New to Sheffield

We kicked things off with a session with Learn for Life to get aligned on the problem and their vision for the new site. Early on, it became clear that the need went beyond people seeking asylum — there was an opportunity to support anyone new to Sheffield. We agreed to broaden the audience to reflect that.

The project quickly evolved into a genuine partnership. We brought to the project:

• UX (user experience)
• Experience design
• Accessibility strategy
• Content design
• Branding
• Technical delivery

While Learn for Life contributed invaluable:

• Local knowledge (within Sheffield)
• Community relationships
• Lived experience insights

We established clear roles and responsibilities from the outset and created a collaborative approach that enabled both organisations to play to their strengths.

With that in place, we moved on to shaping our discovery plan.

From day one, we knew this project had to be built with users, not simply for them. So we spent time embedding ourselves at Learn for Life, working alongside students, volunteers, and people at different stages of settling into Sheffield.

Being physically present made a huge difference. Over time, people started to recognise us, trust us, and open up about their experiences. It also gave us a much better understanding of how Learn for Life operates day-to-day, which helped strengthen the partnership.

We spoke to a wide range of people, and quickly learned that rigid interview scripts didn’t always work. Many conversations were sensitive, so we adapted our approach — letting people lead and sharing what they felt comfortable with. This gave us much richer, more honest insights.

From these conversations, we started to identify the most important content areas for the site, while also capturing lower-priority topics to come back to later.

We also worked with groups of university students to understand the needs of young people new to the city. They helped us gather service information and took part in card sorting exercises, which gave us an early steer on how to structure and categorise content.

To broaden our perspective, we connected with other organisations across the city, who helped us speak to people with different experiences. We also engaged with neurodivergent users to better understand how content should be structured, displayed, and prioritised to be as accessible and usable as possible.

Before exploring colours, typography or layouts, we focused on how the platform should feel.

Using divergent thinking exercises (playful, no-wrong-answers exercises for generating a wide range of ideas), we explored what we wanted the site to communicate emotionally before thinking about how it looked. Those insights informed every design decision that followed.

We wanted the site’s purpose to be clear the moment someone arrived. So we asked university students to run a co-creation session with Learn for Life learners, designing an icon for each main category. The goal was visuals that made sense without words. The result was a set of icons that felt intuitive across cultures and ages — which matters for such a diverse audience.

We chose Webflow to build the site. It gave us the flexibility of a custom build without the cost and time of traditional development, so we could move fast, make changes often, and launch an early version quickly. Just as importantly, it means the Learn for Life team can update content themselves, without requiring ongoing developer support.

Webflow’s CMS also made it easy to structure our categories and subcategories. Its built-in search and Google Translate integration covered our most important needs: helping users find information quickly, and making it available in their own language.

Accessibility remained a priority throughout the project. Working alongside our accessibility specialists at Hive, we tested continuously during development. This ensured that the final platform could be used effectively with screen readers, keyboard navigation and assistive technologies.

It was a highly collaborative process — grounded in user input, shaped by real needs, and built to last well beyond launch.

A platform is only useful as the information it contains.

With that in mind, we worked closely with Learn for Life and a network of local charities, community groups, businesses and public services. We mapped the support available across Sheffield and identified the information people needed the most.

To keep things simple, we created clear content guidelines so partners could send information in the right format without guesswork. We then rewrote everything in Entry Level 1 English. This kept our tone consistent, made the content easy for everyone to understand, and helped it translate accurately without losing meaning. Google Translate has its limits, but for an early version on a small budget, it covers a huge number of languages.

From early on, we knew we wanted to celebrate the launch with a party that everyone could come to. Holding it at Learn for Life Enterprise felt only right — It’s where New to Sheffield first sparked to life, and a place where so many people in the community already feel safe.

We packed the room with everyone who made this journey possible, bringing together students, volunteers, local services, partners, Hive clients, and local MPs under one roof. The day was a massive, joyful celebration of Sheffield’s incredible diversity, highlighting the vibrant energy that people seeking sanctuary and asylum bring to our city.

Every detail of the day felt personal. The amazing team at Open Kitchen Social Club kept everyone fed, while the room was filled with beautiful artwork created by Learn for Life students. To top it all off, the One World Choir and students took to the stage for an unforgettable afternoon of live music and poetry. It was a wonderful, truly inclusive day that we wanted to feel like a massive thank you to the community that built New to Sheffield.

Launching the site was just the beginning.

Now, we’ve moved into the support and maintenance phase, but we’re keeping that same spirit of co-creation alive. We’re using a feedback form on the site so the people using it can help us spot quick content edits and corrections in real time.

At the same time, we’re teaming up with people in the community to run user testing across different groups. We want to hear firsthand what’s working well, what needs a little tweak, and what completely new features we should build next. To make the site feel even more dynamic, we’re also working with a local student to capture real-life imagery from around the community.

Looking at the bigger picture, we’re currently researching how we can use or build a much more accessible translation tool to break down language barriers even further.

Ultimately, our main goal is to keep the platform packed with relevant, genuinely helpful information, working side by side with Learn for Life and all the amazing partners we’ve met along the way.

If you want to check out the website and provide your own feedback, you can do so by accessing the website at New to Sheffield.

This project is a great example of what can happen when organisations, communities and users come together to solve a problem.

At Hive IT, we help organisations uncover insights, improve user experiences and build digital products that work for people who need them most. From user research and service design through to branding, accessibility and website development, we support projects from idea to launch and beyond.

Thinking about a new project? We’d love to hear what you’re working on. Get in touch with us and let’s see what we can build together. Contact us here.