Redesigning a fragmented maritime marketplace into a swipe-based mobile experience

Yacht owners, crew members and travelers all worked off the same web platform, and by the time it needed a redesign it had grown past the point of making sense -- blogs, port data and listings stacked on top of each other with no structure holding them together. People stayed anyway, because a time-sensitive task -- finding a port, connecting with crew before someone else did -- still had to happen somewhere. A JavaScript-heavy build made every one of those moments slower than it needed to be.

What started as a redesign turned into questioning the one decision already made for me: a dating-app-style swipe, borrowed wholesale. I kept the swipe and changed its meaning instead -- not accept-or-reject, but continuous browsing with nothing lost by looking twice -- and built three separate paths for owners, crew and travelers under that same model. Four months, working directly with the founder, with no developer in the room to catch a bad call before it shipped.

Role

Product Designer (Sole Designer)

Timeline

Jan 2025 - Apr 2025

Platform

Mobile (iOS & Android)

Type

B2C SaaS -- Maritime / Yacht Marketplace

Team

Direct collaboration with founder (Product & Business)

A dating-app swipe was the starting brief. Getting to a marketplace that actually worked meant keeping the gesture and rebuilding what it meant.

The Short Version

What it is

A mobile-first maritime marketplace rebuilt around swipe-based discovery -- separate browsing paths for yacht owners, crew members and travelers who'd previously shared one undifferentiated web interface.

Who it's for

Yacht owners listing boats and managing opportunities, crew members finding roles, and travelers exploring destinations and trips -- three groups with different goals, now separated instead of merged.

How it was made

Designed solo over four months (Jan-Apr 2025), working directly with the founder, with no dev team embedded during the design phase.

Where it stands

Delivered as structured, developer-ready Figma files for asynchronous handoff. The source doesn't say whether development has started or the product has shipped.