🧶 I Built a Production-Ready Blogging Platform with Django, DRF & Supabase

I wanted to go beyond a basic CRUD app.

So I built StitchTales — a full-stack blogging platform designed for creators to publish tutorials and stories, complete with authentication, REST APIs, image storage, and production deployment.

🔗 Live:

🏗 Tech Stack

• Django 5.2


• Django REST Framework


• PostgreSQL (Railway)


• Supabase Storage (custom backend)


• HTMX


• Whitenoise


• Token + session authentication

✨ What It Supports

• Full blog CRUD with draft → publish workflow


• Slug-based URLs + SEO fields


• Categories, tags, view tracking


• Comment moderation + like system (HTMX)


• Profile system with avatars + social links


• Public REST API with permission control


• Production-ready deployment on Railway

🔌 API Design

GET    /api/posts/

GET    /api/posts/<slug>/

POST   /api/posts/

PUT    /api/posts/<slug>/

DELETE /api/posts/<slug>/

POST   /api/auth/token/

Design decisions:

• Public read access


• Authenticated write access


• Author-only updates/deletes


• Slug-based lookups instead of IDs


• Pagination enabled

🖼 Why Supabase Instead of S3?

Instead of AWS, I built a custom Django storage backend for Supabase.

This required:

• Understanding Django’s storage API


• Handling server-side uploads securely


• Generating public CDN URLs


• Structuring bucket organization cleanly

It kept the stack simple while still being production-capable.

⚡ Why HTMX Instead of React?

I intentionally avoided a heavy frontend framework.

HTMX gave me:

• Dynamic likes without reload


• Cleaner backend focus


• Simpler architecture


• Faster development

Right tool for the project size.

🧠 Production Considerations

• Environment-based configuration


• SQLite locally, PostgreSQL in production


• CSRF + trusted origins configured


• 
  DEBUG=False in production


• Whitenoise for static files


• Sitemap + robots.txt for SEO

I treated it like a real deployment — not just a localhost demo.

🚀 What I’d Add Next

• Automated tests


• CI/CD pipeline


• Redis caching


• Rate limiting


• Social auth


• Structured logging

🎯 Why This Project Matters

This wasn’t about crochet.

It was about demonstrating:

• Clean backend architecture


• Thoughtful API design


• External storage integration


• Production deployment awareness


• Full-stack decision-making

If you're hiring for a backend or full-stack role, I’d love feedback.

— Sneha