Background
Adrienne Arsht Center Trust is a large, dynamic performing arts venue presenting a wide range of productions, from ballet and opera to concerts, lectures, and community programming. Their mission is to engage and connect people from every corner of their community through artistic excellence and inspiring educational experiences. Their brand relies heavily on bold imagery, expressive color palettes, and show-specific creative direction—elements that can easily conflict with accessibility requirements if not handled thoughtfully.
An accessible digital experience is essential for Arsht to deliver on its mission; thus, it was a high priority and of significant importance as they considered their CMS options.
The organization faced several intersecting challenges:
• A diverse and constantly changing set of visual assets that needed to work cohesively across the site
• The need to ensure that all imagery, typography, and color combinations met WCAG 2.0 AA contrast and readability standards
• A desire to preserve accessibility compliance while migrating the site from Optimizely to Umbraco
• Ongoing concerns with site speed, scalability, and cost, particularly during major on-sales when traffic spikes dramatically
On their previous platform, enforcing accessibility consistently was difficult, and performance issues required significant infrastructure scaling during peak demand. The client needed a solution that would improve performance and cost efficiency while making accessibility easier—not harder—to maintain as content changed daily.
Solution
Adage designed and implemented a set of integrated solutions that embed accessibility and security directly into the Umbraco experience.
Solution 1: Accessible Theme Picker for Blocks and Templates
Adage built a custom theme picker within Umbraco that allows editors to theme individual blocks and templates in ways that complement the venue’s diverse imagery while remaining accessible and cohesive.
Editors can select colors, fonts, and backgrounds, including custom hex values, and immediately see whether their choices meet WCAG 2.0 AA contrast standards. This removes guesswork and eliminates the risk of publishing inaccessible combinations. Accessibility becomes a visible, real-time decision rather than a hidden technical constraint.
Solution 2: Motion and Audio Controls
To support users with cognitive sensitivities or assistive needs, Adage implemented play/pause controls and audio toggles for animated or multimedia content. This ensures users can control motion and sound, reducing cognitive overload while still allowing rich storytelling for those who want it.
Solution 3: Semantic Structure, Focus States, and Screen Reader Support
The site was built with proper semantic HTML, ARIA roles, and clear focus states, enabling users to navigate the site entirely via keyboard. Interactive elements announce themselves clearly to screen readers, ensuring users can understand both structure and context as they move through the experience.
Solution 4: Automated Accessibility for Performances
Adage enabled structured content and iconography to clearly identify accessible performances and the specific accommodations available. This information is consistently surfaced across the site, reducing ambiguity for patrons and minimizing the burden on box office staff to answer repetitive accessibility questions.
Impact
The solution delivered measurable and practical outcomes:
• Consistent WCAG 2.0 AA compliance
• A website that is significantly easier to parse for low vision and assistive technology users
• A more pleasant, less cognitively taxing experience for all visitors
• Reduced strain on box office and customer service teams due to clearer accessibility information
• Empowered internal teams who can now publish and update content independently while maintaining accessibility standards
Accessibility is no longer fragile or dependent on developer intervention, it is sustainable and repeatable.
Sustainability was addressed through performance, efficiency, and infrastructure optimization.
On the previous CMS, the organization was required to scale up to as many as eight servers during major on-sales due to traffic spikes. After migrating to Umbraco Cloud and optimizing code, caching, and content delivery, the site now performs up to five times faster, even under peak demand. Eight servers are never needed; the maximum needed is now five.
This improvement reduces:
• Server load and resource consumption
• Carbon footprint associated with over-provisioned infrastructure
• Operational cost during high-traffic events
The performance gains are the result of efficient frontend code, reduced payloads, and Umbraco’s cloud-native architecture—demonstrating how accessibility, performance, security, and sustainability can reinforce each other rather than compete.
Results
