Kanshingama is a Japanese clay workshop operated by Yasunobu Osugi, a skilled artisan dedicated to creating exquisite, handcrafted tableware. The project is an ecommerce website focus on Kanshingama’s signature product: the Kamadohan claypot rice cooker.
Challenges 🎯
Identifying the challenges helps to ensure that the website is designed to address specific problems or issues that the client is facing.
(Notes before reading:
This project is a redesign inspired by the original website of Kanshingama and their Kickstarter page for Kamadohan, the challenges I listed here are assumptions to build the project case study not fact)
One of the main challenges in this project was working with a non-technical client who entrusted the design decisions to the copywriter and website designer. The absence of an established visual brand identity required additional research to capture the essence of the handcrafted kamadohans and create a design that evoked tradition, uniqueness, and authenticity.
Targer Audience (User Personas) ✍️
Conducting user research helps to identify the needs, goals, and pain points of the website's target audience. By designing a website that is tailored to the user's needs and expectations, the website can stand out in a crowded market and attract more users.
* The names and avatars of these personas have been changed due to privacy reasons
James P.
32-years-old
Description: James P. is a food blogger and culinary influencer with a focus on Japanese cuisine.
Goals:
Source unique and visually appealing tableware for his food photography and videos
Painpoints:
Limited knowledge about where to find unique and visually captivating Japanese tableware.
Emiko S.
26-years-old
Description: Emiko S. is a professional chef who specializes in authentic Japanese cuisine.
Goals:
Find high-quality, traditional kitchenware for her culinary creations.
Painpoints:
Uncertainty about the performance and durability of the cheap clay cooking products.
Michiko N.
25-years-old
Description: Michiko N. is a home cook who values authentic techniques and flavors.
Goals:
Discover kitchenware that enhances her traditional cooking methods and elevate her cooking experience
Painpoints:
Limited access to high-quality, traditional cookware in local stores, uncertainty about the proper use and care for handmade products.
Solutions 🧠
After carefully go through the challenges the client is facing along with considering ways of solving the customer's painpoints to achieve their goald, a design and development strategy is devised to provide the solutions for the problems.
- Research on similar business, create a moodboard, conduct user research, low-fi and hi-fi wireframe and then final design, mockup in figma and develop the website in Wordpress.
- Create a visually captivating design that celebrated the tradition and authenticity of the kamadohans, with a clean and minimalistic aesthetic that accentuated the products.
- Utilize WordPress with Elementor, JetWooBuilder, and WooCommerce to build an eCommerce website, ensuring seamless integration with different payment systems and gateways for international transactions.
- Test the website across devices and browsers to ensure optimal performance, responsiveness, and accessibility before its successful launch.
Results 📈
After rounds of feedbacks and consultations, the final product is launched successfully
- Great performance: The website received an A-grade on GTMetrix and scored more than 80 on PageSpeed Insights, ensuring fast loading times and a seamless user experience.
- Intuitive user experience: The intuitive navigation, minimalist layout, and strategically placed calls-to-action guide visitors effortlessly through the site, resulting in increased engagement and conversions.
- Enhanced global accessibility: The integration capability of various payment systems and gateways facilitated secure international transactions, enabling customers from around the world to purchase kamadohans with ease. (has yet to be implemented for this still an experimental website and I don’t want people to accidentally bought something!:) For now it will be just COD payment available)
- Visual authenticity: The design successfully captured the traditional authenticity and uniqueness of the kamadohans, instilling a sense of trust and exclusivity among website visitors.