On Friday 10th October, Booking.com hosted the first-ever combined Booking.com and Smashing Magazine event, B.Smashing, at our head office in Amsterdam.
For years we have been attending Smashing Magazine events and sponsoring conferences together. However, this was the first time we invited them to our head office with a bunch of web enthusiasts. For us at Booking.com this was a particularly special event.
The event kick-started with some drinks, nibbles, and a meet and greet. After which, we enjoyed Zoe Gillenwater’s presentation on “CSS Lessons Learned The Hard Way.” Zoe spoke about the power of failing in order to learn something thoroughly and how this enables professionals to have an in depth knowledge of their craft.
“I’ve made plenty of CSS mistakes, but I’ve learned so much from them and think I’m a better web designer because of it. I truly think we all need to take risks and make mistakes in our work from time to time, so that we can learn and grow.”
Zoe’s presentation was followed by Vitaly Friedman, co-founder and chief editor at Smashing Magazine, who spoke about “Responsive Web Design: Clever Tips and Techniques.” His presentation offered insight into his experiences, as well as offering tips and tools for web design and development in today’s multi-device world. Vitaly also put emphasis on the importance of having a well performing website, as responsive design is viewed on a mobile and data connections are not always the best.
“Responsive design is just a tool, but it’s a very good and powerful tool to help us cope with this multi-dimensional web that we have today.”
We love putting on these events and connecting with our industry peers — especially when we can offer something back to a community we’ve all benefited from so much in our own careers. We will be hosting the Sketch & Framer group in November and are always on the look out for more opportunities to host such events. Watch this space!
Thanks to Ivan Babko, you can also see a small video about the event!