Open4home | My Site

Open4Home is a building materials retailer expanding into e-commerce, transforming its physical showroom into a scalable digital presence.

My Role

Project Lead/ Product Designer

Team (3)

Developer (2)

Timeline

2022.11-2023.08
(Discovery / MVP / Beta)

Design Responsibilities

Research, Flow design, Interface design, Prototyping, Testing

Leadership / Collaboration Responsibilities

Stakeholder management
Team alignment
Integration handoff

Leading the End-to-End Design of Open4Home’s Digital Transformation

I led the end-to-end 0-1 design of Royal Wood’s first e-commerce platform - Open4home, transforming it from a physical showroom with a basic Wix site into a scalable digital presence.

The challenges were tight timelines, limited resources (only me as the sole designer and 2 outsourced engineers), and rapidly evolving directions.

As lead product designer, I took ownership of the process—building the foundation, creating key systems, and shaping Open4Home’s first step toward a scalable digital presence that could support future growth.

My Role

Led end-to-end design: 30+ flows, 210+ screens (desktop + mobile)
Ensured design quality across deliverables
Partnered with ops, finance, and engineering on third-party integrations (Termly, Userway, Avalara, Stripe, BOA)
Defined PIM workflows for product upload & backend management
Contributed to business rules for web/device compliance
Conducted research, testing, and stakeholder alignment

Major Impacts

Enabled the company to sell both standard and custom products online for the first time (3 pricing models)
Launched the first digital membership system, making points & tiers visible
Designed taxonomy for 160k SKUs / 284 categories, enabling scalability
Delivered end-to-end interfaces and flows for desktop and mobile, adapting the platform for multi-device use.

Although not fully launched, the work served as the strategic foundation for the company’s digital roadmap.

View Live Beta

1 | Context

AUDIENCE DEFINITION

Dual audience informed by showroom sales data

Based on showroom sales data, Open4Home serves both B2B and B2C customers. Homeowners account for most transactions, while professionals are smaller but high-value.

COMMONALITIES

Interviews with the sales team also revealed a fundamental pattern across both groups:

These characteristics shaped my design principles:

Reduce uncertainty
Guide decisions
Make complex choices transparent

DIFFERENCES

Although both groups purchase building materials, homeowners and professionals show clear differences in knowledge, motivation, and expectations.

This duality shaped my design goal:

Clarity for homeowners
Efficiency and details for professionals

DESIGN APPROACH

Two distinct user groups demanded clarity and efficiency, while their shared context of high-value, complex purchases required trust and guidance. Together, these insights shaped the foundation of my design approach.

RESEARCH & INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE

I conducted a competitive analysis to validate the baseline shopping flows and establish the foundation for the site map.

I selected 3 types of brands—mainstream big-box retailers, specialized vertical players, and a design-driven brand (IKEA)—to cover both B2C and B2B references.

The analysis shows that while core flows are consistent, differences lie in evaluation features, post-purchase support, and loyalty models.

The analysis aligned us on baseline flows as the Phase 1 priority, while differences in evaluation, post-purchase, and loyalty were marked for Phase 2 optimization.

The sitemap was laid out from competitive analysis, serving as the baseline framework.

DESKTOP AND MOBILE STYLE GUIDE FOUNDATIONS

I created a unified design language and style guide for both desktop and mobile, ensuring consistency across 200+ screens. This foundation streamlined collaboration, reduced inconsistencies, and set the stage for scalable future design.