Hi, I'm Mark, a Digital Designer focused on UX, product design, and brand identity. I care about designing things that actually solve problems: experiences that are clear, purposeful, and built around real user needs.
During my placement year as a UX Specialist at Cirdan, I worked on healthcare technology products used within digital pathology and laboratory environments, collaborating with developers, analysts, and stakeholders to design solutions within complex, real-world workflows. That experience, alongside my time studying Digital Design at Ulster University, shaped how I approach problems: research-led, systems-focused, and always working toward clarity.
Outside of design I go to the gym regularly, enjoy gaming, have recently started getting into photography, and spend a good amount of time reading.
Most home design platforms are built around inspiration. Settled is built around decisions.
The problem Settled addresses is one that research kept surfacing: people moving into a new home aren't short of ideas. They're overwhelmed by them. Open-ended browsing on platforms like Pinterest produces saved collections, not resolved choices. For couples, the problem compounds further. Without a shared framework, different preferences become friction rather than a conversation.
Settled is a structured, collaborative decision-support app that helps people move from inspiration to action. By breaking large decisions into smaller, manageable comparisons, it reduces overwhelm and helps couples make confident choices together, with disagreement treated not as an edge case but as a specific, solvable part of the process.
Research came first, and it shaped everything that followed. Primary interviews with five participants across different living situations revealed a consistent pattern: people weren't searching for inspiration, they were searching for reassurance. Validation of decisions already half-made. Observational research across Reddit communities, property forums, and first-time buyer content reinforced this. The dominant behaviour in these spaces wasn't curiosity, it was uncertainty looking for a way through.
Four key findings guided the direction of the project. Open-ended browsing produced accumulation rather than decisions. Avoidance was a structural response to having no clear process, not a personality trait. For couples, disagreement wasn't about taste, it was the absence of a shared framework. And "where do I start?" was the most common question of all.
From that foundation, the design went through several significant pivots. Early concepts included open browsing, which research showed was precisely the behaviour causing the problem. A tournament bracket structure was introduced and then removed after users described it as gamified. It was replaced with a sequential comparison flow that kept the focus on deciding rather than winning. Shared-screen collaboration became asynchronous independent voting after testing revealed the friction of requiring both users to be present simultaneously. Item deletion became archiving after users reported anxiety about permanent removal, a direct response to the reassurance-seeking behaviour the research had already identified.
Iteration happened at every level, including language. The word "bracket" was removed from the interface entirely after users didn't recognise the term, replaced throughout with "New comparison." Every layout decision, navigation choice, and piece of copy was evaluated against one question: does this reduce cognitive load or add to it?
Settled is a high-fidelity prototype covering all core user flows across approximately 35 screens and states, including full onboarding, the complete decision flow across four states (pending, waiting, conflict, and agreed), conflict resolution, checklist, explore, and profile. The collaborative model is built around asynchronous independent voting: each partner votes separately, outcomes are compared, and where they diverge the app surfaces a conflict state with four resolution paths rather than leaving the disagreement unresolved.
Beyond the prototype, the project produced a complete visual identity and brand guidelines document covering colour, typography, logo, tone of voice, motion, and accessibility, alongside six user persona cards designed within the Settled brand system. A detailed launch strategy built around estate agent partnerships, placing the app in users' hands at the exact moment after an offer is accepted, before move-in begins. No comparable app has an equivalent distribution strategy.
Settled is built on a single insight: the challenge of making a home is rarely a shortage of ideas. It is the absence of a structure for turning those ideas into decisions. By making that process guided, collaborative, and calm, the project demonstrates how thoughtful design can reduce uncertainty and help people move forward together with confidence.
