Presence Magazine has been a staple of Rogers’ corporate storytelling since 2011. With its striking visuals and thoughtful articles, it’s long been a key touchpoint for brand perception and engagement. But by 2022, Rogers wanted to shift gears. The goal: reduce their environmental impact by cutting back on print runs while still delivering the same high-quality experience to their audience. That’s when they approached Fourlines Design Studio (my creative agency) to bring their annual publication into the digital space.
I led the project from day one, managing both the technical execution and the coordination between collaborators. While I oversaw development, I worked side-by-side with Kevin, our second developer, and collaborated with Xavier, who handled the UI design. We also worked closely with the in-house Marketing and Communication team at Rogers, which ensured alignment with their internal expectations and timelines.
Tight timelines, tangled templates
One of the most complex aspects of this build was the timeframe. We were working against the clock, yet we had to wait on content delivery from the design agency responsible for the print layout. This naturally created a bottleneck.
Another early roadblock was Rogers’ initial decision to use a premium WordPress theme. While it seemed like a shortcut at first, the sheer number of internal stakeholders led to design paralysis. Everyone had opinions. The template was pushed and pulled in too many directions, until it no longer resembled what it was supposed to be.
Rather than fight the constraints of a rigid theme, Kevin and I proposed a custom solution. We reverse-engineered the structure of the original template to maintain a familiar look and feel, but rebuilt it from scratch. This gave us full control over layout, performance, and functionality, freeing us from the theme’s limitations.
Custom features for a unique publication
Presence Magazine wasn’t just another blog or news site. Rogers needed more than a digital article feed, they wanted to preserve the tactile feel of a print magazine while offering modern digital perks.
To do this, we built several custom components:
- Dynamic animated banner on the homepage, powered by a Custom Post Type. It pulled key metadata directly from uploaded PDF files of each issue.
- Flipbook functionality that let readers engage with a digital version of the magazine, preserving the page-turning experience of print.
- Magazine issue archive with custom-designed landing pages that grouped article content under each respective issue, complete with cover imagery.
- Search functionality optimised for scale. The site needed to search across almost a thousand articles instantly, with results returning in real-time.
- Performance-first architecture, tailored to be extremely lightweight. Despite the heavy content and dual language setup (English and French), the site loads quickly and performs well across all devices.
One technical constraint that proved challenging was the original UI design. It was created without full consideration for how some features would work from a functionality perspective. That meant part of our job was translating a pretty design into something structurally sound and technically feasible, a balancing act we managed through careful dev adaptation.
Live, maintained, and mission-aligned
Since launch, the results have been encouraging. Rogers successfully reduced the number of printed copies and now relies heavily on the digital version for distribution. The site continues to receive steady traffic without major issues, thanks in part to the ongoing maintenance subscription they’ve retained with me. Any bugs or content updates are handled swiftly, and the site remains optimised and secure.
For me, this was more than a technical build. It was about helping a major corporate player shift towards more sustainable communication methods, without compromising on brand presence or user experience. And from a creative and operational perspective, it was a lesson in adaptability, balancing stakeholder feedback, rapid timelines, and technical performance with precision.
Presence Magazine now lives in a hybrid world, part digital, part print, but 100% intentional.