ISSUE N°03 — PRODUCT DESIGN

STARTUP
CROYDON

Room booking platform

Startup Croydon is a charity that gives early-stage founders a place to work.

I designed its room-booking experience — leading research, UX and visual design in a team of four, and taking it all the way to a shipped launch.

Redesigned Startup Croydon meeting-room booking platform on desktop — FIG. 00 Business Space — the shipped booking experience

bookmark STARTUP CROYDON — THE CHARITY EMPOWERING STARTUPS

ROLE Product Designer

SCOPE Research · UX · UI
Prototyping

TEAM Four Designers

YEAR 2024

SECTION 01

The Challenge

Startup Croydon rents out lounges, co-working pods and meeting rooms to the founders it supports. But its booking tool got in the way — members weren't sure which space fit their needs, or what actually happened after they hit "book."

I shadowed Sam, the facility manager, as he juggled room availability and chased confirmations by hand. The pattern was clear: the platform was doing the charity's admin work for it, but leaving members guessing. My job was to make booking a space feel as simple as reserving a desk.

Startup Croydon Business Space — meeting rooms booking platform — PLATE 01The existing "Meeting Rooms for your Business" flow — lounges, pods and rooms priced by the hour, month, or as a recurring booking.

WHERE IT BROKE DOWN

Booking a space

01No clear starting point for first-time members
02Lounges, pods and meeting rooms blurred together

Managing a booking

01Unclear what happens once a booking is confirmed
02Too many steps to reach booking settings
03No way to see or adjust reminders for a booking

Research artefacts — affinity mapping, empathy map and service blueprint — PLATE 02Synthesis wall — affinity clusters, empathy map and the end-to-end service blueprint that framed the redesign.

SECTION 02

How Might We

Three questions anchored our whiteboarding — each one aimed at a moment where members were getting stuck.

OBJECTIVE 01

Ease of Use

How might we make booking a space effortless — even for a member doing it for the first time?

OBJECTIVE 02

Clarity

How might we help members tell booking, modifying and managing a reservation clearly apart?

OBJECTIVE 03

Control

How might we give members simple tools to review, adjust and stay on top of their bookings?

SECTION 03

Research & Discovery

Competitive Analysis

I benchmarked how leading booking tools handle availability, room types and confirmations, then mapped the patterns worth borrowing for a small charity's space-booking flow.

Usage Patterns

Working with the data on past bookings, I pinpointed peak hours and the actions members repeat most — which told us exactly which features to prioritise.

Who We Design For

Two people carry this product: the founder booking a room between meetings, and the facility manager keeping the calendar honest. Every decision had to serve both.

Design System

I audited the existing UI, kept what already worked for consistency, and built new components only where clarity demanded them — nothing decorative.

SECTION 04

Exploring Design Treatments

I moved fast on paper before committing pixels. Sketching the flows by hand let me test the logic of each step in critique, then validate the winners with members before building them out.

Low-fidelity wireframe exploration of the booking flow — PLATE 03Early wireframes — testing how members move from browsing a space to a confirmed booking.

Full screen-flow iteration of the booking journey — PLATE 04The end-to-end journey mapped screen by screen, from entry point to managing a live booking.

Navigating Booking Management

Members kept confusing booking a space with browsing events — two different jobs living too close together in the old flow.

So I designed one continuous path, from the moment a member is interested in a space to the point where they're managing it, with guidance surfaced exactly where it's needed.

Booking management navigation flow — PLATE 05The redesigned navigation model for booking management.

SECTION 05

The Solution

Everything a booking needs, in one place

I organised the experience into three clear zones — Upcoming Bookings, Saved Spaces and Space Overview — so a member can see what they've booked, what they're considering, and what's available without hunting for it.

Redesigned Startup Croydon booking platform on desktop — PLATE 06The redesigned booking platform — spaces are legible at a glance, with pricing and availability up front.

KEY MOMENTS

Browsing spaces — 01Browse what's on and available spaces through a clean, swipeable home.

Saved spaces — 02Save the spaces you use often so they're one tap away next time.

Search and filter — 03Filter by date, time, capacity and room type to find the right fit fast.

Space detail — 04Open a space to see amenities, pricing and everything a booking needs.

Booking at the right time

The data showed members book most between meetings — mid-morning and early afternoon. I used those windows to surface availability and gentle reminders when people were most likely to act.

Language that fits

I replaced system-speak with words members actually use — "Book a room," "Your bookings," "Saved spaces" — so the product sounds like the community it serves, not a corporate portal.

IMPACT — IMPACT — IMPACT

SECTION 06

Impact

The redesigned booking platform shipped to launch — turning a confusing, admin-heavy tool into a flow members can move through on their own. Fewer questions for the facility manager, a clearer path for founders, and a product that finally sounds like the community it serves.

TEAM & ROLE