Designing
the activity app
Paris was missing
The "Too Good To Go" of Parisian leisure.
I joined the &joy project when it was still a concept. Few screens made with Lovable, but mostly a great idea: what if someone turned last-minute unsold spots into spontaneous Parisian experiences, the way Too Good To Go turned unsold food into a market?
Before any real design work began, I helped shape the app's positioning and identity: what &joy should stand for, and what voice it should carry.
Brand strategy, voice, market framing
Analysis of interviews conducted by the founder
17 participants · 2 waves · semi-structured interviews
Full interface design, component system, V1 → V2
17 participants · 2 waves · semi-structured interviews
A starting hypothesis
First interviews revealed something more precise. For most of the respondents, looking for weekend activities is often a source of stress because major events sell out quickly.
We assumed the main problem was choice overload in a buzzing city: smaller events struggle to find their audiences, and vice versa.
Three decisions that shape the experience
30 hand-picked, verified activities beat 300 unfiltered listings. The catalogue should be a quality promise, not just a suggestion.
Onboarding to booking confirmed should be under 2 minutes. Every tap that can be removed should be.
From "Salut Jane 👋" to human-written activity descriptions, the app speaks with warmth and a real voice. In a category of generic platforms, tone of voice is the brand.
Warm, human, and deliberately un-corporate
Aa
Cormorant Garamond · Editorial serif
Rounded sans-serif · All UI text
Two voices. One for curation, one for clarity.
Typography · Dual type systemWhat are we doing today?
💡 Your code is your ticket. Just show it at the entrance.
Only 4 spots left!
UX writing · Friendly & warm
Only 4 spots left
Rooftop Yoga at Sunset
18 € Clarity firstThe app in 5 key moments
An onboarding flow that gets straight to the point
Users reach a personalised home without a lengthy setup. They are mainly asked about their preferences, so that the activities suggested on the homepage suit them.
No blank slate, no friction before the first discovery.
A home that curates, not just lists
A first-name greeting, the city weather, a curated featured activity with a live scarcity badge. Then several sections: team picks, personalised recommendations, and a geolocation radius.
No generic feed. Every section has a reason to be there and a reason to be different tomorrow.
Explore the city, your way
Every category gets its own emoji pin on the map. A 🧘 for wellness, a 🎭 for culture, a 🍽 for food. The city becomes readable and diverse at a glance. A list toggle lets users compare activities side by side without losing the spatial context.
Filters were designed around real usage patterns from research: a rolling 7-day date strip (not just "tonight" or "this weekend")*, a category picker, a price range slider, a headcount picker, and a promo toggle. Every filter answers a question users actually asked.
*13 / 17 participants needed date-specific filters.
The page where the decision happens
A swipeable photo gallery sets the scene before anything else. Below it: a rating, a metro stop, a duration, a cancellation policy, and a live scarcity count. The included/not-included and "Good to know" sections remove the last source of ambiguity before payment.
Reviews were intentionally not displayed at first but were gradually added to the app based on user feedback*.
*14 / 17 cited missing reviews as their top friction.
A code or QR?
Venue professionals are diverse. Not all have a scanner. A 6-character code works with a tablet, a printed list, or just a pair of eyes. No equipment required, no friction at the door!
Almost all users said they expected a QR code here, but none asked for one back after seeing the code and reading the note below.
Testing the prototypes
Working alongside the founder, I ran two rounds of user testing across the project. We were not looking to confirm what we already thought but for where we were wrong.
One finding came up in nearly every session: users could not commit to a booking without reviews. The aggregate score told them how many people had gone. It told them nothing about whether they should.
In V2, we introduced the &joy team's own recommendations — written with conviction, the way a bookseller recommends a book. But testers explained they couldn't trust a review written by the people selling the experience…
A score without comments was seen as invented. "21 reviews and I can't read them." The trust gap on the activity page was the sharpest finding of the study.
"It's the &joy team saying it's good... Obviously, they won't say it's bad." Team reviews were read but not trusted.
Trusted by the community, approved by the city
Ambassadors are not hired reviewers but selected users based on how well they know the city and their online reputation. The app gives them early access to new activities for free. In return, they write a detailed, signed review. The review is attached to their name and their reputation — that is what makes it readable, where the team's own voice was not.
In terms of pure design, ambassador reviews are visually highlighted and appear alongside standard user reviews, without replacing them. The mechanism goes further than just reviews: an activity that does not earn ambassador approval does not enter the catalogue. Ambassadors are not just the voice of the app. They are its quality filter.
From concept to final prototype in less than 1 month
I joined the &joy project to help with positioning. Seventeen interviews and dozens of iterations later, the final prototype was handed off to developers. I was glad to bring my expertise across the whole chain: product strategy, user research, visual identity, and interface design.
The V2 prototype has been handed off to developers.
The app is scheduled for release in the fall of 2026.
