LooWho
LooWho is a bathroom review app that helps users traveling near and far find a bathroom that fits their personal hygiene, privacy and accessibility needs.
In many cultures, bathrooms are a rather taboo topic that no one seems to want to talk about even though literally everyone uses them. On top of that, public restrooms often leave a lot to be desired, with many lacking privacy, cleanliness, and accessibility. This is unfortunate because everyone should have access to a bathroom that they feel comfortable using.
LooWho aims to end that problem by providing users with a quick way to find a restroom that they actually want to use.
Programs/Websites Used: Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Unsplash, & The Noun Project
RESEARCH & BRAINSTORMING
GOALS
Inform myself as a designer on how to create an app or product that best suites my users wants and needs surrounding the issue of poorly designed and maintained public bathrooms
Discover common frustrations surrounding the functionality of public restrooms, learn about the varying levels of accessibility that these bathrooms offer, and what users believe would improve public restrooms
METHODOLOGY
1:1 interviews with around 6-10 participants. Each interview will last between 10-20 minutes.
Here are a few of the questions I asked:
Can you think of a time recently where a design feature in a restroom particularly stood out to you?
Can you think of where the worst restrooms you have been in were? What about the best?
Do you ever have trouble using public restrooms due to certain features?
If so, what feature specifically causes you to avoid them?
1. Function, Privacy, & Sanitation are the 3 most important features a restroom can have to users.
If you had to pick just one thing to improve on in public restrooms, what would it be and why?
In your mind, what would the perfect public restroom be like?
What features would it have? What would it look like?
FINDINGS
Once I conducted my user interviews, I organized my answers by writing them all out on sticky notes. I organized like answers together, and based off of those groupings, I was able to make a few key observations:
2. Many frustrations users feel are heightened when traveling in unknown places.
3. Most users go out of their way to avoid public restrooms when they are out, and are willing to “hold it” in order to stay out of them.
PROTOTYPES & TESTING
After completing my user research, I first mapped out what I considered the key ‘journey’ I wanted my users to complete as they used my app.
My goal was to focus on how a user who is traveling might go about locating a restroom that actually meets their needs, and then leave a review for it.
Based on the above journey, I then created a set of simple wireframes to flesh out my preliminary app design.
At this point in the design process my focus was on how to display this journey in the simplest of ways so that when I tested it with classmates their feedback would be focused on that.
Some of the feedback I got on these wireframes were that they had a pretty good flow, but were lacking a few key features, like clear back buttons throughout the app.
Finally, I created my first prototype, with colors, images, and functioning Figma connections. I was able to test this prototype with a few classmates, and got another great round of feedback.
One of the biggest takeaways was that the home page of the app should allow for users to find a restroom as quick as possible near them without needing to do any typing. Manually searching for a restroom is a feature that is still very useful, and should remain an option for users to navigate to when they are in less of a hurry, but it should not be given first priority when opening the app. Another great piece of advice I got was that a map view that give users a better feel of where each restroom was located would be nice to have. I had been considering adding one, but wasn’t sure if it was what users really wanted.
Based on these useful comments, I improved on my prototype and was able to create a final design.
FINAL DESIGN
Through this design process I have learned a lot about, well, the design process. The two main takeaways I have are:
User testing and insight from other designers is beyond invaluable.
It is easy to get so caught up in your own ideas that you often forget a detail here and there that is otherwise obvious. User testing and getting critique not only helps you resolve those small details you missed, but also points out larger flaws that will make you design so much stronger once fixed. Overall, a good design does not come from an idea with no user research to back it, otherwise there is no precedents to whether the problem you are solving actually exists, and there is no validation of whether your idea is a good solution to said problem.
Consider the “Lobster”
This is a phrase I remind myself often. Now, at first this may seem quite confusing, but allow me to explain. When I was in High School, I was made to read an article about the ethics of the lobster industry and it was called Consider the Lobster. It urged readers to consider how one might feel in a lobsters situation, and ever since I read it, the title has stuck with me in an important way. As a designer it is so so incredibly important to always think outside of your own perspective and experience. No one lives the same life as you or feels the same emotions, so taking the time to consider the experience of being in someone else’s shoes is absolutely crucial to the design process. And, the more often you take the time to do so, the better you become at including those perspectives initially. In the case of LooWho, considering how each and every person feels about using unknown restrooms, however weird that may seem, helped me craft an experience where every persons can feel comfortable, regardless of personal needs and physical abilities.