Vango iPad App

Vango is a marketplace connecting artists to art buyers with original, one-of-a-kind works. The iPad app was created following the Design Thinking process and the iPad product was dedicated to the buyer experience. The iPad app pre-dates the iPhone app by a year.

As co-founder and product designer, I was responsible for designing the initial product and the iterations that followed. Work included user interviews, sketching, user flows, wireframing, prototyping, usability testing, mockups, prepping for development, behavior driven stories and specs and testing development. 

The Vango iPad app has been featured on the front page of the Apple App Store on several occasions, in Apple marketing material and highlighted on stage during the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference for our integration of Apple Pay.

Context

Artists live to create and are constantly contributing to their body of work, but struggle to develop an audience of patrons and the basics of running a business. Buyers and collectors are often intimidated by galleries, opaque pricing and buying art sight unseen. Vango saw an opportunity to reduce the hurdles for both the artist and buyer to create a better union and experience for each side.

Research

Our research was found through Emphasize and Define stages of Design Thinking process by interviewing over 50 artists and art buyers about their experiences. These are the insights we worked with:

Buyers:

• When considering a piece, they didn’t know how it would look or fit in their space

• When looking online, it was difficult to see the details and craftsmanship of the work

• Often times they didn’t know where to start their search or exactly what they wanted

• They didn’t understand the price and value of a work, especially over the $500 price point

• When shopping, they became paralyzed with too many choices and had a difficult time picking the “one”

Artists:

• They struggled to sell works beyond their family and friends

• When they did, determining the price was difficult and random

• It was uncomfortable and awkward when buyers attempted to negotiate the price of the artwork

• They couldn’t or didn’t want to keep up with promoting their work and business organization

Solution

From the research findings, we decided on these goals:

• Focus on the buyer experience as we had supply and believed increasing sales/demand would drive additional supply

• Create an approachable and comfortable experience to counter the intimidating galleries

• Inform the buyer to make sure they know what they are getting and help reduce the fear of buyer’s remorse

The main feature in the app allowed us to show the user how the art would look in their home and allowed them to shop right from their own walls. The user would take a picture of their space and we would use that photo as a backdrop for browsing, as well as analyze the colors in their home to recommend personalized suggestions.

The iPad's retina display allowed us to present the user with large, high-quality images that could enlarged to show the artwork with incredible detail. The iPad app provided a much improved experience over shopping online with a desktop.