Shelved – Kamila Romaniak

Case studies ⟶ Shelved

Shelved visual experience

Shelved is an app designed to manage and keep a home library organized. It also allows for tracking borrowed and lent books. It promotes sharing meaningful content, setting reading goals, adding notes and reviews and discovering new books.

Design challenge

Create a consistent online presence and brand identity. Make it easier and more enjoyable for users to manage and maintain their book collection by providing intuitive functionalities and engaging visual setting.

Phase 1: Research

People and places explorations

How people organize their home libraries, whether they have big or small collections, has always fascinated me. This research showed that there is no space limitation for true book lovers, and they will always find a creative way to fit in a new book (or a vinyl record), even in the smallest apartment. It also made me realize there is a special connection or bond between collectors and their collections. Every item has its unique place and destination, even if it looks abandoned or thrown on the pile of other things and books at times.

Role

Visual identity

Brand development

UX and UI design

Tools & technology

Adobe Illustrator

Adobe Photoshop

Figma

2023

Personas

I played a little bit with the concept of personas. I read the characteristics of fictional characters and famous people online and tried to figure out what they would appreciate or focus on when using the app.

Visual identity

The app's interface and navigation had to be simple and minimalistic. Still, I wondered if there was a way to incorporate some of the features of a maximalist's preferences through typography, colours and imagery that could give the app a little bit more extinguish flair and create memorable visual impact.

Phase 2: Design

Information architecture/Wireframes

The main goal was to create an intuitive and user-friendly information architecture with clear sections and functions that help users manage their collections, share books with others, and discover new books to read. The home screen serves as an overview of the user's library, providing access to various functions. The highlighted features are quick library access and the possibility of adding new books easily.

Typography

I chose Niveau Grotesk for the main text, based on geometrical forms and straight architecture, yet with a retro and slightly eccentric flair. It works well in headers, but most importantly in smaller sizes and longer texts and supports Central and Eastern European as well as Western European Languages.

Colours

I focused on three main colours - red, white, and black. This elegant yet highly contrastive colour palette complements well the typography and imagery used in the app and serves a few purposes. White and black increase the legibility and accessibility and can serve as a more neutral or contrastive background for the text. The bright and vivid red is attention-grabbing and helps to create a strong and memorable visual impact.

Logo

I thought a font for the logo should combine the retro/maximalist spirit and the clean, well-balanced architecture at the same time. I found the perfect candidate - a fun yet functional Alkaline packed with fully functional ligatures, international language support and stylistic alternates, which can be easily used on other promotional and marketing materials.

Explorations

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@ 2023 Kamila Romaniak