I'm working on a project with some fellow students at my design school, where we've managed to secure a bit of funding to create an e-commerce platform for students to sell their work. We all have a background in front-end development using HTML, CSS, JS, and tools like p5.js and three.js. I'm the most experienced in backend development due to my prior coursework, but I'd love to learn more about that side of web development. Our main focus is to create an eye-catching website that represents our design school well, with the potential to expand into a mobile app later on.
After researching, it seems we have two main options for the e-commerce aspect:
1) Use Shopify's website builder and customize a theme with Liquid. However, I worry about how much flexibility this will give us for the front-end design, and none of us are familiar with Liquid yet, although we're open to learning.
2) Use Shopify's Hydrogen API for the backend and build the front end from scratch. I'm not sure how reliable Hydrogen is compared to regular Shopify and whether we should explore using frameworks like React or Flutter, since most of us have only done smaller projects with vanilla JS. I'm also curious if using a framework would simplify the future development of a mobile app.
Which option do you think is better for a small-scale platform? Are there any other alternatives I might not be considering? I apologize if my questions seem basic, but I'm eager to learn more about backend development!
4 Answers
I'd definitely recommend going with option 2, using Hydrogen and building a custom frontend. The limitations of Shopify themes can really stifle your creativity, especially for a project like yours that aims to be visually striking. Hydrogen will give you the flexibility you need without locking you into any predefined structures.
Going headless with Shopify's Hydrogen is a smart move if design freedom is what you're after. Using Liquid themes can constrain your ability to implement things like three.js or other heavy web graphics. Hydrogen lets you control everything while still providing the commerce essentials you need. And I'd suggest really diving into React for your storefront; it makes future mobile transitions smoother too!
I would lean towards option 2 as well. Shopify's built-in themes are great for traditional e-commerce, but they may not do justice to the creative works you're looking to showcase. Hydrogen will help you maintain your branding and creative decisions better. I'd recommend using a modern framework like Next.js; it has a bit of a learning curve, but the benefits in routing and optimization are huge!
Good point about Next.js! It really makes deployment and integration a breeze.
For your platform, I strongly suggest going with Shopify's Hydrogen combined with a custom React frontend. This approach will allow you to create a visually appealing site and also handle complex e-commerce features without having to start from scratch. Just keep in mind that even with Hydrogen, there’s still a lot to build, like user authentication and order management. Focus on getting your web platform solid first before tackling a mobile app.
Definitely! E-commerce can get complicated really fast, so good call on focusing on the web version first.
Totally agree! Plus, with React, you can take advantage of all the useful libraries available for three.js integration.