Hush Baby Co.: A Website Refresh for a Neighborhood Store

Context

When I was a first-time expectant mother, I loved visiting a boutique baby store in our neighborhood whose soft, pastel aesthetics gave me a sense of safety and nurture. However, their online experience didn’t live up to their in-store magic. With the baby and kids market valued at $288B and pregnant users often reliant on online shopping, I saw an opportunity to bridge that gap.

Challenge

The boutique’s existing website lacked the warmth of its in-store experience due to its outdated visual design with a narrow layout, muted colors, and undersized serif font. Navigation was clunky with key product categories buried, and there were minimal cues guiding users toward action.

Goals

Refresh the UI and visual identity, improve navigation and engagement, create a welcoming, conversion-friendly user experience.

Redesign Approach

First, I redesigned the layout to utilize the full screen, replacing the narrow central-column format with a more immersive and accessible experience, especially on larger displays.

Secondly, I took steps that would encourage user engagement. These included adding a bold headline and CTA in the hero section to guide users from landing to shopping; integrated micro-interactions to create a playful and interactive interface and introducing new sections to the homepage, like "Shop by Category", "Customer Reviews" and "Follow on Instagram" to make product discovery and customer validation more prominent.

The next goal was to improve user experience and accesibility. I increased the size of the product images and removed borders for a cleaner, accessible display. I also reorganized the navigation bar by removing redundancy, improving information hierarchy and eliminating outdated elements and moved the newsletter subscription CAT (which was a persistent pop-up upon enter) to the bottom of the page for an uninterrupted browsing experience.

Lastly, I introduced some branding improvements like shifting to a soft pastel palette and clean sans-serif typography to evoke warmth, trust, and modernity.