Case Study
BandMate
Design System
Design rationale
The system is dark, high-contrast, and typographically bold. A dark base tone, orange as the active accent for calls-to-action, and a graduated gray scale for hierarchy and status. Special Gothic Expanded One gives headlines presence, Didact Gothic keeps body text readable on small screens.
The moodboard draws on analog music culture, cassettes, concert lighting, without tipping into nostalgia. It's built to feel like the world these bands already live in, not another productivity tool borrowed from an office.
The emotional goal was commitment without control. Orange signals activity and urgency where it's needed. The dark palette gives the tool seriousness without sterility. Status is never carried by color alone, every open or completed task also has an icon and a label, so the system stays legible under WCAG AA contrast and doesn't rely on color perception. Language throughout is direct and cooperative, no jargon, no passive phrasing.
Typography
A member's own tasks are highlighted. Everyone else's stay neutral. That single color decision came directly out of testing, where color-blind task assignments were the most confusing part of the mid-fi prototype.
Status is never carried by color alone either. Every completed task gets a checkmark and a strikethrough, so the system stays readable under WCAG AA contrast and works regardless of color vision. This is the design tension from earlier, solved in one screen.
Lasse sees exactly what's assigned and what's done. Everyone else sees their own responsibilities clearly.
Ownership, made visible
Microcopy
The rationale called for language that's direct and cooperative, never corporate. That shows up in the small moments most:
The home screen doesn't greet you with "Welcome back," it says "Hallo Lasse." An empty task list doesn't say "No tasks found," it says "Noch kein Projekt geplant. Wird Zeit." ("No project planned yet. Time for one.")
Small shift, but it's the difference between a tool reporting a status and a tool nudging you like someone who's in the band with you.