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niche
Create a website for our Loyola University New Orleans’ Niche shop, which specializes in selling handmade designs
sections
Opportunity
Scope
Meeting Prep
Wireframes
Interview
Round 1
Round 2
Final
Reflection
Role
Research, Wireframing, Branding
tools used
Figma, Photoshop
team size
7 Designers, 1 Instructor
duration
12 Weeks
Client goals
Highlight the artists
Appear high-end but casual and fun
Position their brand as a leader for design in New Orleans
design goals
Create a layout that facilitates sales
Understand our brand
Decide what what features are essential or just nice to have
Find out how to brand the website
opportunity
When people think about design in New Orleans, the first place their mind should go to is Niche! Opened by the Loyola University New Orleans’ Design Department, Niche sells handmade goods by student and alumni designers. While they have previously sold items as a pop-up shop, they were looking to expand their presence with an e-commerce site. Professor Daniela Marx, the founder of Niche, contacted our team for help with designing the site. We had to research how to make an effective storefront, prepare interview questions to better understand the Niche brand, and explore different possibilities for expressing their brand identity through the website.
Various Niche products: paper flower - sketchbook - earrings
Scope and Constraints
Our team understood that Niche needed basic e-commerce features but didn’t know their products or brand. We would also have to wait several weeks to meet with our client and learn more. When that time came, we received a brand guide with logos, fonts, colors, and brand descriptors, though there were no strict requirements.
Initially, we planned to use a website builder like Squarespace to bring our prototypes to life. However, due to time constraints and the scope of the project being significantly narrowed, we instead finessed our prototypes for Niche to possibly reference someday.
meeting preparation
We organized our individual questions for analysis
Our team began by creating interview questions for a meeting with Professor Marx. We drafted questions individually, then consolidated them by identifying common themes and merging or removing duplicates. Some of the questions that proved particularly useful were:
What type of aesthetic and feeling do you want the Niche website to convey?
What existing branding or marketing strategies are in place for Niche?
What are the primary goals, messages, and/or values of Niche?
wirefrAMES
Wireframe sketches
While waiting for the meeting, our team started planning the site layout. Knowing the essential features of an e-commerce site allowed us to create a solid site map. To explore layouts, our team split into two groups and created individual wireframes for each page. We then brought the best ideas together and reviewed with the other group. This approach allowed us to refine our ideas efficiently, keeping the strongest elements from each design without needing to vote on dozens of iterations.
My individual wireframes, made with Figjam to get the idea across quickly
With our content decided, we created two new wireframes: one with all potential features and another focused on a minimum viable product. Unsure if we could finish everything on time, we needed to understand our priorities.
Both sets of wireframes - Closeup of ideal layout
Since Niche was only started a year ago, I aimed to build customer trust. Ideally, the site would include user testimonies and social media posts of satisfied customers to make Niche seem well-established. I also considered a review section, but Niche would likely have few reviews at first and each one would be significant. Negative reviews could disproportionately affect newer products while positive reviews from discontinued products would disappear. To mitigate this, I proposed an overall Niche rating that aggregates all reviews ever published, making low scores on new products seem like a fluke.
interview
When we interviewed Professor Marx, we gained clearer insight into Niche’s brand. She envisioned a “high-end contemporary” feel that used layering, pattern and texture. Niche already had several logos, a color palette and a typeface we could experiment with. Our client wanted the brand to be positioned as a leader of design in New Orleans, appealing especially to people connected to Loyola or visitors seeking a souvenir from the city.
Niche brand guide
Although our team anticipated the site’s primary features, I saw opportunities to improve our layout based on what we learned. For example, Niche planned to sell more kinds of products than I expected. . Instead of highlighting just three items on the home screen, it made more sense to showcase the full range by featuring product categories.
round 1
Moodboard - Button iterations - Review section and product card iterations
Before styling our wireframes, I created a moodboard to define the feel of my version. I was inspired to use geometric patterns instead of ornamental ones from the Diboll Design Center’s site. It’s a subsidiary of Loyola that our client told us to ensure Niche’s brand is cohesive with it. Because our school makes riso-printed designs often, I made use of saturated duotone imagery and paper textures. These textures would make the site feel tactile and emphasize the handmade nature of Niche’s products.
I realized during critique that the patterns on the product cards distracted from the items, potentially hurting sales, and the patterns on the review cards reduced text legibility. I also received feedback that the paper tear divider was overused, the artist photo felt oddly cropped, and the centered type on the About page looked awkward due to short line lengths.
round 2
In my next round of iterations, I addressed most of these concerns. I restructured the About page into columns, resized the artist portrait, and limited the paper-tear effect. Afterward, I put more patterns in the background and replaced those on the product and review cards with gradients. I also adjusted colors and created new patterns so each section looked distinct.
Although the product cards were simplified, the gradient was very saturated and still drew attention. Additionally, my instructor suggested including the Niche logo into my patterns for stronger branding.
final
To wrap up the project, I desaturated the product card gradient and designed two new patterns using versions of the logo. While reviewing functionality, I realized I was missing form submission buttons and added them. From there, I made small refinements: shortening the footer, improving alignment,increasing the header size for a bold impression, and making the forms stand out using a subtle gradient. These changes added up, contributing to a professional appearance.
This is where my involvement with the project ended. With no more feedback or official content to include from Professor Marx, progress stalled. We soon found out that a stand-alone site couldn’t be funded, and the brand would just be a single page on the Loyola design website for now.
reflection
Overall, I’m pleased with my contributions to this project. Through several iterations, I created a prototype that meets expectations for an e-commerce site while reflecting the vision of Niche’s brand. This project taught me that I don’t always need extensive client direction to move forward. Our team remained productive during the whole process, preparing for a client interview and even making several iterations of wireframes. We made the most of the information we had, however little.
That said, the way my involvement ended was far from satisfying. I still don’t know if Niche will ever get a proper website or what the Niche team even think about our designs. It feels like our efforts had little impact, if any. This experience showed me how quickly a project’s scope can shift and the importance of staying flexible. Not every design role will be fulfilling, but that makes the projects where my work does make a difference all the more rewarding.
try the prototype
Great Ideas
Student Peace . . .