Alright, so “beggars lodge” – sounds kinda grim, right? But stick with me, it turned out to be a pretty cool project. It all started when I stumbled upon this phrase online, and it just stuck in my head. I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but the name itself felt… evocative. I just knew I wanted to build something, anything, around that concept.
Brainstorming and Getting My Hands Dirty
First things first, I had to figure out what “beggars lodge” even meant to me. Was it a literal place? A metaphorical one? I spent a good few hours just scribbling down ideas, anything that came to mind. I jotted words down, drew rough sketches that look like a child made, and basically just let my brain vomit onto the page.
After a while, I started to see a pattern. The ideas that kept popping up were about community, resource sharing, and, well, a little bit of desperation. I thought about digital spaces, how we all kind of scramble for attention and resources online. That’s when it clicked – I wanted to build a website.
Building the Foundation
I’m no coding whiz, so I knew I needed some help. I decided to go with a really simple website builder, one that wouldn’t make my head spin. No fancy databases or anything, just a straightforward site to get my ideas across.
- Choosing a Platform: I spent a day just trying out different website builders. Some were way too complicated, others were too limiting. I finally settled on one. It was a good balance of easy to use and had some nice templates.
- Picking a Template: I wanted something stark, something that felt a little… broken, but still functional. I ended up going with a minimalist design, lots of white space, and a gritty font. Nothing pretty, you know?
- Writing the Content: This was the hard part. I had all these big ideas, but I needed to make them make sense on a webpage. I started with a kind of manifesto, laying out what I thought “beggars lodge” meant. I also added a section for people to submit their own thoughts, stories.
The Process
Getting to start building the website was pretty exciting.
I began by inputting the name, “Beggars Lodge”, then I found the text input area so I can begin writing.
I wrote about sharing, and surviving together. The page looked okay, not too bad.
Then I played around with the design template that I selected earlier, I tried making the font bigger, I think it looks better with larger fonts.
I spent the whole day doing this, trying things, writing a lot of random stuff, and changing colors.
Making it “Live”
Once I had the basic structure down, I spent a few more days tweaking things. I added some images, messed with the layout, and generally just tried to make it look… presentable. I’m still not 100% happy with it, but that’s okay. It’s a work in progress, just like the idea itself.
Finally, I hit the “publish” button. It was a little scary, putting something so… raw out there. But it also felt good. Like I’d actually made something, from a weird phrase that was just bouncing around in my head.
The “After”
So, “beggars lodge” is out there now. It’s not going to win any design awards, but that’s not the point. It’s a space, a starting point. A place for people to connect, to share, maybe even to build something bigger together. Or maybe it’ll just be a weird little corner of the internet. Either way, I’m glad I built it.
It felt good building something from scratch, to input texts and change designs.