Exploding Kittens
Overview
Redesign of Exploding Kittens’ eCommerce site that balances their irreverent sense of humor with an experience that is usable and delightful.
ROLE + DELIVERABLES
UI Design Lead
Discovery workshop, Design direction, UI design, QA
COLLABORATORS
Carmela Ocampo, UI Designer
Jack Rometty, UX Designer
AGENCY
The Stable, 2022
Challenge
I led the redesign of Exploding Kittens’ DTC eCommerce experience — focusing on patterns and ecommerce best practices that were altogether missing from their previous site, modular components, badging, and more.
Exploding Kitttens also presented a unique brand challenge: differentiate between Exploding Kittens – the game, and Exploding Kittens – the company. Many consumers know of Exploding Kittens, but don’t realize that the company puts out new party games throughout the year.
The result is a carefully crafted balance of branded content moments and moments that showcase the excitement of the games — coming to life as a design system that can easily adapt for EK’s growing catalog of games.
Flexible Color Theming
To emphasize each game’s unique look & feel we developed a flexible color system for the PDPs and the product cards. Each game has a branded color assigned to it and the templates & cards will pair with dark or light text to meet ADA color contrast requirements.
Before & After: Product Pages
The product page in its original state felt more like a landing page, lacking traditional eComm patterns. The new page streamlines the most pertinent product information including a badging system for users to easily scan the age group, player count, and time to play.
Retaining Brand Spirit
Exploding Kittens co-founder Matthew Inman’s comic illustration style played a huge role in the visual brand, but the longform comic style led to cumbersome pages not optimized for eCommerce. We kept the spirit of the comic-style but translated the stills into a new, scrollable module that succinctly summarizes the rules of each game.
Outcomes
Exploding Kittens’ new site experience is now a brand hub that goes beyond the singular game that made them popular, while still maintaining their rebellious attitude and spirit that sets them apart from other party game companies.
Full of moments that surprise & delight and with a strategic design system that is modular and easily customizable, Exploding Kittens is set up for future success with new releases and brand growth.