Make connections through books and people.
A social app where you can discover conversations you care about, find new reads, and chat with people who share your interests.
Introduction to the Project
As the Lead Designer at Threadable Books, I was brought on to take full ownership of the product’s visual and user experience—from the iOS mobile app to the website and all supporting marketing materials. My mission was clear: bring clarity, consistency, and creativity to every touchpoint of the brand. I began by conducting a comprehensive UX audit of the existing product, identifying opportunities to improve usability, streamline user flows, and create a more emotionally engaging reading and sharing experience for our users.
One of my first major initiatives was building a scalable, component-based design system that could support rapid iteration across product and marketing teams. This system not only accelerated development cycles but also established a cohesive visual language that reflected the brand’s personality and mission. I collaborated closely with product managers, developers, and stakeholders to ensure that every design decision aligned with business goals and user needs.
My Impact Was Clear
Within the first six months of relaunching the redesigned app and website, Threadable saw a 60% increase in active users, a 40% boost in user engagement, and a 25% improvement in user retention. The new marketing materials and improved onboarding experience also contributed to a more compelling brand presence, helping the company better connect with book lovers and influencers alike.
Throughout my time at Threadable, I acted as both a hands-on designer and a design leader—mentoring junior team members, championing user advocacy, and continually pushing the product forward through thoughtful, user-centered design. My work helped shape Threadable into a more polished, intuitive, and beloved platform for readers everywhere.
🔑 My Key Achievements
I led the full design process—from shaping the brand identity to crafting a fun, user-friendly experience tailored to book lovers and influencers. I created a scalable design system and collaborated closely with cross-functional teams to bring a cohesive and engaging product to life.
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Designed a full brand system including logo, color palette, typography, and visual voice—establishing a recognizable and cohesive identity across app and web.
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Directed UX/UI for the mobile app, creating wireframes, high-fidelity mockups, and interactive prototypes for core features like book scoring, community ratings, and reading progress tracking.
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Conducted user interviews and feedback sessions to align design decisions with actual reader behavior and influencer needs.
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Built and maintained a modular, scalable design system in Figma to streamline team collaboration and handoff to developers.
Listening to Our Users
As Lead Designer, I was responsible for driving a deeply user-centered approach to product development, with a strong focus on continuous discovery, validation, and iteration. I led end-to-end user research efforts—including planning and conducting user interviews, facilitating remote usability tests, and gathering behavioral data—to uncover real user needs, pain points, and expectations. I used this research to inform product decisions early and often, ensuring our design direction stayed tightly aligned with the evolving goals of our users.
Figma was at the heart of my workflow—not just for high-fidelity UI design, but as a collaborative platform where I could build interactive prototypes, run live testing sessions, and gather feedback from stakeholders and team members in real time. I created clear, clickable prototypes to test early concepts, allowing us to validate ideas quickly and pivot before investing engineering time.
In close partnership with product managers and key stakeholders, I translated insights into well-defined user workflows, journey maps, and wireframes that clarified the end-to-end experience. These deliverables served as a shared source of truth across teams, helping to align priorities and ensure everyone was working toward a unified vision. I also worked closely with engineering to ensure our designs were feasible and scalable, and participated in regular design reviews and cross-functional planning sessions to keep momentum strong.
This research-driven, highly collaborative process led to the development of features that were not only highly usable, but deeply aligned with what our users actually wanted. As a result, we saw measurable improvements in both product adoption and user satisfaction. My work helped create a foundation of empathy and clarity that supported smarter design decisions and ultimately shaped a product that users genuinely loved engaging with.
A Deeper Approach.
I initiated a comprehensive UX audit and conducted user research to understand pain points and opportunities.
Key Actions:
Performed heuristic evaluations to identify usability issues.
Conducted user interviews with diverse reader demographics.
Analyzed user behavior data to uncover engagement patterns.
Key Findings:
Users desired a more intuitive navigation structure.
Lack of community features hindered user retention.
Inconsistent branding led to confusion and reduced trust.
Team Management & Development
Over the past five years as a Lead Designer, I’ve been deeply invested in building, mentoring, and scaling high-performing design teams. I’ve led teams ranging from 2 to 6 designers, creating an environment rooted in collaboration, creativity, and continuous growth. From hiring and onboarding to day-to-day leadership, I’ve taken a hands-on approach to supporting each designer’s growth—whether through regular 1:1s, design critiques, goal-setting sessions, or personal development plans.
I championed a culture of feedback, curiosity, and design excellence, encouraging open dialogue and knowledge sharing across product, UX, and marketing functions. I established clear design processes and expectations, helping the team stay aligned while giving individuals the autonomy to thrive in their areas of ownership. I also helped designers level up their craft and confidence by pairing them with the right projects, offering coaching, and advocating for their contributions at the leadership level.
By fostering a strong team culture and investing in professional development, I helped increase both team performance and retention—ensuring we delivered consistently high-quality work while creating a space where designers felt valued, heard, and empowered to grow.
Additionally, productive relationships with engineers has been a cornerstone of how I work. I believe great products happen when design and development are tightly aligned, so I’ve made it a priority to establish open lines of communication, early and often. From the start of a project, I collaborate closely with engineering partners to ensure that design solutions are not only user-centered but technically feasible and scalable.
I involve developers early in the design process—sharing prototypes in Figma, walking through user flows, and inviting input before finalizing decisions. This not only helps surface edge cases and opportunities for smarter solutions, but also creates a shared sense of ownership across disciplines. I’ve found that including engineers in conversations around UX and product strategy leads to better implementation and a more seamless handoff process.
During development, I stay closely engaged—answering questions, providing detailed specs, and making quick design adjustments when needed. I also work with QA to maintain the integrity of the design and ensure that what we ship reflects the original vision. Whether through regular design-engineering syncs, Slack collaboration, or design tokens tied to our system, I’ve built a reputation as a designer who respects the dev process and makes it easier to build beautiful, usable products.
