Svalbard is a year-round haven for nature-based experiences, offering an unrivalled landscape in an Arctic climate, dominated by tundra, bare mountains, glaciers, extreme light variations and exciting animal life.

Visit Svalbard set out to create a website experience that conveyed the stark beauty of this Arctic wonderland, complemented by stunning, high quality imagery. The team at Simpleview, formerly New Mind | tellUs, stepped up to the challenge, creating a dramatic effect on their destination site.

Now, when a visitor arrives at their site, they are presented with four potential travel experiences: Polar City Break, Classic Nature Adventures, Be Like the Locals and Epic Expeditions. Each of these journeys enable the prospective travel to imagine their ideal, quintessential Svalbard experience—whether that includes more calming activities or a hardcore adventure.

Beyond this inspiration, the homepage also offers practical information in the form of tips from locals of Longyearbyen. With more polar bears than people, it’s wise to provide guidance for new visitors—including tips to avoid wildlife mishaps and a host of other essential information.

The team also was able to enhance the functionality of other featured items, including an effective and flexible launchpad to boost awareness of a whole range of the key activities in the area. The brand new activity planner allows the visitor to search and filter activities by season, difficulty, category and duration in an intuitive manner. And, the new joint booking widget facilitates seamless access to two different booking systems for activities and accommodation in Svalbard.

The Visit Svalbard team has worked hard on content to position the site as an extensive information resource, from the 'Did you know?' feature on the homepage to a comprehensive Visitor Information section with everything from how to dress to sustainability in Svalbard.

"We're proud to present Svalbard and Longyearbyen's brand new destination website, wrapped in a fashionable and modern look,” shared Susanna Margula, web coordinator at Visit Svalbard.  “The site is the result of our strategic work over a long period of time and forms an important part of our development strategy 'Destination Svalbard Towards 2025'.”

Developed for a range of platforms, from phone to tablet, the site will help to inspire curiosity in this unique destination, and position Svalbard as a must-visit destination for adventure-seekers.

“Our High Arctic destination is unique, authentic and different—and our new website reflects this," said Margula.