Brief

Lumara Escapes is a fictional boutique travel brand created as a self-initiated design sprint to explore how a Wander-inspired travel experience could be adapted for a more intimate, restorative, and design-led audience.

My goal was to not copy Wander’s product, but to study its strengths, clarity, trust, and elevated usability, and reinterpret them through a calmer, boutique lens. I focused on designing a booking experience that feels immersive and luxurious while remaining highly usable and conversion-focused across platforms.

This spring was completed in 10 days and spans brand, product, and marketing design.

Mockup showing a hand holding a phone displaying a form and a laptop with the Lumara Escapes landing page.

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Challenge

Avoid generic travel-template aesthetics while maintaining usability
Define a distinctive luxury identity inspired by but not a direct copy of Wander
Design a cohesive cross-platform system (desktop, mobile, marketing)
Implement an intentional dual light/dark mode experience
Balance conversion-first UX with elevated visual storytelling

Research + Strategy

To kick off the sprint, I analyzed Wander as a benchmark for clarity, trust, and booking-focused UX, alongside other boutique travel brands that prioritize design and personalization.

Rather than copying Wander’s visual style, I extracted foundational principles:

Clear hierarchy and scannable layouts
Early trust signals and social proof
Simple, guided booking flows
Strong brand consistency across touchpoints

I then translated those principles into a distinct visual and experiential direction for Lumara Escapes – one rooted in elevated simplicity, warm modern tones, refined typography, and immersive photography. This approach allowed Lumara to feel calm, intimate, and restorative while still meeting the functional expectations of a modern travel platform.

Side-by-side comparison of a design concept for Lumara Escapes next to the Wander website interface, highlighting its dark aesthetic and property imagery.

Mood board showing four color circles (dark blue, beige, sage green, brown) linked by lines to various luxury home interior and exterior photos that inspired them.

Collage of diverse, high-end millennials and Gen-X professionals relaxing, traveling, and socializing in luxury settings, defining the target customer.

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UX Structure

My UX strategy focused on creating a calm, conversion-driven experience grounded in clarity, hierarchy, and trust, drawing inspiration from Wander’s structured approach to booking while softening the experience through boutique-level pacing and storytelling.

I carried the same clarity, trust, and conversion strategy into every asset, from social carousels built around key selling points to performance ads and emails that introduce Lumara Sites, inspired by Wander's innovation. Each piece reinforces a consistent and credible cross-channel experience.

Pencil sketch of Landing Page Concept 1, showing an immersive, visual-led layout with large hero imagery and sections for "Why Lumara" and "Signature Experiences."

Pencil sketch of Landing Page Concept 2, featuring a dynamic, information-forward split-hero layout, scrollable categories, and early social proof.

Mobile view of the Lumara Escapes landing page, showing the search bar, categorized retreats, a featured property with bulleted highlights, and a "Loved by Travelers Worldwide" testimonial section.

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High Fidelity Prototypes

Brand & Visual Exploration

I explored how color, typography, and photography evoke calm, warmth, and quiet luxury. The resulting system includes soft neutrals, refined serif/sans-serif pairing, and natural light photography creating an atmosphere that feels restorative and intentional. This visual direction became the foundation for all interface and marketing design.

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Final Design

The final design brings Lumara Escapes to life through a cohesive, multi platform experience that blends calm luxury with conversion-focused clarity. The landing page features a dynamic split-hero layout, immersive photography, scrollable experiences categories, and early trust signals, supported by both light and dark modes for modern usability. Mobile layouts were fully optimized, ensuring the experience feels equally refined on smaller screens.

Across social, performance ads, and email assets, the brand extends seamlessly: warm neutrals, elegant typography, and intentional spacing creates a consistent visual language. Every touchpoint reinforce Lumara's core narrative of restorative, design-led escapes delivered with simplicity and ease, resulting in a polished, credible ecosystem that feels both aspirational and grounded.

High Fidelity Prototypes

Dark-mode landing page for Lumara Escapes, showing properties and testimonials.

Light-mode landing page for Lumara Escapes, showing property listings and search.

Comparison of desktop and mobile layouts for a dark-mode landing page.

Five-slide Instagram carousel ad promoting luxury property escapes.

Digital ad promoting direct booking with the slogan "Own Your Bookings. Not the Fees."

Desktop dark-mode property detail page for "The Beachline Residence."

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Impact

Created a cohesive brand-to-product translation ensuring the Lumara Escapes brand identity carried seamlessly across web, mobile, and marketing touch points.
Explored cross-platform consistency and dual-mode design while maintaining a unified visual and functional experience.
Applied conversion-focused UX in a luxury travel context optimizing layouts, flows, and CTAs to guide users towards bookings while preserving premium feel.

Design process showing inspiration, cross-platform UI/UX, and marketing assets.

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Collaboration + Feedback

Throughout the process, I analyzed assets from similar niche brands and iterated my designs based on performance insights, improving user engagement while preserving brand integrity.

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Lessons Learned

This project reinforced the importance of cohesive storytelling across platforms. I explored how a landing page could guide users through discovery while subtly encouraging conversion, how an instagram carousel could extend that narrative, and how performance ads and emails could educate users while creating additional conversion touchpoints.

Design Lumara Escapes highlighted how luxury products require a careful balance: emotion immersion must coexist with clear UX patterns. Strong conversion outcomes are not driven by visual alone, but by thoughtful hierarchy, pacing, and consistency across every interaction.

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Skills Highlighted

Brand strategy & visual identity
UX/UI design (desktop & mobile)
Conversion-focused user flows
Responsive & accessible design
Marketing asset creation (social, email, ad)
Design system & component library creation
Self-initiated project management

Lumara Escapes – Self Initiated Brand & UX/UI Design Sprint

Client

Role

Timeline

Deliverables

Brief

Challenge

Research + Strategy

UX Structure

Brand & Visual Exploration

Final Design

Impact

Collaboration + Feedback

Lessons Learned

Skills Highlighted

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