Harrogate Community Radio
I was in charge of the branding for Harrogate Community Radio - the local radio station in the town I live.
About the project
Harrogate Community Radio is the volunteer-run station for the town I live in. No studio, no building, just 30 to 40 hosts broadcasting from their own homes, week in week out. I am one of the people who started it, and I built the website and the digital side of things from the ground up.
The project has successfully cemented Harrogate Community Radio’s place in the digital landscape, providing a valuable and enjoyable platform for its community.
1st December 2025
Why Harrogate needed its own station
There was already a commercial station covering the area. The problem was the music. It did not fit the audience we were trying to reach, and there was nowhere broadcasting for the people of Harrogate, by the people of Harrogate. That gap is what got the station started in the first place.
Why I built it
As one of the founders, building the site fell to me. Nobody asked me to do it. I just took it on, because it needed doing and it was the part of the project I knew how to handle.
What I built
The site runs on WordPress. Underneath the obvious stuff, pages, a blog, contact details, sits the part that actually matters for a radio station: the streaming.
Getting live streaming working properly took more testing than I expected. Listeners need to be able to tune in from home or on the move without the broadcast cutting out or buffering. That sounds straightforward. It was not. I went through a fair bit of trial and error before it held up.
Off the back of listener feedback, I added a genre based search, so people can find a show by the kind of music it plays rather than scrolling through a list of names they do not recognise yet.
There is also a shop for merchandise, a listen again page so people can catch up on shows they missed, and a profile page for every host with their show times and a bit about who they are. Listeners get to connect the voice to a person, and the hosts get something they can point to and feel proud of.
The result
In 2024 Harrogate Community Radio won Best Use of Tech at the Stray Ferret awards.
Andy has created a visually impactful and diversely applicable visual identity for Harrogate Community Radio. So much more than just a logo, the identity works in a highly effective way across multiple channels, and has the flexibility to work when new areas of marketing the station require it. A great job, crafted with passion and the user’s experience in mind.
What I would do differently
I would have started monitoring listener numbers from day one rather than picking it up later. I also deleted some older series early on instead of keeping them as an archive, which I regret. I am putting them back on the site now, a few at a time.
None of that takes away from what the station is. It was never about the technology or the awards. It was for the community.
A Web Designer in Harrogate
This project is one example of the web design work I do for small businesses across Harrogate and beyond. Every site I build comes with fixed pricing agreed upfront, and I stay around after launch so you are never left on your own. You can read more about my web design services or tell me about your project.