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Bespoke Jewellery

Role

UX Researcher

UX Designer

Visual Design

Prototyping

Duration

Google UX - 6 Weeks

Tools

Figma

Adobe Photoshop

Artboard Studio

Connect

  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn

Challenge

The COVID-19 pandemic has forever redesigned our world and reinforced the importance of businesses having an online presence. However, shoppers have expressed hesitancy in purchasing jewelry online due to difficulty with sizing, material quality and the inability to visualize the jewellery on themselves.

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Bespoke is a Montréal-based handcrafted jewellery brand born from a desire to produce unique pieces that uphold the founder's values of sustainability and inclusivity. A website is needed as the unique pieces have garnered international interest. 

The Solution

A fully responsive shopping website that builds customer trust by reflecting the real essence of the brand, streamlining the shopping experience and using technology to replicate an in-person shopping experience.

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Show me the goods (i.e. Prototype)

Overview

- The Barriers to Online Jewellery Shopping - 

Shopping Websites Need to Do More

To better empathize with the challenges that customers face while shopping, I hit the ground running by conducting 6 interviews and putting out a 15-question survey to get shopper insights on their experience browsing and purchasing jewellery. I received 130 responses. As a jewellery lover, I also reflected on my experience and combined the insights to pinpoint the main problems I want to solve. 

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Aisha, 29 yrs

I mostly purchase my jewellery in stores because of the high rate of misrepresentation of quality and sizes. I also always want to see how it looks on me because most brands show lighter skin models. On the rare occasion, I shop online, I look at the visuals because I think a poorly designed website is an indication of low-quality jewellery.

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Faith, 34 yrs

I don't wear a lot of jewellery but I do purchase a lot of jewellery for friends and family which can be quite nerve-racking, especially when they have different styles. Most websites lack detailed information on the jewellery and are not optimized for viewing on mobile devices which makes shopping almost unbearable.  

Key Research Insights
  • Lack of detailed product information, return conditions and reviews majorly hinder purchasing decisions. 

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  • Customers depend heavily on word-of-mouth recommendations as they want to be sure of their purchase.

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  • Rings are particularly difficult to purchase online due to sizing complexities.

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  • Though sometimes inconvenient, customers prefer to go to a store when making high-value purchases. ​​​

 

  • Unorganized content and unnecessary steps make ordering from mobile devices unbearable.

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  • Inclusivity is still a major issue, making it difficult for shoppers to visualize the jewellery pieces on themselves.

Persona & User Journey Development

Using the data collected from the research, I defined two personas; Aisha and Faith. I focused on Aisha because her profile was must extreme and covered the pain points of Lola. I also created a user journey to have a deeper understanding of user needs, motivations, pain points and reduce personal bias when making design decisions.

Research & Persona

- Answering the Question "How Might We?" - 

Bridge the Gap Between Users and Their Goals?

From the journey map, I was able to translate pain points and challenges into the following user requirements and opportunities to inform our ideation towards potential design recommendations:

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  • How might we reduce the negative emotions involved with purchasing jewellery online?

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  • How might we replicate the in-person shopping experience?

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  • How might we provide users with effective and personalized services?

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  • How might we ensure a simple and easy-to-use experience?

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  • How might we be inclusivity and accessibility at the forefront of our design? 

Measure Success

Before I started creating layouts and mocking up screens, I consulted with the team to identify the healthcare considerations and constraints:

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  • How might we encourage shoppers to regularly use services provided on the website to have consistent sales?

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  • How might we create opportunities within the app to learn more about the users in order to serve them better?​​

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  • How might we convey our value of transparency and accountability?

- Who's Killing it in the Industry? - 

With a good understanding of the highs and lows in shopper emotions when purchasing jewellery, I looked at direct and indirect competitors to observe to see how they handle common issues and gain insight into the best design features. I selected highly-rated small jewellery brands as well as well-known jewellery brands.​

I observed similar trends across competitors on how jewellery is displayed to attract shoppers, however, the smaller brands all lacked personalized recommendations which provides Bespoke with an opportunity to stand out. While bigger brands like Pandora, utilize augmented reality to replicate the in-person experience and combat sizing issues, the jewellery really looks realistic and does not help with the issue of lack of representation. 

- Reducing Overwhelm with an Intuitive Flow - 

With numerous ideas and potential layouts in mind, I created multiple sketches to think freely on how to structure the website in order to eliminate complexities, what features and interactions could be used to address customer needs. 

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Information Architecture

To structure the website, a sitemap was created to visualize how much was content needs to be created and how the story of the website can be told. It also helped to condense the number of pages in order to keep it easy for visitors to navigate. (Click to enlarge)

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An Intuitive Flow

- Visual Concept - 

When deciding the visual style of the website, I kept in mind that the mastery of the jewellery must shine through, so I decided on a modern and minimalistic style that does not grab attention from the jewellery. I also stayed true to the brand values by keeping accessibility and inclusivity at the forefront. Therefore I created a mood board with colours and visuals that are conveyed the mood of the brand — elegance, femininity and adventure. 

Visual Concept

- Let's Start Building - 

Several ideas were transformed into a more tangible form by creating wireframes. As users do a lot of shopping on their phones, I started with mobile wireframes. I iterated a few times based on insights from the usability testing to get the wireframes into a state I wanted to continue with and then proceeded to design the desktop and tablet versions of the website.

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