Herge’s comics offer an insight into who Tommy is. The analog nature of the books reflects his habit of getting away from the screen and technology as much as possible outside of work. Within the agency Tommy is renowned as a lover of board games. This sense of fun and competition translates well into inclusive and occasionally daft games to play on staff nights out. 

Tommy’s deep foundations with WordPress started 12 years ago in a tiny office in Worcester. At the time he was working with it as a user rather than a developer. Over time he started looking for coding solutions to solve challenges. The shift to WordPress developer began in earnest. In the intervening years a mixture of training, WordPress community participation, hands on experience and conference appearances have honed Tommy’s technical and problem solving skills to become a vital part of our developer team.

Today his experience and technical expertise make him the perfect fit for his role as Technical Delivery Lead. Internally he oversees the core codebase of our proprietary theme, owns the team tools and services and creates the process documentation that helps our team work smoothly. 

On the client work side he works closely with our Head of Experience, Tod on finding the right technical solutions for large, complex projects. His experience means he can be called upon for tricky tech support questions from clients and the dev team. 

Craftsmanship in coding

When Tommy talks about his work, the theme of craftsmanship comes up over and over again. He has a passion for making our sites as efficient, effective and robust as possible. While others in the team focus more on design and features, Tommy is busy ensuring our code base is crafted with care, attention and longevity in mind. 

Does this feel restrictive I wonder? 

A little perhaps, but Tommy views any constraints as a good thing, a structure to work within. He sees issues arising from adopting the latest CSS features. Wholegrain is in the business of building sites that have few barriers to entry. This includes technical barriers, where older devices or browsers can’t support the latest features reliably.Using a tool like Can I use to check how widely supported a new HTML or CSS feature is allows us to strike the right balance. Broadly speaking these features should be almost universally supported, but there is always room to manoeuvre given likely audiences and site intentions.

This brings us to another of the key themes I take from the conversation, balance. His “analogue” pastimes balance his technical, digital work. At work he pushes the agency to find balance in our output. This search has users at its main focus and means balancing usability, accessibility, sustainability and creativity. 

Does this impact how creative Wholegrain can be?

Not especially, particularly in light of Wholegrain’s sustainable and user focussed approach. In Tommy’s view, questions about how creative to be should always take into account a user’s needs. We should always be asking “what are you trying to solve”. Meeting user requirements is rarely a question of using the latest tech.

Respect your users and they will reward you

The best Wholegrain sites showcase our creativity without sacrificing usability and respect a user’s attention.  I ask if he has a favourite project where these elements come together. Operation Smile comes readily to mind. Wholegrain worked to improve their donation journey, which in Tommy’s words, was very nerdy work. 

The combination of complex coding and integrations, lots of important and open conversations and a worthy cause represents the best of what Wholegrain does. The end results were impactful too, resulting in a 141% increase in conversions, a reduced exit rate and most importantly a 161% increase in online donations. 

Sustainable Digital Transformation

Craft, efficiency and attention to detail is something that Tommy brings to our digital sustainability consulting projects. He loves helping to bring Wholegrain’s pedigree and experience to other organisations. 

Ever since Tom pioneered sustainable web development we’ve been building an institutional understanding of the issue. What seems obvious to our team is anything but obvious to other organisations. There is a joy in sharing our knowledge and watching understanding grow and behaviours change. Not only that but it’s a way of exploring issues away from our day to day or regular client base. 

It’s a learning experience for everyone involved and each project evolves our understanding. 

I’ve been asking other members of the team what aspect of Wholegrain’s working methods other agencies should adopt. His experiences of delving into some horribly tangled code bases informs his response. Developers should respect the craft of coding when it comes to creating websites. Choose quality over the cutting edge (or vibe coding).

This belief reflects his thoughts on AI coding too. Generative code, produced without a sense of craft or background in coding, is unlikely to meet Tommy’s strict standards when it comes to efficiency, simplicity or accessibility. Coupled to this, you’ve got to know who you are building a site for. 

There can be a massive difference between a site that will make your C-suite happy and a site that meets your user’s needs. AI’s tendency to support and reinforce your prompt rather than push back could exacerbate this problem. 

As you can see Tommy is the perfect person to set the standards for our sites. If you’d like a site crafted specifically for your users, people and planet, get in touch with Bailey to discuss a project.

I’ve been really excited to talk to Wholegrain’s Growth Manager, Bailey as part of our series introducing you to key members of our team. She is a true digital sustainability disciple and brings an energy and eclectic set of influences and ideas to all she does. Her role at the agency includes vetting potential new clients, pitching for projects, managing client projects and relationships as well as working to knit together our Sustainable Digital Transformation offering. 

I start our conversation asking about her inspirations. Typically she mentions a wide range of influences. Gardening features heavily in our initial discussions but otherwise a couple of newsletters stand out to me as illustrative. Creative Destruction and Dense Discovery are beautifully curated emails that aim to find connections and sense in an increasingly “noisy” world. They are inherently curious, pragmatic and realistic but also look to find joy and optimism where it can be found. All of these adjectives are descriptions I’d apply to Bailey too. 

Collaboration and BCorp alliances FTW

Connection and collaboration are key themes for Bailey. She is a keen advocate of the BCorp Agency Alliance. Her enthusiasm about the alignment she finds in this group, as well as a push towards collaborating for the greater good is infectious. While in other circumstances you might find agencies jostling for position, here there is a view that the collective is stronger when ethically driven agencies collaborate together. 

When I talk about her role at Wholegrain (WG), I put it to her that she could be seen as a bit of a protector of WG. Ethical screening and client and project alignment is of vital importance to how WG operates. Given that part of her role is to run prospective projects through the ethical screen policy does she see herself as a gatekeeper? 

She doesn’t quite agree with the characterization. It’s about calling aligned clients in, not blocking them out. Ethical screening is part of the picture but in reality it’s about spotting mutually beneficial relationships. You have to ask “can Wholegrain’s approach benefit a prospective client”? Will there be the right amount of synergy between client and agency to make things a roaring success? 

She points out that energy and effort in the team is not infinite. We have a holistic approach that benefits both clients and the Wholegrain team and we can’t do our best work if we’re overstretched. So Bailey sees part of her work as ensuring that those efforts are focussed on the right clients and the right projects. 

Sustainable Digital Transformation

Some of the most exciting projects Bailey has won for the agency recently are for our Sustainable Digital Transformation offering. Bailey tends to bring a positive energy to calls and meetings but when I start to discuss the transformation projects in the pipeline, this energy kicks up a notch (or three). 

Digital sustainability (DS) is what brought Bailey to Wholegrain. She describes when she first learned about the topic as being like a smack in the face. Our daily lives are digital and when you learn about the amount of energy and infrastructure that enables this you can’t help but be shocked. The scale can be mind blowing.

She cites emails as a powerful illustration.

• In 2025 approximately 376 billion emails were sent and received daily. That’s one hundred thirty-seven trillion two hundred forty billion (137,240,000,000,000) annually. 
• EcoSend estimates that this equates to an annual carbon footprint of 300 million tons CO₂ from emails worldwide.

There is a finite amount of energy that we can expend as a species and remain within safe planetary boundaries. But when your contribution to the problem remains almost infinitesimally small compared to the whole, what can you do? It can be hard to find a starting point to make improvements. As with so many sustainability issues it’s a case of starting small. Like many, Bailey discovered the Website Carbon tool at the start of her journey and it inspired her to greater action. 

The open sharing of knowledge that Website Carbon represents was an inspiration to Bailey. This transparency forms the cornerstone of her approach to DS and Sustainable Digital Transformation. But transparency and knowledge are nothing without positive action. “Like much of sustainability, DS is not a checkbox exercise. It’s a journey to better governance and behaviours”. 

Moving beyond carbon emissions

In many ways Bailey’s journey mirrors Wholegrain’s. Website Carbon represents a starting point, a way of benchmarking, with energy use and CO2e estimates as a metric. But at the core of Sustainable Digital Transformation is the concept of the Humane Web which moves things beyond carbon emissions.  

“CO2 has been the metric for so long but it’s a starting point.” It doesn’t take into account things like climate justice. “Climate change is unequally damaging”. While we in the global north benefit from access to digital services, the harm this causes is often visited on the global south. Issues like E-waste processing, low paid data tagging, arduous and dehumanising content moderation, resource extraction and climate change are all issues felt more keenly in developing nations. At the same time those nations can suffer from low data zones meaning a lack of access and lack of digital benefits. 

Our transformation services aim to take a more global view. Low cost digital platforms and storage have often created messy digital estates. As Bailey puts it “expansion without architecture is chaos”. As with the newsletters Bailey loves, you need to take a holistic view and look for connections, positivity, optimisation and solutions. This leads to asking questions like:

• How do your digital platforms fit together? 
• How do you improve usability for all? 
• How do you bake sustainability and accessibility into your projects from the start? 
• How do you facilitate digital decisions being made quickly, both internally and externally? 

Paradoxes and misconceptions 

From the outside it might seem paradoxical that the creators or Website Carbon are moving away from CO2e as the key element for digital sustainability. Bailey argues that it shows the field is maturing. After years of measuring, benchmarking and considering the sources of digital emissions, she sees Wholegrain as having the experience and mindset required to move the conversation and field forwards. 

I ask if Bailey sees any misconceptions around Wholegrain and the work we do. If there are any, they’re around how the web design process should happen. Too many agencies offer ungrounded designs that over-promise on their capabilities but end up under delivering.

The misconception is that it’s possible to create a fit purpose design without carrying out an effective exploratory discovery process. The findings from the process feed into our iterative design process. All of this allows us to deliver strong designs that not only look great but also work for you and your audience in the short, medium and long term.

Alignment is key here too. When Bailey lands work for clients who are completely aligned in purpose, mission and direction, the results are outstanding.

I ask what this alignment looks like in practice and Bailey cites one of the first projects she brought on board at Wholegrain, Environment Bank. From the very start of the process, there was total alignment, trust and collaboration. With both sides trusting the process and some award winning branding to work with, the result is a site that matches their aims. It’s handsome, robust and supports the work they do. 

Bailey points out that this idea of robustness highlights another misconception around Wholegrain and our process. We won’t only build a site that looks good but also one that is long lived, secure and maintainable. We sometimes inherit sites that look good on the front end but are messy to update and manage at the back end. Cutting corners and moving too quickly at the outset of a project can add technical debt and hugely increase the lifetime cost of a website, or necessitate a full rebuild. 

Why, why, why?

I remind Bailey that she is nearly two years into her time here and ask her what she’s learnt since joining the agency. “Asking why is more important than how or when”. To Bailey’s mind many of the issues we’ve discussed come up because not enough people ask about “the why”. If you don’t know “the why”, you can’t accurately answer how something needs to happen or when it could be finished. 

I can’t leave the conversation without asking about AI, a topic I know she has strong thoughts on. “Tech should enable our lives and not be a destination where we spend our lives”. Much of the AI discourse seems to be about integrating technology into every element of our lives. It’s not clear if the benefits outweigh the costs, be they financial, environmental or societal. If AI lives up to the hype, then maybe the benefits will outweigh the costs after all. 

She appreciates Wholegrain’s considered approach to the technology, pragmatically using solutions where appropriate. Integrating Holp onto the UKGBC site is one such example. Much of Wholegrain’s work is about making things as efficient as possible, so users can find answers and spend their time elsewhere afterwards, while minimising the impact at the same time. Weighing up the pros and cons of a service like Holp allows us to do that.

Ultimately, the evolution of DS and Wholegrain means that our digital experiences are meeting human needs. Our services and working practices can offer inspiration to others. We continue to show that you can put your users first while respecting and protecting the planet and humanity as a whole.

If you’ve been considering making your site more tailored to your community and mission, Bailey is all ears!

So far in this series I’ve spoken to Tod about our Discovery process and Chânelle about Designing for a Humane Web. Both these pieces give an insight into the processes the agency follows. But in this piece we’ll look at the bigger picture and talk to our MD Chris about how he is guiding Wholegrain. It’s nearly 3 years since Chris took over the day to day running of Wholegrain from founders Tom and Vineeta. It’s been a time of internal change but the direction has remained steadfast – building websites (and by extension a web) that are better for people and planet.

This article will give a better idea of what inspires and influences Chris, his thoughts on the sustainability space and his vision for the future of Wholegrain

Inspiration

I kick off our chat by asking what influences Chris both personally and professionally. I already know he’s one of the B Community’s foremost experts on vegan hot spots so I steer clear of this topic as it might derail my research. Chris describes himself as a serial hobbyist. “If it’s creative and something you can learn, I’m pretty much going to say yes – from pottery to sewing to painting, I’m happy using my hands to make something.” Having previously seen Chris’s incredible hand made backpack this definitely rings true. 

More surprising is a keen interest in Architecture. Chris is careful to stress that he’s got no idea of the names of buildings or even architects involved. For him it’s “about the impact space, light or form can have on you as a person”. When faced with a difficult project or decision he’ll often take these thoughts to different buildings or spaces. The simple act of changing your surroundings can be a great way of unsticking an issue. “It’s so interesting how something like a building, that is fundamentally about shelter and survival, can also provide creativity and emotion.” 

I’m keen to find out a little about his professional inspirations too. He comes alive when describing the creative services offered by Nice and Serious. “To me, they were a driving force behind what I think of when it comes to creativity for good.”. He’s reverent about the lack of ego and self promotion in their work and I hear echoes of what Wholegrain does best when he talks about “quality, creative work that is for the people who need it”. 

Dispelling the myth that BCorps only celebrate other BCorps, he also mentions the work Reuben Turner is doing at Rewild. He’s taken with the “gorgeous simplicity to how he approaches creativity” and the humanity of his work. Nowhere is this humanity more apparent than on his Five Things page. The distillation of Rewild’s philosophy into five simple pillars is something I see in Chris’s approach too, as well as the treatise that “Allies always win”. 

As a leader of a celebrated agency I’m interested in other organisations that Chris looks to for leadership and operational ideas. He highlights humanity as being incredibly important to him and it’s a theme that we will revisit over and over again in our conversation. Chris looks for organisations outside of the agency and BCorp bubbles to find people that live and breathe their values on a micro and macro level.

He highlights Hearth as an example. The Wholegrain team recently visited this social enterprise community bakery in Hackney. They “operate in such a circular way that when you see it, you can’t help but be inspired. The impact that individual people can have on the fundamental needs of others and the planet is really inspiring. I want that to be something I distill into Wholegrain.”

Wholegrain and the Humane Web

Humanity has always been important within Wholegrain and how we operate on a day to day basis. Nowhere was this more obvious than in the pioneering work done on Sustainable Web Design. It’s an oft repeated line but our founder Tom, literally wrote the book on the subject. Under Chris’s leadership, Wholegrain has been evolving. Sustainability is still a key but our operations and philosophy are becoming more holistic. Enter the concept of the Humane Web. 

As Chris puts it:

“For a long time Wholegrain has been at the forefront of digital sustainability but we also know that alone is not enough. The reality is that the internet needs far more nuance than just making it sustainable from a technical point of view – it should work for every person that needs it, wherever they are and however they access it. A Humane Web is the defined vision of that thought and it perfectly sums up how Wholegrain has evolved its ways of working over the past couple of years.”

The Humane Web concept is changing Wholegrain on a technical, operational and foundational level.

“Its changed the shape of our business and led to creating roles within our team that focus on experience design and technical delivery alongside the more traditional agency roles to design and build websites. It goes past the idea of ‘user centric’ and instead builds websites that enable users to define what that even means for them individually as they engage with your site – as an example, it leads us to consider users who want exploration and fact gathering in order to convert with equal weight to those who want quick conversion. 

Self paced, accessible both in terms of design and data and high performance built in, are key to everything we do.”

Low weight, highly performant, robustly coded and accessible Wordpress sites remain at the core of everything we do as an agency. We’ll be committed to building low carbon websites as long as we operate. But this evolving approach has allowed us to look beyond websites to be able to offer something more transformative. 

“We have crafted and defined a new service offering that stitches the work we do together across accessibility, sustainability and data inequality for organisations to go past just their website and consider the impact of their entire digital estate. Sustainable Digital Transformation is the best way to evolve and future proof everything digital in your organisation. 

It’s a really exciting evolution of what Wholegrain can do to further the mission of a Humane Web.”

I suggest that this approach might be seen to be at odds with the actions of the big tech firms that shape the way we browse and live online in today’s society. Invasive data gathering and massive data centre growth pushes on regardless of the societal and environmental costs they reap. 

How does he navigate that tension?

“The tension is definitely there but so is the simple fact that a more humane website is a better performing website in all areas. I hold that front and centre whenever we hit that tension because I don’t think there is any brief or hurdle that I’ve seen that can’t be solved with it. If you want to increase performance, a sustainable site does that. If you want increased conversion rates, robust experience design will deliver that. 



We can’t change big tech but we can show organisations and individuals that there is another, greener, fairer, more effective way.”

Inevitably Generative AI sneaks into the conversation at this point. I ask what one word springs to mind when Chris thinks of AI. After a moment’s thought, he settles on “regressive”. It’s not the technology itself that feels regressive rather the models the platforms are based on. 

“Any model, in any area of life, that is based on mass data input and then making decisions based on averages – feels regressive.” This belief has played a part in Wholegrain taking a cautious approach to AI adoption. As with any digital agency, it’s a constant presence in client and technical discussions. For the time being Chris doesn’t see this approach changing. 

Never say never though. 

“As we get further clarity on the benefits and negatives, there is definitely room for a more sympathetic and considered way of using AI and Wholegrain will follow that path.”

The bigger picture

Anyone who works in, or adjacent to the sustainability and purpose driven “sectors” will recognise that the past few years have been tough. The push back against environmental protections and equality by the Trump regime has sent unwanted ripples across the world. Charities and sustainability focussed organisations have suffered. Chris and others in Wholegrain’s leadership have worked tirelessly to protect the agency and team against this backdrop. 

More positively it looks like there are green shoots of recovery starting to become visible. The successes of Zohran Mamdani in New York and Hannah Spencer for the Green Party in Gorton and Denton have provided succour. Their successful campaigns have also marked a shift in sustainability messaging. Equality and quality of life are the core messages with sustainability an important but less explicit policy point. It’s something Chris and I have discussed a lot recently. 

I ask what organisations like Wholegrain could learn from this shift in approach and messaging. 

“Whilst Wholegrain has always led in digital sustainability, there is a legacy and baggage that comes with the word ‘sustainability’. That realisation runs parallel to a second, which is that in the world as it exists in 2026, what’s important is humanity. We see that with the evolution of the Green Parties core messaging and we will start to see that with Wholegrain evolution over the year ahead as we start to position ourselves more authentically to the agency we are now.” 

As I start to wrap up the conversation I ask what aspect of Wholegrains’ ethos he’d like to see other organisations and competitors adopt. Again, humanity is a key influence. 

“Short wins don’t benefit like long term impact does. I struggle to see why that wouldn’t be something that doesn’t steer your approach when it so clearly benefits the quality of your output, the impact of digital on the environment, the experience of the user and the clients ability to meet their goals.”

Additionally there is sometimes a lack of true authenticity in the “business for good” sector. Conversations with prospective clients in the sustainability space can be frustrating. “The amount of purpose or impact driven organisations that don’t live the same values in their digital space when the benefits are so undeniable on all levels.”.

As we often say in our presentations, digital is physical. You can’t separate your online and offline actions and decisions and policies when it comes to equality and sustainability. There is an idea that story telling and impact on a website comes from autoplay videos and heavyweight javascript powered features. Performance and environmental impact be damned. 

For my final question I keep things nice and easy.

What’s the thing that Chris is most proud of in his first 3 years at Wholegrain?

After mildly berating me for the question he considers and settles on “resilience”. As I mentioned earlier the past few years (most of Chris’s time in charge in fact) haven’t been made any easier by external factors. 

“Wholegrain has a legacy that was definitely heavy to carry when I first started and as a sector, agencies have not had an easy few years, but we are still here, still innovating and still moving the needle on what a purpose led business in our space can do. I’m proud of that.”  

For me, the most important thing innovative and ethical businesses and organisations can do is continue doing what they are doing. They have to keep carrying the torch and inspiring others to do better. With Chris at the helm, the Humane Web as a guiding light and resilience as a core tenet, Wholegrain looks well set to do just that. 


*Author’s note. In early drafts of this article I used phrases like “flesh out” or “adding meat to the bones” which are wildly inappropriate for our proudly plant powered MD. I briefly thought about using “adding pulses to the salad” but it didn’t quite land. If you’ve got plant based metaphors to use in place of carnivorous ones, drop me an email…

In our last article we discovered the Wholegrain Discovery process. Tod explained how the process helps align our projects and identify Experience Principles. But when the Discovery phase is over and we’ve identified these principles, what’s next? 

This is when our UI/UX designer Chânelle gets involved and her design magic brings things to life. When I think about her a few things spring readily to mind.  

• The holder of the unofficial title for “most desirable interior design in the background of video calls” at Wholegrain
• A “Ghost Sign” enthusiast
• A fount of NeilsonNorman knowledge
• A taker of (too?) many photos while travelling

But most importantly for this article she’s Wholegrains’ design lead. Since 2020 Chânelle has been helping craft sites with users and the planet in mind.

I chatted with Chânelle about her influences, process and where she takes design inspiration from. 

If you’re lucky enough to be a Wholegrain client you’ll have seen her sorcery in action. If you’re not yet a Wholegrain client, read on to find out why you should be… 

About Chânelle

I kicked things off by asking how she would describe the sites she designs for Wholegrain’s. After a moment’s pause she settles on “clean and considered”. It’s a great summation of our diverse portfolio. Clean design with users considered above all else. Chânelle is on a mission to help create sites that endure and work for all users. 

She explains that there are layouts, patterns and conventions that just work for websites. They allow users to find information quickly. If you can use these conventions it allows you to be creative elsewhere, without sacrificing usability.

Design Inspiration

If the devil is in the detail, where does she find inspiration for those details? As you’d expect from an experienced designer, her inspiration comes from far and wide. Magazines, blogs, her travels, mid-century design and of course websites of all shapes and sizes. 

Regular visits to places like Awwwards means Chânelle is on top of the latest trends in web design. I find this interesting because like most of the team at Wholegrain, if I see a site I like on Awwwards, the first thing I do is check out its carbon score on Website Carbon. More often than not, they are cutting edge but have poor performance scores.

As it turns out Chânelle does the same! What she looks for are features that might work for our clients. From there she works with our developers to see if it’s possible to reverse engineer them with lower weight code. Cutting edge features with lower carbon scores. 

Away from the flashy stuff, places like SiteInspire, LowwwwCarbon and intriguingly, Brutalist Websites feature in her bookmarks on her browser. When she tells me this I have to pause our chat to check out the Brutalist site as Chânelle watches on. She’s smiling as I scroll because hardly any of the site designs are appropriate for any of our client’s sites!

She explains that she likes that the nature of these sites lets the content do the talking and often in a low weight way. Even if the aesthetic isn’t appropriate, the design language can be and looking at these sites provides useful touchstones for her designs.

Designing for a Humane Web in practice

As you’d expect for Wholegrain, Chanelle’s designs have accessibility, usability and sustainability built in from the very beginning. So knowing a bit more about where her inspiration comes from, I’m keen to understand how she uses her years of experience to create designs that fit with our Humane Web approach. 

“Sites should be designed with all users in mind,” she says.

That means 

• Working to AA WCAG standards as a minimum
• Colour combos are verified and changed if required. (Clients can sometimes change their brand guidelines to be more accessible because of this)  
• Fonts chosen for legibility rather than following a trend 
• Important information and hierarchy are prioritised to allow users to easily navigate the sites

Encouragingly, accessibility recommendations are the most readily accepted by clients.

And what of designing with the planet in mind? What measures does Chânelle employ to keep the weight of a site down? 

For her it’s all about pragmatism coupled with sustainable design knowledge. The lowest page weight possible for each use case or user journey is the right approach. Optimising and minimising is more important than the lowest overall weight. 

A donation journey is a good example.  Including heavier elements, such as videos, animations or images often makes for a more engaging and effective experience. Increased engagement equates to maximised donations for important causes. Sacrificing fundraising for increased lower carbon scores isn’t justifiable. Minimising the carbon score for the right features is. 

A close relationship with the dev team is important here. There’s no point in designing a feature that isn’t possible within the low weight methodology that Wholegrain is so proud of. 

And what about client relationships? A Humane Web approach means that corners can’t be cut. On the face of it, it might seem that simple, effective designs are easier to create. In reality the opposite is true. There’s nowhere to hide for these types of designs. Information has to be readily available, not obfuscated by vertical scrolling and distracting transitions. Explaining design decisions in this context relies on buy in from clients and clear communication from our side. 

In Chânelle’s experience there is a difference between what the design and development community vote for on site showcases and what users actually want. A lot of the heavier features you see on showcases like Awwwards are not actually very popular with users.

Usability takes precedence over flashy features. 

The Humane Web approach in action

2026 looks likely to see this Humane Web approach really take flight. Tantalisingly some of the design work that Chânelle is most excited about is just over the horizon. When I ask what we should be looking forward to she mentions some client sites that are currently in development and a rebranded suite of Wholegrain sites that should launch later this year. I’ve seen some of these designs and agree that they’re pushing the boundaries of what a “sustainable website” looks like.  

Watch this space for some beautifully usable and accessible sites launching in 2026.  They are going to show the industry what a better web can look like for all of us

One of the most tantalising prospects of the internet is having the sum total of human knowledge just a couple of clicks away. The challenge is narrowing down all the options to find the relevant information you need.

If you’ve grown up in parallel with the internet as I have, you’ll have seen numerous ways of meeting this challenge. From narrow but reliable options like Encarta, to early search engines offering a glimpse into the wider world, to algorithms offering personalisation to nascent AI driven services and drivers, all are attempting the same thing; fast, relevant curation of information. 

A challenge for membership platforms

For specialist membership platforms and content driven organisations this is an acute challenge. Audiences demand relevant, up to date and engaging content that cuts through the noise of the internet. Platforms need to find commercially viable ways of providing this type of content through subscriptions and premium tiers. Not only that, in a world of AI generated content and a challenging attention economy they also face challenges such as:

• Whether to have a narrow or wide content focus? 
• How to effectively curate content?  
• How to stay relevant and engaging?

At Wholegrain we collaborate with our clients to help meet this challenge head on. Let’s dig a little deeper into the issue and then explore some of the solutions.

Curation methods

Content rarely arrives on CD-ROMs nowadays and curation takes a wide array of forms. For membership platforms we see three broad curation methodologies that work effectively:

Human driven curation on a specific topic

Organisations with a specialist focus provide trusted sources of expertise across the web. There are numerous examples but in a Wholegrain article it seems relevant to choose two that are close to our hearts.

Our client, Carbon Brief is a UK-based website covering the latest developments in climate science, climate policy and energy policy. Their site provides a wealth of well written, data rich content on a range of climate topics. Their daily briefing emails provide comprehensive breakdowns of the latest climate news. 

Our own Curiously Green newsletter does the same thing. We pull together the latest news, resources and regulations relating to the humane web and digital sustainability, sending regular emails to our subscribers. 

Human driven curation that pulls together narrative threads

A favourite newsletter among the Wholegrain Team is Dense Discovery. Described as “Thoughtfully curated links from a noisy web” it doesn’t focus on any particular topic. Rather it does an incredible job of tying together disparate topics and elements in a pleasing alchemy. We often end up seeing things that aren’t usually part of our algorithms and we’re generally glad to see them. It’s a hard trick to pull off and needs an open minded reader to work effectively.

Away from the digital world, I thought of William Gibson’s Blue Ant series of novels here too. They weave popular culture, technology, fashion and global politics into coherent and connected narratives. Curation can be artful as well as commercial. 

Machine driven curation

You can split this into two broad sub categories, algorithmic and of course AI driven.

Algorithmic curation comes from machine learning based on user habits. Analysing user behaviour reveals patterns and connections allowing related and relevant recommendations to be made. Spotify springs to mind here. Its recommendation algorithm can provide a comfortable, familiar set of recommendations and playlists based on your listening habits, but informed by behaviours across the user base.

On the AI side of things I find a platform called Finchling an intriguing prospect. Describing itself as “Intelligent media monitoring” that “helps brands, comms & PR teams find press opportunities, and monitor what competitors are getting coverage for”. It pulls together relevant information for your organization and prioritizes risk and opportunity.  

Challenges and opportunities in content curation

The obvious opportunity here is that you can add value and retain an audience if you are providing information that is relevant to them. On the commercial side you can provide invaluable service within a sector. It can build brand authority and reputation as well as offering monetisation avenues. From a more holistic point of view you can share vital and important information with a wider audience, encouraging behaviour change. 

But there are challenges to doing content curation well too. If you make your focus too narrow users could lose the opportunity to make unexpected discoveries and links across topics. However, if you spread yourself too thin you risk losing relevance among your audience. 

I came back to Spotify here. As time went on I found that its algorithm became less effective. I was listening to less new music as my feed became more and more homogenous. It was frustratingly difficult to break new musical ground. I switched to Deezer and have found it does a better job but still not perfectly. Ultimately I find myself going to places like Six Music’s playlists to find new music. It’s curated by people with (I assume) similar music tastes to mine and an openness to new acts and genres. It’s doing what I found an algorithm could not.

Balancing access and gate keeping 

A particular challenge in the new media landscape is allowing access to your content while paying the bills. Paywalls can be vital for organisations but can put off digital natives who are used to free access. Adding value to your user base and providing exclusive info while keeping your casual audience engaged is a tricky balancing act. I find that 404 Media threads this needle quite well. Their articles are great and free to access for the most part. But the reporting they provide is niche enough to have a loyal, paying audience who see the value in the stories they tell.

Solving the problem with Humane Web Principles

Whatever methodology is most relevant to your organization, it won’t work effectively without a well thought out application or website to back it up. At Wholegrain we are guided by our Humane Web Principles when approaching these challenges. We build with the human in mind crafting self-paced online experiences for diverse needs. Curation is nothing without design choices that empowers audiences.

At the core of this is the Discovery Process. To make the right design choices and streamline curation workflows you have to answer certain questions. You need to know your audience and whether they want a narrow or wide focus to remain engaged. Are they only interested in a specific topic or are they open to being introduced to related areas by experts they trust?

Discovery always illuminates internal factors. It helps identify the key curators within a team and help enable them to effectively use the back end of a website. Interviews and discussions help identify the themes and content types within an organisation’s digital estate as well as how best to showcase them.

It can also help find tech solutions to help streamline workflows. Can analytics help identify what your audience resonates with? Can AI bring something to the party? Regardless of the tech side, it’s the humans in the process that provide the secret sauce. Why should someone subscribe to a membership service or newsletter if there isn’t human oversight taking time to organise and curate your information?

Wrapping up

Curation done well requires knowing your audience and an in-depth knowledge of the topics you are curating. The innate understanding of the topic comes from your experience and expertise and this, in turn, gives some insight into your audience too. However to really get to know your audience and their needs requires something more; discovery and iteration.

Taking time to confirm your understanding of your audience and their requirements is a must. The way we engage with our audience evolves over time along with their needs.

Testing, checking, and creating opportunities for growth from audience led insights. Reach out to our team if you would like to know more.

Most countries’ government websites already prioritise accessibility, however the European Union is ensuring its usability doesn’t just stop at government websites, many product and service websites will be affected too. 

As of 28th June 2025, the European Accessibility Act 2025 comes into effect requiring any business that is trading, or plans to trade, in the EU needs to provide accessible digital services. This also affects UK businesses that provide services to EU consumers and to public or private bodies that are in the scope.

Why does web accessibility matter?

Our founder, Tom Greenwood, described this clearly when writing about the public sector accessibility regulations for the UK in 2019. Succinctly, it comes down to the fact “a huge part of our world is now online, if we don’t take accessibility seriously then people with disabilities will be excluded, creating a two-tiered society.”

What do the European Accessibility Act 2025 regulations require?

The Design for All (DfA) approach is a design philosophy for products, services and systems to have maximum usability by as many people as possible without the need for adaptation. This philosophy was responsible for the development of the European Standard on Design for All, published in 2019. In the same year the European Accessibility Act (EAA) was officially published by the European Union.

The regulations are not new as such, but the deadline for implementing them, June 28 2025 is now fast approaching. 

So what are the key requirements for websites?

• Depending on which EU country is involved, websites must at least meet WCAG 2.1 compliance at level AA. Ensuring that websites are WCAG 2.2 compliant at level AA is a more prudent, robust and future proof approach.
• Non-text content such as images, videos and products must have associated alternative text providing clear, simple descriptions for screen reading technology .
• All parts of the website should be usable with just keyboard navigation.
• Audio and video, must be accompanied by captions or transcriptions and offer alternative formats. Auto play of videos should be avoided.
• Adaptable website design so it can be adjusted to suit different needs, such as changing text size or colours for better readability.

Accessibility is not a feature, it is a universal human right

Universal design isn’t new or novel. The result of designing for additional needs, benefits everyone, sometimes in ways we couldn’t have predicted.

• The dropped curb? Originally created to assist wheelchair users, also benefits people pushing a pram, shopping trolley, or suitcase.
• The electric toothbrush? Designed for those who lacked the movement or dexterity to brush thoroughly, and now many people own one as it can clean your teeth more effectively.
• The world wide web? Yup! Even in its inception, the inventor of the world wide web, Tim Burner’s Lee created it with universal design in mind. He stated: “The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect”.

The above are three examples of things we all benefit from frequently, if not daily. 

When the web was launched, it prioritised universal accessibility. However, when you release things into the public domain, you lose control of how people adapt it. Legislation and laws are often required to maintain our universal human rights, especially as we continually iterate and improve our digital platforms.

Happily there are many people and organisations who took it upon themselves to make sure this knowledge is shared and accessible to drive change sooner. Here are a handful of those improving accessibility through education, community alliances and free tools:

• WCAG 1.0 was published in 1999 and 26 years on WCAG 3 is fast approaching;
  • You can evaluate WCAG standards for webpages with WAVE.
  • Reminder! For the EAA 2025, as a minimum, websites must meet WCAG 2.1 compliance at level AA.
• The A11y Project is a community-driven effort to make digital accessibility easier as well as providing a list of resources.
• Web Sustainability Guidelines which was created by the W3C Sustainable Web Design community group. Designing for not only audience needs, but data & WiFi bandwidth means that no one is hindered from information or interactions online based on data inequality.
• WebAIM colour contrast checker is a useful, free tool to validate colour combinations in design.
• Accessibility Insights is a free browser extension to test accessibility of webpages and web applications.

Wholegrain supports all moves that increase inclusion online

We’re encouraged that accessibility protections are written into law and continually iterated. However for us, accessibility online has always been and continues to be non-negotiable, meaning anything we create is done through the lens of universally accessible digital design.

We’ll keep doing what we’re already doing, putting the human behind the screen, first.

This is exactly why we prioritise user testing because without representation, we can never truly understand how to create a fully inclusive digital experience.

From a UX standpoint, accessibility is intertwined with usability. When we design with accessibility in mind, we’re creating experiences that are not only compliant but also intuitive and enjoyable for everyone. Accessibility means removing barriers for people with disabilities, but it also enhances the experience for all.

For example, clear navigation and logical content hierarchy improve usability for those using screen readers, while also benefiting people in noisy environments or those unfamiliar with a website. Captioning videos helps people with hearing impairments but also supports those watching content in quiet spaces. Keyboard navigation is essential for people with mobility challenges and it also improves efficiency for those who prefer shortcuts.

Designing for accessibility encourages empathy, helping us focus on the diverse ways people interact with the web. It ensures that we’re building websites that are not just functional but delightful and impactful, reinforcing trust and inclusivity. For Wholegrain, accessibility isn’t a box to tick, it’s an integral part of creating human-centered, sustainable digital experiences that serve everyone.

It’s important to restate our mission to frame our position on accessibility:

Sustainable web design is accessible design.

In a world that is increasingly prioritising algorithms and non-human users, we stand strong in putting the people using a website front and centre. Through collaboration, we can uncover usability we’d never discover on our own, that discovery may even benefit you one day!

Happy Black Friday!

To prepare ourselves for the most wonderful, consumption driven time of the year, my wife and I watched Buy Now on Netflix last night.

Not so much Netflix’n’chill as Netflix’n’seethe.

As efforts to decarbonise our economy and society continue to gather momentum (perhaps in spite of COP29), the film provides a reminder that overconsumption is a parallel issue in need of tackling. From a web designer’s point of view the core messages from the film are stark: 

• Overconsumption for the sake of profit is rife in the developed world
• Planned obsolescence in tech and throw-away fashion encourages dangerous consumption
• The developing world is drowning in waste from the developed world 
• Websites, digital platforms and highly effective UX all contribute to this problem

In this time of climate crisis, the web design industry needs to take note of these issues and act accordingly. 

The birth of frictionless UX

The opening section of the film features the early days of Amazon.com and Maren Costa, Amazon’s first Principal User Experience Designer. In the early days, Amazon focused its efforts on making purchasing on the site as simple and efficient as possible. Millions of experiments and data points were analysed to not only remove friction in the process, but to actively encourage people to buy, even if they were just browsing. The lessons learned at Amazon have since been replicated and refined across the internet.

But it’s not just the UX patterns and methodologies that have been honed. Website and digital platform messaging and SEO techniques have helped spread messages encouraging unchecked consumption and greenwashing far and wide.

The message to me was clear. The sad truth is that the craft of our industry is part of the problem and that web design agencies (including B Corps) help encourage excessive consumption.

Just as every job is a climate job, every website can be a climate website. Website messaging and UX is a powerful message delivery system. We know this to be true and sell that vision to clients in every project we undertake. Using the most effective methods to spread information about the climate crisis, alternative business models and customer solutions can help turn the tide. 

What can web designers, marketers and agencies do?

Given that we are discussing consumption, e-commerce is the obvious place to start. Committing to putting choice back in the hands of the user and removing consumption-encouraging nudges can help change the psychology of purchasing. Instead, let’s support purchasing choices with transparency. Clearly showing the materials, provenance, supply chain, life cycle analysis, end of life options, resale value and communities supported gives users the power to make more informed decisions. Northern Playground, a brand I’ve written about recently, do this brilliantly.

Similarly, it seems to me that some friction could be added back into the process to help respect users and the planet. One click purchase journeys feature heavily in the film. Removing those easy options and developing more conscientious UX patterns, giving users space and agency to make purchasing decisions is the ethical thing to do. Perhaps more controversially, I would advocate for removing services like Klarna to discourage unaffordable consumption and debt. 

Showcase the alternatives

Something else I’ve noted is the priority (or lack thereof) alternative business models are given by brands. Brands like Mud Jeans have prominent rental and take back schemes on their websites. Other brands with similar schemes hide these options away. Giving equal or higher positioning for circular products helps show users that alternatives to liner consumption are available.

Talk about it!

Over and above the tech solutions are the human connection solutions. A theme from the film is people having realisations that their day to day work is harming the planet and recognising that nobody is talking about it. Maren at Amazon built an employee climate justice programme which forced Jeff Bezos to at least acknowledge the problem. Nirav Patel’s recognition that the products he was designing for Facebook and Apple lead to discussions about how to do things better. As a result, Framework was born, providing computers built with repairability and end of life in mind.

Talking to friends and colleagues about the climate crisis and how it affects your personal and professional life might be the most important action you could take. Holding space for this enables discussions to take place. It’s something we’re doing at Wholegrain. Hopeful conversations and sharing of ideas might just be the thing that helps save the world.

If you’ve watched Buy Now, let me know what you think. – curiouslygreen@wholegraindigital.com.

Other than working on all things Curiously Green one of the other things I do for Wholegrain is provide a weekly round up of sustainability news to the team.  This involves connecting digital sustainability with topics like privacy, general sustainability, community building and the offline world.

The round up is occasionally (ok, always) a bit spicier than the newsletter. You’ll have to get a job with Wholegrain if you want to see it. In recent weeks though the average scoville level has risen due to a noticeable lack of positive news and solutions hitting the feed.  

It could be that the movers and shakers of the sustainability world are all bouncing around the busy summit season and don’t have time to share things. Maybe it’s the anxiety caused by US politics bleeding into other facets of life? Either way the autumn feels to have started on a downer. 

The RSS feeds I’ve curated for myself, tech communities I’m part of, podcasts I listen to and the people I follow all seem pretty glum at the moment. There are petty squabbles in the Wordpress community, rising emissions from big tech, AI is in everything, net zero commitments are rolling back.  

It’s making this Curiously Green manager somewhat blue and I wonder if other digital sustainability folks might feel the same.

A problem shared is a problem solved…

In these circumstances, I find that community mindedness is often the answer. So, as 2024 draws to a close, I thought it would be useful to crowdsource a little joy, optimism and solidarity. 

We are asking our Curiously Green community:

• What was the most impactful sustainability action you took this year?
• What digital sustainability action did you take this year?
• What is your biggest sustainability challenge for 2025?
• What would you like to read more about in CG in 2025?

To kick things off I’ll share mine – 

1. My most impactful action was changing our petrol car for an EV. We live in the French Alps with minimal public transport options. When we analysed our family footprint an EV was the next step that we could take. So far, our e-Kona is working very well but we’re waiting to see what winter brings! 
2. On the digital sustainability (DS) side I educated myself! I connected my work life with wider sustainability issues by taking a Carbon Literacy course. The course connected a lot of dots for me and changed the way I see the world. A Digital and Technology specific course will be released this autumn. If you want a DS resolution for the new year I highly recommend attending a course.
3. I think my biggest DS challenge will be the same as the wider industry – AI. Grappling with its proliferation and how to work within the tech space without using it is a challenge, let alone influencing others. Of course the bubble might burst and deal with things for me!
4. The biggest thing I’d like to see (and write about) on Curiously Green is positive DS stories from the Curiously Green community. Solutions, ideas, innovation and inspiration are what the world needs right now.

You can share your responses via the button below. If you are happy to share with the wider community I will showcase some of the best responses in a future post and newsletter. 

Thank you! 

Andy

As the temperature drops, the land starts to bed in for winter and days shorten, conference season in the purpose space kicks off in force!

As a very vocal ‘business hippie’ who loves to mark the passing of the seasons in our day-to-day operations- and a parent who has just ‘survived’ the summer holidays – it always comes as a shock to me that this energetic time of year falls now when, I’m not going to lie, I often feel exhausted. But then, year in, year out I am surprised by how much I actually need this time out with like minded people and businesses to rejuvenate, to stoke the passion and to come back to the team brimming with ideas and actions. So, from September, here are my takeaways from attending B Corp’s Louder Than Words and GoodFest, for which I am incredibly grateful. I hope they bring some positive warming vibes of sunshine to your autumn days. 

The Power of Dreaming

GoodFest’s theme for 2024 was ‘Dream Big, Act Now’ which was at the forefront of all discussions. I was fortunate enough to attend a brilliant workshop with Carlos and Laurence from The Happy Startup School – check them out if you’ve not already heard of them! – who raised the topic of ‘Effortless Impact – do good, be happy’. That’s the dream, right? A lot of themes and learnings came out from this one session for me, but one of the most important learnings was to acknowledge the power of dreaming and the ideas that come out as a result of taking the opportunity to dream. Think about it – when was the last time you sat down and asked yourself things like, ‘What would you bring to life if anything was possible?’, ‘What would you love to master that excites your soul?’.

This power of dreaming really struck a note for not only me, but also for the whole event for it is indeed the dreamers and the creatives who will provide the solutions to the challenges we face.

In a particularly powerful session, Kalpana Arias, climate activist; ecosomatics educator and founder of Nowadays On Earth, referenced the brilliant Saidiya Hartman reminding us that ‘One of the powers of oppression is policing the imaginations’ and that it is indeed a privilege to be able to dream. And that dreaming cannot be in isolation and, as I will come to later, collaboration is as vital in future developments as it is for dreaming – on your own you are one crazy guy dancing, as Matt Hocking would share, but together we are a rave. Share those ideas and dreams, they might not go anywhere, but they might grow and in the case of our founders; 17 years later a 40 year old woman might be sitting at her desk writing a blog post about the power of dreaming and reflecting on how grateful she is that they followed their dream which allows her to follow her own to forge a career she is passionate about.

As Kalpana shared, ‘Don’t ask what someone needs. Ask what they dream of. What they love.’

Imperfection

This was my key takeaway from Louder Than Words. That striving for perfection in all we do is the enemy to progress. That isn’t to say that we can do the bare minimum and it’s ok, because we will build on it – music to our clients’ ears I am sure – but that if we want flawless solutions to everything we will never progress. The wider context for this was focusing mainly on impact reporting and sustainability goals and the rise of greenhushing in the wake of some very public greenwashing cases.

When it comes to our own sustainability and purpose led journeys, open dialogue and sharing imperfect progress is key to drive progress, because any progress is progress. Although transparency comes with risk, being more humble and acknowledging that this is new ground we are all treading will never be thought of negatively and will lift us all. Which leads seamlessly to my final takeaway.

Collaboration

We are lucky to work with fantastic partner agencies outside of the brilliant Wholegrain team, and in turn are part of collaborative networks within our communities – Clean Creatives, Business Declares, Better Business Network. It is through these networks of like minded people that we all learn and thrive, but it’s also pushing that collaboration forwards, beyond those that already know about us, to a wider, more diverse,  audience to continue to learn, adapt and evolve – just like the very best networks in nature. 

Ultimately, we can’t do this on our own or in isolation. Remember, together we are a rave. Together we are impactful. Together our small, single voice becomes a shout. As John Brown put it at GoodFest, when raising the ceiling we need to ensure that we are mindfully raising the floor too so we all start to rise.

So, there you have it. Just a quick summary of the key themes that stuck with me after the last few events and which have been buzzing around my head as I crunch through the leaves on lunchtime dog walks (avoiding the showers) and that I’ve already been bringing to the team. We’re off to Blue Earth Summit next week, which I am really hyped for as it’s always a font of incredible thinking and ideas, so we will be sure to share more. If you are heading over please do let us know and it would be great to catch up.