CASE STUDY #1 | MD | A personalized furniture e-commerce
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The app is an e-commerce platform focused on customizable furniture for individuals and businesses. Users can browse styles, personalize options like materials and colors, and view 3D previews. With features like corporate color matching, it’s ideal for hotels, offices, and commercial spaces. The app simplifies the buying process by integrating customization, secure checkout, and order tracking, offering a tailored online shopping experience.
DESIGNER'S ROLE IN THE PROJECT
As the lead designer for this e-commerce app project, I was responsible for crafting an intuitive and engaging user experience tailored to customers interested in personalized furniture. My role involved understanding the unique needs of this niche market, where users prioritize customization options, visual appeal, and seamless navigation. Starting with user research, I gathered insights into common pain points and expectations in online furniture shopping. I translated these insights into a cohesive design strategy that emphasized ease of use, aesthetics, and functionality.
THE PROJECT'S GOAL
The goal of this project was to design an e-commerce app that makes it easy and enjoyable for customers to shop for personalized furniture. Since customization is key to the appeal of bespoke furniture, the project aimed to create a user-friendly platform where customers could explore, customize, and purchase pieces that match their personal style. This involved designing a clear product catalog, adding easy-to-use customization options, and ensuring a smooth checkout process. The app’s design was focused on removing common frustrations in online shopping and making personalized, high-quality furniture more accessible. Overall, the app aimed to give users a seamless, enjoyable experience from browsing to purchasing, helping them feel confident in creating furniture that fits their unique needs.
THE TARGET AUDIENCE
The target audience for this app includes people and businesses who want personalized, high-quality furniture. This could be individuals furnishing their homes, like young adults decorating their first apartments or families wanting unique pieces. It also includes companies, like hotel chains or offices, that need furniture in specific colors or styles to match their brand. These users enjoy the ease of online shopping but often feel limited by standard furniture options. This app allows them to create pieces that fit their exact needs and style, making it ideal for anyone looking for furniture that truly feels personalized.
THE CHALLENGES
One of the main challenges in designing this app was creating an easy-to-use customization tool for a complex product like furniture. Allowing users to adjust colors, materials, and dimensions while keeping the interface simple was difficult but essential. Another challenge was ensuring the app could handle a wide range of products and customization options without overwhelming the user. Balancing aesthetics and functionality in the design was also key—our goal was to make it visually appealing while still being intuitive. Lastly, integrating a smooth checkout process and handling customer support for such unique products required extra planning to keep users engaged and satisfied.
THE RESEARCH STUDY
We started by analyzing similar e-commerce platforms to understand the standard features and common pain points in furniture customization. Next, we would interview potential users*, including corporate buyers, interior designers, and hotel managers, to gather insights on what they needed most. We also would conduct surveys to learn more about their preferences, like the level of customization they expected and their biggest frustrations with online furniture shopping. This research guided our design decisions and helped us prioritize features that would make the app genuinely useful, especially for businesses looking to order large volumes of customized furniture.
*As this is an hypothetical study case, there was not a real interview on companies or hotel chains, just some people on my personal inner circle.
THE INITIAL DESIGN CONCEPTS
The focus was on creating a clean, modern interface that balanced simplicity with the flexibility needed for customization. The goal was to ensure users could easily explore and personalize furniture without feeling overwhelmed. Early ideas included a modular product catalog with clear visuals, interactive 3D previews for customization, and filters to help users quickly find what they needed. For businesses, the design incorporated features like bulk ordering and corporate color options. The design also prioritized accessibility, ensuring the interface was intuitive for all users, whether they were individuals or companies purchasing furniture in large quantities. These concepts set the foundation for a seamless and engaging user experience.
SKETCHES / WIREFRAMING
Wireframing for the furniture configurator was one of the most challenging aspects of the project, as this feature needed to function flawlessly to deliver a seamless user experience. The configurator required a dynamic, interactive interface where users could click on specific parts of a piece of furniture—such as the seat, backrest, or legs—and select materials, finishes, or colors for each component. The wireframes focused on creating an intuitive layout, ensuring clear visibility of the customization options and the clickable areas. To make the experience even smoother, the configurator included real-time price updates, recalculating the total cost with every change the user made. These early wireframes were essential in mapping out the interactions and validating the logic behind the tool, ensuring the configurator could handle complex selections without lag or errors. They served as a blueprint for aligning technical feasibility with user needs, setting the foundation for the configurator’s ultimate success.
THE RESULTS OF USER TESTING
The user testing results gave us important feedback to improve the app. Many users liked the clean and simple design, calling it “intuitive” and saying they “would use it in real life.” However, some pain points stood out, especially with the personalization tool. Users wanted it to be easier to use and suggested adding a 3D view or augmented reality to see the furniture in their own space. Some also found the menu confusing, with too many categories, and they missed having a search bar. Other issues included unclear instructions on certain screens and the lack of a feature to save progress when leaving a customization. This feedback helped us make the app easier to use, improve navigation, and ensure the personalization tool worked smoothly for everyone.
HIGH FIDELITY PROTOTYPE
PENDIENTE INTEGRAR PREVIEW UIZARD
CONCLUSION AND NEXT STEPS
The design process for the personalized furniture app taught us a lot about user needs and challenges. We learned how important it is to create a simple and clear app while including powerful tools like the furniture configurator. User feedback showed areas to improve, such as making the app easier to navigate, adding features like 3D previews or augmented reality, and allowing users to save their progress. These lessons helped us create a better and more user-friendly app. Next, we plan to improve the personalization tool, add more interactive features, and test the app with more people to make sure it works well for everyone.
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