Role: End-to-end product designer, Concept, Research, UX, UI, Branding
Skills: Product Design, UI/UX Design, Wireframing, Figma, Adobe XD
Duration: September – October 2022
Project
In order to start my career path change, I knew I had to start a functional portfolio for both job applications and networking connections. Through designing this website, I designed my prospective career switch.
Challenges
- Designing a minimalist interface filled with personality.
- Writing in a personal tone while maintaining a professional appearance.
- Allowing for persuasive articles but upholding a concise format.
Brainstorm
From the start, I knew several questions needed to be addressed before I could construct my portfolio. I was able to narrow the questions down to the following:
Who is my primary audience?
What is the hierarchy of content?
What are the challenges I will face moving forward?
Preliminary Ideation
After analyzing the previous questions, I was able to draw up the following notes relating to the overall view of my portfolio:
Meet the Users
Primary
Name: Alice
Age: 26
Occupation: Social Media Manager
Secondary
Name: Josh
Age: 35
Occupation: Senior UX Designer
Alice is a social media manager for a non-profit. She wants to search for a new job in the near future, so she is starting to build her network and inspire herself to touch up her portfolio.
Josh is a Senior UX Designer at a large corporation. He is on the hiring team to fill a position within his department and is on the lookout for possible candidates.
Sitemap
In order to stay true to the motive of my portfolio, I needed to maintain a landing page and focus on simple navigation. By establishing a minimalist navigation bar that is easily accessible for both new and old users, anyone can navigate to their intended use for my portfolio.
Low-Fidelity Wireframes
Creating a low-fidelity allowed me to envision how my portfolio would be viewed by users. It was important to have enough content to inform users, but I needed to focus on keeping the screen clear of clutter.
Branding Kit
I created a brand kit hosting a color palette of natural tones while keeping a crisp appearance. By incorporating a thin, sans-serif font as the body text and a serif, display font for the headings, I was able to create a personal, yet professional front.
Takeaways
My portfolio is an active representation of my work and will continue to evolve as I work on more projects. However, the current layout and functionality of my portfolio is satisfactory and I am excited to share my work with my potential users. The primary difficulty I faced was figuring out how to create an interface that was concise and clean since I enjoy categorizing. I know I have a lot more to learn as a self-taught UX Designer and I look forward to growing the content through my experience.
Shelby Ann Davis 