Topp Shelf Building

A custom website for a builder, so a cautious homeowner can judge the work — and the builder — before a phone call.

Strategy and copy
Design system
Custom website build
Callback booking flow
Content editor
SEO and Google Business Profile

The business

Topp Shelf Building is Clinton Topp’s owner-operated building business in Waikanae, on the Kāpiti Coast: renovations and alterations, new builds, and rural and farm buildings. Clinton runs the job and works on the tools, with his son alongside him as an apprentice, bringing around 20 years of combined trade experience, and he wanted more of his work to come directly from homeowners.

Topp Shelf Building is Clinton Topp’s owner-operated building business in Waikanae, on the Kāpiti Coast: renovations and alterations, new builds, and rural and farm buildings.

The challenge

People commissioning a build often weigh up several builders, and many hesitate to cold-call a tradesperson. The website had to do the introducing: show the quality of the work, show who turns up, and answer the questions people feel awkward asking — before they commit to a conversation.

People commissioning a build often weigh up several builders, and many hesitate to cold-call a tradesperson.

The approach

Proof first, straight answers second, the smallest possible ask last. Projects lead, each with its scope, location and story. Common questions and guides deal plainly with pricing, consent and subcontractors, and there are no prices on the site, on purpose. The call to action is Clinton’s own: book a callback, a smaller commitment than booking a builder.

Proof first, straight answers second, the smallest possible ask last. Projects lead, each with its scope, location and story.

What I built

Strategy, copy and a design system from Clinton’s own brief — dark tones, warm greys and brass — then a custom React build with project pages, common questions and guides, a booked-callback flow, consent-gated analytics and an editor so Clinton can change his own words. Structured data and Google Business Profile work completed the picture. It launched in September 2026.

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The home page on a tablet: “We build houses. We build for family.”

Topp Shelf Building’s home page on a laptop: the rotating headline, “Kāpiti-based builders, working in our own neighbourhood” and Explore our work

Laptop · Tablet · Phone

The laptop is the easy part.

Even on a phone, the callback is a sentence you finish with a few taps.

His home page’s Projects section, recorded on the live site. One screen holds it all: pick a build, turn the fan or tap a thumbnail for another photo, with a client’s words in the corner.

The mark goes up first

The home page opens on Clinton’s mark assembling under a moving light, on a datum line with survey ticks. It settles into the lockup, then the dark ground lifts onto the home page.

Common questions page with a question search and topic tiles

Straight answers, no prices

Common questions and plain-English guides do the reassuring. The absence of prices is deliberate, and the site says so.

Typography & colour

Two grounds and one metal.

Four typefaces and eight colours, each with one job. Brass is the mark’s own metal.

Font

Basement Grotesque

Every heading on the site.

Symbols

Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū

Colour palette

Eight colours, approved by Clinton. Soot and Limewash are the grounds; brass is the accent.

Brass#BD8C38
Lit Brass#D9AB4D
Tanned Oak#5C3A1E
Site Grey#A09A90
Limewash#EFE8DA
Soot#12100D
Ironbark#1B1814
Rasp#2F2A22

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