The cannabis market is currently unfortunately dominated by big mass-producing faceless corporations. The mission of Emerald Exchange is to increase the market share and support the livelihoods of artisan, small-batch, organic family farms who produce high-quality cannabis products that also care for their soil. I especially enjoyed working on this project because of my own values of sustainable farming, supporting small businesses, and caring for the land.
They had a vision for a new cannabis platform that targets a "Whole Foods" type shopper - distinct from the "get as high as possible" marketing common in southern California. They began their offering as a hybrid upscale farmer's market meets music festival live events -- areas you can wander around to meet farmers and browse artisanal cannabis products, check out a sound bath, listen to some speakers on stage to learn more about the science, culture and utility of cannabis.
They are now pivoting towards a digital experience and came to me to bring their vision to life.
On this page you can see some screenshots of the app, as well as a video walkthrough further down.
From proposal to writing product requirements to wireframing to creating art assets to building prototype, all work on this page was done by me while consulting the client. All farms featured below are real businesses that partner with Emerald Exchange.
Designed for discerning cannabis consumers, the app provides a shopping and educational experience through interactive maps where they can explore digital booths of artisan farms as if they were at a farmer's market. Or check out a CBD yoga class, or some live bands, as if they were strolling around a cannabis festival.
Product Requirements, user flows and whiteboarding - I led virtual workshops in Miro to define to product
Art Direction - I developed an art direction based on their desire for a rustic festival experience and produced all visual assets in Photoshop and Illustrator
UI/UX Design - Adobe XD
Prototyping - rigged and animated in Protopie
Video Walkthrough of Prototype
Here is a screen recording of the prototype that I designed and built in Protopie.
Though the UI/UX was designed with Adobe XD, I chose Protopie as our prototyping solution because we wanted to feature custom video content of featured farmers. One of the app's goals is for the user to get to know the farmers through them introducing their farm wares and touring you through their organic farms. Protopie was (and currently still is) the only tool that allows full embedded video that is playable in the prototype.
The app features embedded videos so it's recommended to play with sound on :)