01. Overview
Pathloom is a trip-planning platform designed to simplify outdoor adventure planning by providing a centralized hub for hikers, campers, and explorers.
Goal: To design an intuitive platform that consolidates trip planning tools for outdoor adventurers, offering features such as trail and camping planning, mapping, information, and overall trip recommendations.
Timeline: Mar 2021 – Mar 2022 | 12 months
My Role: Sole Product & Visual Designer during Pathloom’s MVP phase, I owned end-to-end design—from research and wireframing to high-fidelity UI and prototyping. Post-MVP, I transitioned into a lead design role, mentoring junior designers (UX and visual) to scale the mobile app’s features while maintaining consistency and usability.
02. Discover
Challenges
A lack of information about where to go, how to participate, and whom to participate with can be a barrier to trying new outdoor activities.
Planning outdoor trips is often a fragmented experience, requiring multiple apps and websites for research and navigation.
Nearly half of all U.S. campers found it difficult to find a campsite in 2021. And almost half of campers spend over 5 hours planning their trips.
Competitor Analysis
To identify gaps in outdoor discovery platforms, I worked with leadership and analyzed competitors like AllTrails and Hip Camp. Key findings revealed:
03. Define
Following research synthesis, we developed user personas (e.g., “Weekend Explorer” needing quick planning) and transformed their needs into actionable user stories.
These stories directly informed our wireframe creation – for instance, mapping the complete user journey from trail filtering to offline saving – ensuring every design decision was rooted in observed behaviors. By aligning features like advanced filters and smart trip planning with persona-driven wireframes, we eliminated guesswork and maintained focus on core usability needs throughout the design process.
04. Design System
When I joined the team, the app needed urgently a consistent visual guidelines and reusable components, to ensuring scalability and efficiency across the design and development processes.
Before translating wireframes into high-fidelity mockups, I established a complete visual language through a comprehensive design system.
Green represents the lush, natural environments that users explore, symbolizing growth, sustainability, and adventure.
Orange adds warmth and energy, capturing the spirit of excitement and exploration inherent in outdoor adventures.
Together, these colors create a balanced, inviting aesthetic, enhancing user trust and engagement while aligning the brand closely with its focus on outdoor trip planning and nature-driven experiences.
These functional colors were designed to clearly differentiate between various map layers and conditions.
Each color was selected for clarity, accessibility, and harmony within the overall system, supporting quick decision-making in the context of outdoor planning.
Typography
For typography, I selected Roboto for its versatility, readability, and strong performance across digital platforms. I then established a clear type scale, defining styles for headings, subheadings, body text, and UI labels to ensure consistency across screens.
Iconography
For iconography, I curated and refined a custom set focused on simplicity and clarity, designed to scale well across different sizes and use cases.
I built the entire library of reusable components that are aligned with the brand identity while maintaining functional clarity.
05. Detailed Filtering
Pain Point
Preliminary user research revealed that many users struggled to find suitable trips due to limited and hard-to-access filters. Participants often mentioned frustration when sorting through irrelevant results, with key criteria like trail difficulty or campsite amenities either missing or too hidden to be useful.
Solution
One of the key design solutions in Pathloom is the detailed filtering system that is easily accessible when browsing.
Within the primary navigation, users can quickly choose between hiking or camping, with specific filters for each.
Result
65%
Faster
After implementing this feature, beta users were able to narrow down their search results 65% faster on average, leading to increased engagement and quicker decision-making.
06. Smart Planning
Pain Points
Novice adventurers often felt overwhelmed by endless options, while experienced users wasted time manually cross-referencing trails and campsites.
The solution we came up with is Smart Planning, which simplifies the trip creation process. Users fill out survey-style forms with their preferences, such as activity type, trip duration, and skill level.
Solution
Based on user inputs, Pathloom generates a personalized itinerary that includes recommended trails, campsites, and activities.
In the end, users receive personalized itineraries tailored to their preferences. This includes suggested trails, campsites, and activities, all organized by day with relevant details like travel time, difficulty, and amenities.
Each itinerary serves as a ready-to-go plan, helping users feel prepared and confident before they even hit the trail.
Moderated usability testing showed that Smart Trip Planning reduced planning time and boosted user confidence.
Participants valued the personalized suggestions and discovered new destinations with less effort and decision fatigue.
07. Comprehensive Destination Profiles
Pain Point
User research revealed a critical gap in outdoor platforms – users were forced to consult multiple sources to gather essential trip information, creating frustration and decision paralysis.
Solutions
The comprehensive destination profiles in Pathloom are designed to equip users with all the information they need to plan confidently and efficiently. From the At-A-Glance Overview of core trip details to Data Visualizations that make complex information digestible, each element is built for clarity and ease of use. The integration of Hyperlocal Weather provides timely insights for trip timing, while Community Reviews & Insights add valuable firsthand context. Together, these features create a holistic snapshot of each destination, helping users make informed decisions with minimal guesswork.
