A short-video app for Japanese parents, designed from a pile of image collages.
The client came with scattered references, not a product vision. As the only designer for six months, I turned them into a mobile app and a web admin that shipped on the App Store and Google Play in Japan.
- Role
- Sole designer
- Team
- 1 Flutter dev, 2 backend devs
- Timeline
- 6 months
- Platform
- iOS, Android, web admin
- Status
- Live in Japan
Scattered ideas, a hard deadline, a market abroad.
The goal was simple: help young parents learn about childcare through short video. The inputs were not.
- 01Scope creepNew requests kept arriving, and the 6-month deadline was the first thing at risk.
- 02Designing from abroadDesigning from Vietnam for Japanese parents, so research had to work remotely.
- 03A cultural gapI had to read Japanese childcare habits and UI expectations without field research.
What came in, and what went out.
Four ways to understand a market from abroad.
- 01AI-assisted researchUsed AI to synthesize Japanese parenting culture, childcare app patterns and mobile UX expectations.
- 02Spec deconstructionBroke the client's collages down screen by screen, dropped what couldn't scale, and proposed a structured admin instead.
- 03Reference benchmarkingMapped the TikTok and Reels interaction model onto childcare content and checked the fit before committing to the feed.
- 04Scope negotiationPushed back on requests that would have killed the deadline, defined a tight MVP and held the line for six months.
Four calls that got it shipped on time.
A TikTok-style vertical feed
Exhausted young parents need zero learning curve.
Plausible is not verified.
AI research got me to a plausible read of Japanese parenting UX. The app shipped, but whether those patterns fit how Japanese parents actually behave is something I still can't answer. On a foreign market next time, I'd budget for a handful of remote sessions with real users.
- AI as a research partnerUseful for closing cultural gaps quickly.
- Design is negotiationHalf the job was saying no to protect the timeline.
- Familiarity winsA swipe feed parents already know needs no onboarding.
Turn a moodboard into something you can ship.
For founders with a clear idea and scattered inputs. I structure the product, hold the MVP line and hand off a system devs can build from.
Similar work: UX audit, quoted after a short call
