The Collage Feature, Redesigned…
Project Overview
Pinterest, the go-to application for design inspiration since 2010, has evolved into a powerful tool for organizing ideas and inspiring creatives and casual pinners. Their latest feature, Collages, introduced in 2022, encourages users to explore their creativity and organization further. Collages enable users to create mood boards using their pins and boards. However, many users, especially those less design-savvy, feel unsure about finding and organizing inspiration for their projects.
This project explores a functional redesign of Pinterest’s Collage feature, partnering with generative AI, to make it more inclusive and user-friendly for busy designers and casual pinners.
Ideated & designed with UXpressia & Figma.
The Problem
Let’s start with the user. While users range from all ages, genders, and socioeconomic backgrounds, one thing is unanimous: they desire inspiration to be easy and attainable. This is why Pinterest has been the hot spot for recipes, home decor design ideas, and, more recently, shopping and marketing.
One way Pinterest tried to connect with its users and encourage creativity is its ‘Collage’ feature. The current ‘Collage’ interface, as seen below, allows users to create collages from scratch. Users are given the option to either redesign pre-loaded collages or to work from a blank canvas by gathering pins from their boards, images from their albums, and more.
A glance at Pinterest’s Collage feature’s user pathway.
Unfortunately, users abandon the feature early on or after first use due to:
The interface being too open-ended
A lack of references for users to begin designing
A lack of insights into the design process
How does this look functionally? Not optimal. In understanding that users are often individuals with busy schedules, who work outside of the creative field and who need help in managing personal projects, the goal of this project is to offer assistance on multiple levels throughout the design process. See the user journey map below for a closer look into the common user’s perspective:
Initial Customer Journey Map. Take a closer look!
The Solution
One way to address this interface issue is by introducing a generative AI design assist tool. This tool empowers users to select a system that provides their ideal level of assistance during the design process, and includes the following:
1. Mood Board Generator: A generative AI tool based on user inputs regarding selecting the desired look, feel, colors, or pins to be included in the design. From this point, the tool recognizes these inputs and finds additional pins, colors, and font faces (if the project requires it) that pair well with the pre-selected elements. Users can generate and re-generate mood board collages until they’ve gotten a result that best encompasses their vision.
Mood board generator user input form & collage output.
2. Color Palette Generator: A design assistant that generates a color palette based on user inputs, color psychology & accessibility guidelines where users can save their favorite colors and switch the remaining ones until they land on a palette they adore.
Color palette user input form & tool output.
3. Pin Filters: When users independently choose pins from their boards, the design-assist includes a pin filter where users can filter pins by category, color, or associative-adjectives to increase cohesion between mood board elements.
Pin filter tool with user input form.
When the interface includes these changes, users can make smart, creative choices that fit their needs. They are also less likely to hold feelings of confusion, unpreparedness, and disinterest that result in a lack of engagement with the feature. The tools allow users to benefit from help at varying levels of independence and can provide experiential learning for proper design accessibility and aesthetic themes. When these changes are implemented, the user journey looks far more optimistic:
Customer Journey Map Post-Redesign. Take a closer look!
A closeup at the pain points and improvements for the user through the redesign.
Results
Pinterest Collage Redesign Walk Through.
For a walkthrough of the refurbished app and its new design-accessible features, view the video above. The design may also be accessed and viewed in further detail here.
After gathering user impressions of the feature, it is imperative that each project should be dynamic, informational, and helpful at varying degrees of design-experience. For example, one user asked how the two collage features could be more fully integrated with each other. Would there be a way to pull previous color palettes into new mood boards or go directly from the color palette feature into the creation of a new mood board? Thus, understanding the usability and overall effectiveness by each AI tool is the main focus throughout this project. I also received a number of inquiries on its collaborative abilities, which leads me to further development and design.
In future iterations of this design, it would be compelling to see an interactive co-design feature where multiple users aid in the mood board design process at one time. This has the potential to encourage communication and collaboration between users. Furthermore, it would be prudent to include a note-taking feature within these mood boards. This would help inform the user and viewer of the ideas, elements, and talking points from the board for future conversations. Lastly, it would be beneficial for the feature to close with an AI review screen so that users may be able to express their experience and continue to grow the reliability of the feature. To end, my goal throughout these upgrades is to encourage the growth of creative minds, aid in communication between project members, continue to progression of effective technology, and help users grow in essential community-building skills.
