Treat outfitting as a journey
The strategy connected discovery, product detail, and purchase instead of locating outfitting in one component.
Case study / 04
lululemon · 2023
Building a system for complete looks—not isolated items
I created an end-to-end product strategy that connected inspiration, product discovery, and multi-item purchase behavior across the guest journey.
Project brief
What I owned and why it mattered.
- Role
- Product Designer
- Team
- Product · Merchandising · Research · Engineering
- Platform
- Cross-platform strategy
- Timeline
- Multi-phase strategy
My responsibilities
- Strategic framing
- Journey architecture
- Concept definition
- Cross-team alignment
Methods
- Opportunity mapping
- Experience principles
- Capability planning
- Roadmapping
01 / Challenge
The problem behind the interface
Single-product journeys made it difficult for guests to build complete looks and made it easy for teams to create disconnected outfitting features. The organization needed a shared view of the behavior before investing in individual touchpoints.
02 / Evidence
What the direction was based on
- 01
Guests needed versatile product suggestions that could work with items they already owned
- 02
Guests sought styling education for activities, events, and occasions
- 03
Disconnected single-item journeys did not provide continuity from inspiration to purchase
03 / Approach
Turning uncertainty into a focused design direction
I framed the opportunity across discovery, product detail, and purchase, then translated research and merchandising goals into experience principles, priority moments, and reusable building blocks. The work connected near-term releases to a longer-term product system.
04 / Key insight
Outfitting is not one component. It is a connected behavior that starts with inspiration and needs continuity all the way through purchase.
Define shared capabilities
Reusable imagery, product relationships, and interaction patterns could support multiple experiences.
Stage the future state
A phased roadmap separated immediate improvements from capabilities that required longer-term investment.
05 / Solution
A system people can understand at a glance
The framework defined where complete looks should appear, what guests need at each stage, and which capabilities should be shared. It gave teams a common language for sequencing work without losing the larger experience.
Constraints
Designing inside the real system
- The strategy spanned teams with different roadmaps and success measures
- Product and model imagery varied widely
- Near-term releases still needed to contribute to a coherent future state
Collaboration
I used journeys, experience principles, component concepts, and a capability roadmap to align product, merchandising, research, and engineering around one outfitting model. The work created shared language for later delivery teams.
06 / Outcome
What changed
A shared vision and reusable experience framework
- 01Aligned teams around one end-to-end outfitting vision
- 02Prioritized reusable capabilities over isolated features
- 03Created the foundation for Shop the Look and Outfit Inspiration
Measurement note
This was a strategy outcome rather than a standalone launched feature. Its evidence is organizational alignment and the downstream Shop the Look and Outfit Inspiration experiences; their metrics are reported in their own case studies rather than attributed to strategy alone.
07 / Reflection
What I’d carry forward
A useful strategy is specific enough to guide decisions and flexible enough to survive changing roadmaps. Connecting principles to concrete components made the vision actionable.