Croatia Yacht Club
Client
Croatia Yacht Club, Sweden
Team
Zeljko Simic - Senior Full-Stack Designer
Services
Website Audit; Logo Integration Strategy; UX/UI Design; UX/UI Development; Technical SEO; CMS Handoff and Delivery;
View Project
Croatia Yacht Club is Scandinavia’s largest sailing charter operator in Croatia, connecting thousands of guests from Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and beyond with the Adriatic since 1985. Operating under the Dream Yacht Charter group and run in Sweden by Dream Yacht Nordic AB, the company manages a fleet of approximately sixty vessels across two marinas near Split — Marina Trogir SCT and Marina Baotic — delivering what they describe simply as the height of joie de vivre.
Before and After Case
Brand Problems
- Outdated visual design
- Broken frontend sections
- Poor technical SEO
- Weak boat listing and detail pages
- Logo integration uncertainty
Our Solutions
- Full design system rebuild
- Frontend audit and repair
- Technical SEO implementation
- Boat page restructure
- Logo-led design direction
Croatia Yacht Club engaged us through their new IT agency to redesign their website. The client was attached to the existing site’s color palette and concept, so goals were clear: preserve what works, replace what doesn’t, and raise the overall feel to a standard befitting a member of one of the world’s largest yacht charter groups.
Approach
An audit of the existing site revealed a design that had fallen behind current standards, several broken sections across the frontend, and a technical SEO foundation that had not been properly implemented. The boat listing and boat detail pages — commercially the most critical parts of the site — were particularly in need of structural and visual overhaul.
One early decision shaped the entire design direction. When we joined the project, the client and their IT agency were uncertain about the logo due to its rounded form. We advised strongly that the logo should remain: a well-crafted logo is not a constraint but an anchor, and Croatia Yacht Club’s was no exception. Rather than designing in spite of it, we built the entire visual system around it, treating it as the pivot from which all design decisions were made.
The audit also surfaced genuine strengths in the previous build — ideas and implementations worth preserving. These were retained and restyled within the new design, giving continuity to the site’s history while eliminating what no longer served it. This approach reflects how we conduct every redesign: as an analytical process, not a wholesale replacement.
The Result
The result was a suite of 17 fully built static pages in HTML, CSS and JS, approved by Croatia Yacht Club and handed off to their IT agency for integration into the new custom CMS. The new site presents the brand at a level consistent with its standing in the Dream Yacht Charter group, with a resolved design system, functional critical pages, and a corrected technical SEO foundation.
A great website doesn’t just look good — it loads fast, ranks well, and stays out of your way. When all of that comes together, you stop worrying about your tech and start focusing on what actually grows your business. This project demonstrates that even a heavily compromised site can be turned into a performing platform with the right strategy and execution.
Got a website or visual identity that’s holding you back?
We’ll tell you exactly what needs fixing — before you spend a single euro.
