Center Parcs Redesigned Homepage
Why did we want to redesign the homepage for UK and Ireland?
In short, the old homepage didn’t capture the essence of the Center Parcs experience. It looked tired and dated and was overcomplicated to use. There was a lot of visual clutter, a lack of micro-animations and an overwhelming amount of primary CTAs shouting at our guests. This unfortunately communicated desperation instead of a premium brand. Center Parcs is the market leader in UK short breaks and we wanted to reflect that premium look and feel on our site.
This mission serendipitously aligned with a major rebranding drive from our new CMO. Our Marketing team were collaborating with Neverland to create the “For the center of your world” adverts that would be shown across TV and socials in December 2025. We wanted to ensure our redesigned pages aligned with the new tone of voice and bubble assets Neverland were creating for us.
There were design problems with the old Center Parcs homepage which we intended to solve.
What were the challenges?
There were multiple design challenges. We needed to create clean, intuitive homepages for both Center Parcs UK and Center Parcs Ireland. To maintain visual consistency in key user journeys, we also wanted to redesign landing pages like the Locations Overview and Accommodation Overview page. Based on the prospect of launching a pre-school offer in February, we also wanted to refresh the Child Friendly Breaks page. It was imperative that we created a new look and feel for these pages without alienating our guests and losing our hard-earned brand identity.
I wanted to ensure that our look and feel consistent as possible across the site, even on old template pages. This meant we needed to round off our square CTAs, images and card components site wide, and consider how existing colours in our design system would translate to the new look and feel. My line manager was keen on making sure that it didn’t feel like it was two completely disjointed website experiences.
Our CMO set the ambitious target of having the redesigned homepage built by Christmas, before the peak accommodation booking period started. Guests tend to book holidays in the darker months from late December to early March, so we wanted to implement the redesign before then. This meant the development team had less than two months to create a new AEM template with brand new components. The stakes were high.
What was I responsible for delivering?
Because I had ownership of the accommodation booking journey my role spanned strategy, design and copy. My main responsibilities included:
- UX strategy and information architecture. Planning A/B tests on the page structure and hierarchy for the redesigned homepage and landing pages. I cut the number of primary CTAs dramatically, creating a cleaner, more intentional user journey.
- Hands-on design in Figma. I iterated on wireframes and high-fidelity designs for stakeholder buy-in. I made component and layout decisions, and working closely with the development team as they built new AEM templates.
- UX copywriting. I helped shape the tone of voice for the redesigned pages at a time when the brand’s new TOV guidelines were still being developed. This meant working directly with the brand team to get image, video and copy choices right.
- Stakeholder management. I liaised closely with our Product Owner Lance during development for any fixes. I coordinated with Neverland to ensure web image specs were correct to ensure faces and focal points wouldn’t be cropped. With Marketing team stakeholders, I pushed back where necessary on decisions I felt would compromise the user experience.
- Concept and brief for the offer countdown clock . I sketched an idea for a countdown timer to build urgency during the peak booking offer period, which was subsequently built by Dan using Adobe Target and served only to guests who had accepted cookies.
How did we approach the work?
- Starting with research. Before opening Figma, we commissioned our agency Atomic to run user research. moderated sessions with 5–10 participants and a non-moderated study of 100 people using Maze. The results gave us confidence in the direction: 8 out of 10 people preferred the new homepage design, and 7 out of 10 preferred the new page layout, from the search bar at the top through to locations, accommodation, activities and pricing.
- Letting the brand do the talking. The core design principle was simple: a market leader doesn’t need to shout. We cut the CTA count dramatically, gave the page more space, and structured each section to flow naturally into the next. I worked directly with the brand team on copy and visuals, and liaised with Neverland on image specs to make sure their photography translated well to web without anything important getting cropped.
- Pushing back when it mattered. The Yield team proposed sending homepage traffic to two separate destinations — an offer page and a price point page. The problem was that the price point page included January and February breaks that weren’t part of the offer, which I thought would confuse guests. I made the case for keeping things simple and consistent, and we landed on a cleaner solution. Clarity for the guest had to come first.
- Keeping things moving. With a December deadline, a reduced team from November, and no dedicated project manager, there was a lot of coordination to manage on top of the design work. I worked closely with our PO Lance to catch and fix component issues during the AEM build, and kept the project on track through to launch.
Slide to compare the old Center Parcs UK website before launch and the redesigned Center Parcs UK website after launch.
What did we achieve?
The redesigned homepage and landing pages launched successfully before Christmas, ahead of the peak booking period — which was the business’s primary goal. The pages reflected the new brand direction, incorporating Neverland’s bubble visual language and the “For the center of your world” campaign tone. Guests were met with a homepage that felt premium, calm and confident: exactly what the brief had asked for.
The research validation had already given us confidence going into launch, with 8 in 10 users preferring the new design. Post-launch, I implemented five new UK village-specific booking journeys following user feedback, which increased average traffic across village pages by +2.7%.
The most tangible commercial outcome came from the offer countdown clock I had conceived. Designed to build urgency around our first peak period offer, the clock — served via Adobe Target to cookie-accepting guests — contributed to Center Parcs’ best ever day for revenue and volume of bookings (excluding the Covid period). It was a simple idea, but the right idea at the right moment.
What did I learn from the project?
This project taught me a lot about what it means to lead under pressure and not just design under pressure. The timeline was demanding, the team was stretched, and several workstreams were running simultaneously with no dedicated project manager. I found myself filling that coordination gap with spreadsheets and scenario planning due to pushed back timescales. Even though this was functional, it was not the best use of my time or energy. On reflection, I needed to escalate that resourcing gap more clearly and earlier.
I also learned something important about being confident with stakeholders. Pushing back on the Yield team’s two-CTA proposal was the right call from a UX perspective, but it required me to advocate firmly for the user in a room where commercial pressures were pulling in a different direction. That experience reinforced to me that UX managers need to be as skilled at making the case for good design. Ultimately, one of the landing pages was confusing for guests and therefore wasn’t performing well, so we removed it as an option. It shows that “simple is better for the guest” is always a defensible position.
Finally, working without finalised TOV or brand guidelines for much of the project sharpened my ability to make judgement calls and build consensus without the safety net of clear brand guidelines. It wasn’t comfortable, but it made the final result feel genuinely collaborative with the brand team. I’m proud of the pages that we built and extremely proud of the record breaking booking day we had on Tuesday 3rd February. It shows you what a marketing team can do when we all pull together!
