Multiple Lightboxes with limited CMS

Hi Webflow community,
This is my first post here so pardon if it’s a little unclear.
I’ve created this page with many different photo galleries. From previous years. Each gallery displayed is a Webflow Lightbox. Trails & Vistas Photo and Video Gallery

The challenge is that the way I’ve built this, which is the only way I could think of, requires a unique Collection for each year displayed. Using this, I’ve run out of Collections allowed on the client’s account. An upgrade is required. Based on this use-case, I think an upgrade should be unnecessary, and why I’m here. Is there a better way to build this? I’ve spent hours perusing all sorts of helpful tips but none that help me deal with this specific approach without requiring an upgraded account. Is there a better way?


Here is my site Read-Only: https://preview.webflow.com/preview/trailsvistas-demo?utm_medium=preview_link&utm_source=designer&utm_content=trailsvistas-demo&preview=5fd68ebf9465af95599c8f1895cfe409&pageId=5ce8826d5abdf657b04aefdb&mode=preview

Hello. I took a look at your page, and I’d say it’s pretty inefficent to have an entire CMS collection per year if you don’t want to upgrade the account. Mostly because CMS items support multi-image fields now, and can display a few of them nested inside a collection list.

The way I’d do it is the following:

  • Create ONE collection list that’ll contain everything, not one per year.
  • When creating it add one or more multi-image fields which can contain up to 25 images each.
  • After the list is created, create one CMS item for each year. Put the correct year in the name field and dump the images into the multi-image field.

On the webpage, display a single collection list and add a text box that you bind to the item name (which is the year). Then add another collection list into the collection list - and bind it to the multi-image field. That way you can get the images and display them.

Drawback is that you can only show five images per year on the main image page, but this can be easily circumvented by adding a huge “+”, a “click here for more” or something that links into the CMS collection page which can contain all images for that year. Style these subpages by going into the CMS collection pages template.

Thanks @Fonsume. What causes the “five images per year” issue? Is that something built into the Webflow Multi-Image field?