Throughout the pandemic, it was clear that most people's sense of community took a hit. To encourage re-connection, my team and I created Neighbourlink, a digital medium for in-person social planning that encourages safe and local recreational activities.
While traditional social media platforms exist, we found they actually promote the opposite—with dark patterns like infinite scroll designed to keep people online as long as possible. In contrast, Neighbourlink enables social event planning, facilitates neighbourly assistance, and more.
From the Ground Up
We began with the app's main features. At its core, Neighbourlink's goal is to connect people within their community.
After refining these user flows, we had a good idea of how the app might operate. The next step was to develop low-fidelity wireframes to start experimenting with layout and how these separate features might connect.
Toward a Final Product
Once the foundation had been layed, we could move on to visual development and bringing it all together.
One of my primary roles was developing Neighbourlink's design system and visual identity.
Using the low-fidelity wireframes as a base, we put together a full-fledged app prototype.
We knew that running user studies would require a platform that was truly interactive. That's why I took time to prototype every user interaction including all primary features, scrolling, error cases, and more.
The final result anticipates user intent and clearly facilitates social event planning. With modern digital UX design conventions and interactions based on real-world user testing, Neighbourlink is a fundamentally user-focused product.