Laura Sobral
Role: Design and development, including the custom WordPress theme.
Context: Personal website for Laura Sobral, urban researcher and practitioner based in Europe, used in applications for positions, expert pools and cooperation programmes.
Duration: August 2025, one month from design to launch.
Volume: One page, three sections, five featured publications and seven additional references, biography in two languages, CV in PDF.
Live: laurasobral.com
Personal Website
I designed and developed the personal website of Laura Sobral, urban researcher and practitioner. The website runs on WordPress with a custom theme I built for the project.
Audience
The website is directed at institutions, European programmes, universities and selection committees evaluating her profile. The structure prioritizes what these readers look for, which is qualification, verifiable experience and published work.
Single Page Structure
The content is linear and comparable to an extended CV. I organized it on a single page with anchor navigation to three sections (About, In action and Publications). The reader scrolls through the complete profile without loading new pages, and the anchors give direct access to each section.
Contact and CV
Her email, her LinkedIn profile and the CV download link are in the header. The CV in PDF is the file most requested in selection processes, and its placement in the header makes it available from the first screen, without scrolling. Contact information in the same position removes the need to look for a footer.
Competency Line
Above the biography, her areas of practice are listed in uppercase as a continuous line of keywords. A reader scanning the page gets the scope of her work before reading the full text, and the line carries the terms used in calls for experts.
Language
The biography is published in English and Brazilian Portuguese, since it is the section read by both her European and Brazilian contacts. Experience and publications are in English, the working language of her field in Europe. Duplicating the entire page in two languages would double the maintenance of content that changes often.
In Action
Each entry starts with the period in brackets, followed by the organization, the role and a list of delivered work. Placing the period first allows the reader to scan the timeline vertically. The entries are grouped by organization rather than in strict chronological order, because several of her positions run in parallel and remain current.
Publications
The five main publications are displayed with cover image, title and publisher. Seven additional references are listed as a text block below. The division gives visual weight to the principal works and keeps the remaining ones available without extending the page. Every title links to the original source, which is the publisher, the journal or the institutional PDF. Linking to the source keeps the citation verifiable and avoids hosting copies of material published by third parties.
