It can be tough to take care of your new family members since every plant has different characteristics and needs. To give easy access to all plant moms and dads I designed an app that gives you everything you need to start your own plant family.
UI & UX Designer
Design team of one
3.5 months
(Sept - Dec 2020)
Figma, Mural and Adobe Suite
When people get plants for the first time, it’s challenging to know what kind of environment and nourishing their plant needs. For example, 90% plant dies in the first year for first time plant owners. Even people with some experience often find themselves spending hours researching on their plants and tracking their health. Bloom app is designed to ease the effort and simplify the experience for plant owners.
Build an app that simplifies the experience of owning plants by providing users with all the required details, sending reminder notifications for when water, mist, fertilizers, etc. are needed for their plants.
We all know the struggle of look for the exact article or video to help us find the precise information we need and to believe in the source. Bloom app gives you all the articles and videos that can help you, if you want you can even save to read or watch later.
All of us know how difficult is to remember when a plant needs water or needs fertilizer, this problems is solve here. Bloom app will notify you which plants need to be water or be fertilizer. Our mascot will make you company in the whole experience.
Adding a new member can be stressful or corncened , you might not know what kind of environment or where to place it this is why Bloom give you all the information of the plant. From watering services to temperature all in one.
Its difficult to know when a plants need to be fertilizer or which plants needs water, with a calendar you can see what are your future tasks. This will help you to organize your tasks and be more in control of your chores.
Due to COVID 19 pandemic, people were constraint to their homes; This has led to people adopting/growing more plants than any other year since 2000. The article “COVID-19 pandemic has people drawn to indoor gardening, houseplants” by Courier post stated
“We’re getting the escape value, and we’re getting the chance to feel we’re doing something positive. We’re having positive control over our little environment.”
- Joel Flager from Courier Post Article
Furthermore, plants not only are good buddies. They also help people with their health; according to the article "Why Indoor Plants Make You Feel Better" by NBC News:
“" Studies have proven that house plants improve concentration and productivity (by up to 15%), reduce stress levels, and boost your mood.”
- Sophie Lee from NBC News Article
I was able to get 5 people for interviews, these interviews took place through zoom. Some of the questions I asked were:
I collected surveys from 36 people through variety of channels such as google forms, instagram, youtube etc.
People want to record their plant's growth through pictures
"I don’t know if this is a benefit, but I do like having plants in my room. It’s like a tiny friend :)"
"Just seeing things grow make me happy!"
"They are my children"
Avatar
"It’s like a little plant pal"
"They bring me joy, I can empathize with them, and caring for them gives me responsibility"
"I gave up on growing plants bc they die and I feel guilty"
UI bohemian style
"I wanted to grow one. plus, it’s a cute way to add decor to a room."
"It's nice to have plants to take care of and to decorate the house."
"It started as a trend, it looked nice in the room. But after it I love them"
Articles and Videos resources
"I read a book and try the solutions mentioned, its more a "trial and error" process."
"One of my plants looks bad, I have read more than 10 articles and watched countless of youtube and no answer yet"
"I get most of my information from articles by searching the plant name on google."
Community
"I got inspired after seeing some people with plants on Instagram"
"Sometimes I asked to other Plant moms on Instagram"
"I type my story on reedit and people reply with solutions."
Plants necessities reminders
"It’s tiring when i have to water them sometimes because there’s so many. "
"At first, I wasn’t sure how much water to put and how much sunlight my plant should have."
After gathering all data it was clear who my target audience was. Having them will help me to find the needs that dictate how to solve problems.
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After setting up the storyboards, I created the user flows to see the user's movement through the products. This helped me to see the steps needed to accomplish a specific goal. In this user flows, there were two tasks accomplished
• Adding a plant
• Treat her plant for bugs
To get better feedback from my users, I upgraded to high fidelity prototypes.
In the usability test, I had 3 different users who did not know about the app. I scheduled the meetings through zoom and shared a Figma link. The method I used was "Think aloud testing," and the three main objectives completed were:
• Add a Plant
• Look for resources
• Watering your plants.
These were the design flaws found -
"Am in Home right? Im not sure."
It was added colors to the Nav Bar to help know the user which screen he is on.
“Looks like the accordion of a native webpage.”
“CTA not noticeable.”
CTA is clearly visible and menu was redesigned.
CTAs were replaced
"CTA are confusing, there are like 4 to choose"
Here is the final product and all the screens, you can check also the prototype, just click over here:
Try Clickable Prototype
In general, I loved doing this project; as a plant mom, I was so motivated to solve more problems that I haven't faced.
One of the challenges that I faced in this project was to scope my target audience. In the beginning, I had in mind on target audience but after having the surveys and interview responses I decided two main audiences.
On the other hand, I was so proud of myself for including UI design different from what I'm used to - combining texture, dark lines and earth colors, at the end users who tested the were delighted with this color theme.
