Accessibility

29 October 2024

Access is love!* And access can also be complicated, messy, and full of friction! Both of these things can be true at the same time. This website was designed with the knowledge that there is no One Right Way to do accessibility, but that there are ways to navigate our far-ranging access needs with rigor and solidarity. Thus, this page offers more than a legal accessibility statement. It also outlines what we did to closely adhere to, but also go beyond, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2.

*Read Access is Love by Disability Visibility, Mia Mingus, and Sandy Ho.

Design Concept

Aimi contracted Jessica Oddi to develop an accessible website. The decision was made to move from Squarespace to Webflow for a cleaner accessible build.

During this phase, the team explored font options, layouts, and high-contrast color palettes. They thought about the aesthetics of the website, as well as how text and images will look on the page.

For the text, we started out using outline effects, but then decided to use font weights for legibility. Roboto Mono was chosen for its character distinction and fixed width with different font weights.

The sidebar menu was designed to have the option to remain open while navigating a site on desktop. Large print and uniform padding for easy reading and consistency.

While exploring contrast palettes, the team found a medium between AA high contrast and softness for screen brightness. The light and dark mode toggle also checks a person's browser preference first so the light doesn't bother those who like dark.

Development and Testing

Jessica built the site in Webflow. Community practices were carried from the old site, such as image descriptions.

Jess tested the site with the following accessibility practices and technology:

• Browsers and Devices: Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Opera, on macOS Sonoma. Edge on Windows 11. Chrome on Samsung Galaxy S24 Pro. Safari on Mama Oddi's iPhone and iPad.
• Assistive Tech: VoiceOver, Voice Control, Narrator, NVDA (simulator), TalkBack.
• Manual: Keyboard-only navigation, zoom, desktop inverted/color filters.
• Automated: 1 error on ARC Toolkit for low contrast. Manually checked for an invisible MailChimp input field so not applicable.

Cross Disability Access Notes

The website was already built with a larger base font size. Zooming at 200% on desktop browsers will trigger mobile layouts earlier.

If you have Zoom Text, Jess recommends using the browser zoom before using the app or lessen the width of your browser window. This will trigger the media query to give you an enlarged single column layout, which may make your Zoom Text experience better.

Community Feedback

We know that accessible designs do not always get it right the first time. We value community input to help us learn, unlearn, and adopt new practices. If you are a disabled comrade, we would love to know about your experiences with this site. Please feel free to contact us or email Jessica (oddi.jessica@gmail.com) with feedback.

Any updates to the accessibility of the site will be added once we receive feedback or make changes.