Arbor was a carbon offset mobile app that let users calculate environmental impact from everyday activities — gas, flights, electricity — and fund conservation projects to offset it, either as one-time contributions or recurring monthly subscriptions. I joined as the sole designer during the push toward MVP launch, focused on synthesizing existing user research, identifying friction points, and redesigning core screens to balance the tension between automation and emotional connection to projects. The product later pivoted to a Unity-based mobile game with a different monetization model, moving away from the offset marketplace I designed for — the work here represents the research and design direction before that pivot.
When I joined the team, they had conducted approximately 10–12 user interviews but hadn't fully synthesized the findings into actionable design requirements. I co-conducted 2 additional interviews and spent significant time analyzing all the feedback to identify patterns across competitive analysis of carbon offset apps and donation platforms, heuristic evaluation of existing screens, and usability feedback from alpha testing.
Across interviews and alpha feedback, four friction points surfaced. The headline tension — the one that shaped the most design decisions downstream — was between users wanting effortless sustainability and needing emotional investment in where their money was going.
The biggest tension was between wanting "set it and forget it" convenience and needing to feel emotionally connected to where their money was going.
"I'm lazy and busy — make it as easy as possible for me to be sustainable. Automation would be huge." — Interview participant
"I need to believe that what I'm doing is bad and that this will fix it... send me the picture of the kid who's starving and who's no longer starving as a result of using this app." — Interview participant
Multiple users described the dashboard as cluttered and anxiety-inducing. The grid of action buttons, stats, and project information created cognitive overload.
Users couldn't figure out how to browse project details. The interaction patterns weren't intuitive.
Several users expressed skepticism about whether their money would actually fund real projects. The app needed stronger credibility markers.
I redesigned three core screens to address the friction points. The screens I delivered were built for rapid handoff during the MVP sprint — I've since revisited these concepts to explore how the visual design could better support the research findings. Each redesign is shown in three states: the original, what I shipped during the engagement, and the current refinement.
I proposed replacing the generic user profile screen with a dedicated transaction management view. Research showed users wanted to split contributions across multiple projects and needed a reliable way to track recurring payments. The screen shows upcoming payments, project names, payment status (Active / Cancelled / Error), and next payment dates — giving users control and transparency over their subscriptions.
The original project list felt limited and didn't take advantage of modern screen space. I redesigned it as a more visual layout that could showcase multiple projects at once, making the platform feel expansive rather than constrained to just a handful of options. I added explicit instructional text addressing the navigation confusion users reported, and made tap targets more intuitive.
To address trust concerns, I redesigned the project details page to emphasize visual credibility. Instead of walls of text, I broke information into digestible content blocks with large hero images, partnership logos, funding progress bars, and clear impact descriptions. The key insight: users doubted platform legitimacy not because of lack of information, but because the presentation looked generic. Rich imagery and concrete metrics provide visual storytelling that builds confidence.
During the engagement, there was discussion about adding social features to increase engagement and create accountability among users. While this wasn't part of my core scope, I've since explored what this might look like. These concepts extend the research findings into new territory — the leaderboard addresses the "emotional connection" gap by making other contributors visible, while customizable profiles give users a way to build identity around their environmental impact.
Project leaderboards create light social accountability and make collective impact tangible.
Customizable profiles with swappable titles and impact summaries build user identity.
The redesigned screens were handed off to engineering and incorporated into the MVP build. While the product ultimately pivoted before full launch, the research synthesis I conducted helped clarify the core user tensions that any carbon offset product would need to address: making sustainability effortless while maintaining emotional investment in outcomes.
This project taught me the value of inheriting and synthesizing existing research rather than starting from scratch. The team had valuable interview data — it just needed structure. By creating actionable findings tied to specific design recommendations, I was able to move quickly from insight to implementation.
Working as the sole designer on an MVP also reinforced the importance of appropriate fidelity. The wireframes I delivered weren't polished, but they communicated the right information at the right time. The higher-fidelity explorations I've done since are valuable for demonstrating visual design skill, but they weren't what the project needed in the moment.