Kayu Beauty
Redesigning a beauty brand's website to put the product, and its customers, at the center
Kayu Beauty is a Filipino beauty brand made by Filipinas, for Filipinas. Its founders were the face of the brand, and they wanted the product to stand on its own. I designed a website experience that turns happy customers into the brand's best marketing.
Brand and industry
Beauty and cosmetics · E-commerce
My role
Design lead
University design-thinking project with Kayu Beauty as the client. I partnered with a researcher and led UX and visual design.
The challenge
We interviewed 4 of Kayu's 5 founders. One theme kept coming up: the brand's marketing leaned on the founders themselves, not the products. That limited growth and stretched the founders thin.
Problem statement: How might Kayu Beauty shift its spotlight from its founders to its products, so marketing and sales can grow without relying on the founders?
What I did
Followed a full design-thinking process
- Empathize: founder interviews, market research and competitive analysis
- Define: affinity mapping, synthesis and problem statements
- Ideate: card sorting, "how might we" statements and solution selection
- Design: wireframes and visual design
- Test: a usability survey with Kayu's leadership
Made customers the proof
The redesign features real customer reviews on every product page, with a simple incentive: leave a review and get ₱100 off your next purchase. Every review becomes social proof that sells the product, without a founder in the frame.
Made buying easy
Clear shade swatches, star ratings and one-tap buttons send shoppers to Shopee, Lazada or TikTok Shop, wherever they already buy. An email sign-up keeps them in the loop on launches.
Kept it on-brand
A warm, minimal design that matches Kayu's "inspired by you" ethos, built mobile-first for how its customers shop.
The results
We tested the redesign with Kayu's founders, CEO, CDO and COO. They navigated it easily and saw the business value right away. Their suggestions for what's next, a referral or affiliate program and on-site checkout, built directly on the same idea.
“An incentive to entice people to rate and review our products and convert it to sales.”
“Will drive repeat purchases and increase our credibility as a brand.”
What I learned
The best UX solution was also a marketing solution. A small incentive turned customers into the brand's voice, creating social proof, repeat purchases and a reason to come back, all from one feature.
Visuals
1. Before state
The kayubeauty.ph website before the redesign, on desktop and mobile.
2. Proposed redesign
The redesigned product page and review flow, built mobile-first around customer reviews and one-tap buying.