For fans of the French crocodile, Lacoste has launched a rather snappy website this month, one for us design fans to really sink our teeth into... Okay that's enough of the jokes, so let's be serious and take a look at www.lacostered.com.

Designed and developed by Parisian firm Megalo(s), the site launches the new Lacoste Red Collection. The creative direction is based on a campaign by celebrity photographer Terry Richardson and features a soundtrack by Yuksek. Lacoste Red is Lacoste's junior collection and is aimed at 15-25 year olds.

So seeing as I love attention to detail more than I love a cold beer on a sunny day, I was quite impressed with the loading screen. These things, in my opinion, quite often let a site down because they are left to the last moment, build no sense of anticipation and never fully integrate with the content. It's a bit like going to a posh restaurant and being confronted with a lavatory and accessories from Builders Warehouse - it does the job, but doesn't quite cut the design mustard. Lacoste have gone for an unapologetic full screen clock, music, a couple of zooming bikers and the option for low or high bandwidth (a big tick for those of us that live in South Africa).

Before you know what is going on your ears are assaulted by an awesome soundtrack and a full screen intro sequence to match. I hardly had a chance to look at the clothing as the jumping models morphed and twirled in slow motion. It is difficult to see what concept tied the collection to the visual execution, but hey it's cool right? Roll over that skip button to see what I mean. Oh yes and if strobe lights give you a funny turn you might want to look away now.

So on into the menu. Sadly the music here is softer and a bit less interesting, but select a style and bam! you're back to the good stuff. Strong typography and another fab loading sequence which employs a sense of eighties computer games. This was as far as I got because it stuck at 100%. Big sigh.

Clicking through the footer navigation, my eyebrows raised somewhat when I clicked the 'Find it here' link and up popped a map of Cape Town, with no request from me, seems like someone is finally making use of our IP addresses - sadly my nearest shop is a touch too far up north in Tyne & Wear... There are the obvious wallpapers, but I liked the options more suited to the target age group to buff up your blog and add the results to Facebook. The game is a shade too similar to Guitar Hero which is probably the only negative apart from some obvious Flash glitches in what is a fun and fresh site.

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