2023
Role
User Experience Researcher
User Experience Designer
User Interface Designer
Services
Brand Strategy and Identity
Product Design
Collaborators
Jingting Wang
Vivian Le
Brian Zhao
Yuxuan Xia
Venus' Closet
Venus' Closet is an accessible e-commerce platform that provides fashionable, adaptive clothing for the community with disabilities. It simplifies the current search process and creates user-centered e-shopping experiences.
As the lead designer, I spearheaded the end-to-end design process, from developing design strategies to establishing a cohesive design system and crafting intuitive interactions. My focus was on simplifying the search process and creating a user-centered e-shopping experience that addresses the unique needs of our community.
Problem
Despite 61 million Americans facing disabilities, there remains a significant gap in accessible e-commerce platforms offering adaptive clothing that meets both functional and fashion needs.
According to Center for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) Up to 1 in 4 adults in United States have some type of disability, which is 61 Million People have a disability that impacts major life activities and would need additional help in their daily lives.
It is important to note that, many of individuals with disabilities, especially those with mobility issues, often require special design of their clothes with unique attachment, extra space, or different functions.
Adaptive Clothing refers to clothing specifically designed to make dressing and undressing easier for individuals with physical disabilities or limited mobility. However, we found that the market currently lack of an accessible shopping platform for disabled individual to shop for adaptive clothing fit their fashion needs. Even when there is something like this, the search process for the right clothing is always time-comsuming and unnecessarily complex.
User Research
Insight #1:
There are not enough resources for fashionable, adaptive clothing.
“It'd be really nice if there were more things available.”
Insight #2:
Fashion is an important way to normalize disabilities and make people feel confident.
“A large part of his life was he wanted to be fashionable and he didn't want to look like he was handicapped. ”
设计挑战
What are the key pain points for individuals with disabilities in the process of finding and purchasing adaptive clothing that fits both their fashion and physical needs?
Personas
We created 2 personas from both the individuals with disabilities' perspective and the caregivers' perspective, as they are the ones being impacted primarily by this issue. Both personas expressed the need for more available resources of adaptive clothing, as it will significantly enhance their life satisfaction.
Based on our research, our original hypothesis is confirmed, which means that there is indeed a need for more clothing options that combines fashion and functionality.
We also created journey map and storyboard, which both are able to complement our personas because they are built from the personas. These two visualizations could provide a more detailedunderstanding of how a user purchases new adaptive clothes online so we could prioritize issues to solve their pain points more effectively.
Pre-Survey
This app will ask a series of questions when users sign up for a new account, collected data is used to build an individual profile for the user based on their disability and clothing needs. This data will be used by the algorithm to recommend relevant products based on the users' interests.
Personalization
This app has embedded many features supporting the users to choose particular styles, sizes, and functions of clothing that fit use’s personal needs. Users can filter clothes by functionality in the search page, and also review details about how each product supports the community of disabilities.
Customization
This app will allow users to customize their clothing with features such as color, material, attachment, size, and shape, to best enable them to get clothes based on different needs. The purchase process is also streamlined to reduce unnecessary trouble.
