Oleg Bazhyn
Contact

Crypto marketplace

Nerd Town

From the catalog to the escrow: I designed a collectibles shop where people buy and sell with Bitcoin Cash.

Role
Product Designer
Platforms
Web app
Status
Design delivered
Work

Nerd Town

10Contents

About

What the product is

UsersCollectors and sellers who buy and sell in Bitcoin Cash, without an email address.

Separate parts

Problem

A collectibles shop needs six parts. Taken one by one, they are separate pieces, and no sale can finish.

Main constraintBuyers pay strangers in Bitcoin Cash, so the money had to wait until the seller approved each sale.

  • Catalog
  • Selling
  • Account
  • Cart
  • Wallet
  • Escrow

Around one listing

Solution

All six parts work on one listing.

The listing a seller writes is the one a buyer finds, puts in the cart and pays for.

Listing

  • item
  • BCH price
  • quantity
  • seller
  • Catalog
  • Selling
  • Account
  • Cart
  • Wallet
  • Escrow

What I delivered

Outcome

One shop where a collector buys and a seller approves the sale.

My partI designed the buyer's way through the shop, the seller's, and the wallet between them.

  • Desktopthe shop on a large screenMenus, filters, dialogs
  • Phonethe shop laid out for a phoneCatalog to wallet
  • Style guidecolours and the Poppins type scaleDesktop and phone alike
  • Profilesa seller's page and your ownPolicies and listings

Brief

An eBay-like shop. A crypto checkout. No product yet

The client came with an idea for a crypto marketplace — an eBay-like shop for collectibles, with bidding, a catalog and wallets — but no designed product yet. My job was to turn that list into an interface people could use: a cart that completes a purchase, a wallet that makes the currency feel normal, and an escrow that holds the money until the seller approves.

Without that interface the list would stay a list: a collector could find an item but not finish buying it, and Bitcoin Cash, not the collectibles, would be the first thing people saw.

From the brief

The needs in the brief

Find the needs, then pick one to mark the words it was read from.

The brief, summed up

An eBay-like shop for collectibles, with a catalog people can search and filter by franchise, character, year, and condition.

Sellers list an item and wait for a bid, or buyers purchase it directly.

Everything is paid in Bitcoin Cash, with wallets, and the money is held until the seller agrees to the sale.

No email, and buyers should see who they are dealing with before they pay.

Role

What I owned, and where the work stopped

I owned

  • Purchase path

    Catalog, category menu, filters, listing, cart and checkout as one purchase path.

  • Wallet

    The in-app Bitcoin Cash wallet — balance, history, deposit, withdraw.

  • Selling

    Seller listing, sale approval (the escrow) followed by the parcel tracking number, and the seller profile.

  • Sign-in and pages

    Sign-in without an email address, the footer's pages (terms, privacy, about us, FAQ) and the contact form.

  • Desktop and phone

    UX and UI on desktop and on the phone.

Outside my scope

  • Chain and custody

    Blockchain integration, custody, and anything after handoff.

  • Outcomes

    Nothing about sales or conversion was measured.

Constraints

What the design holds to

  • Crypto in its place

    Bitcoin Cash shows on the prices and in the wallet, and stays quiet everywhere else.

  • Offer or buy

    Bidding was in the brief. The seller's List item dialog speaks of an offer or a direct purchase; the buyer's listing buys with Add to cart.

  • No email needed

    Signing up takes a username and a password, never an email address.

  • Held until approved

    A purchase waits in the buyer's wallet as Pending approval until the seller approves it, then reads Approved.

  • Money in the shop

    Deposit and withdraw are dialogs on the wallet page, with the address, the amount and the fee in view.

  • A phone of its own

    The phone has layouts of its own, not the desktop squeezed.

Goals

What the shop had to be able to do

These were design jobs, not measured outcomes: the project's goals as the things a buyer and a seller do in the shop, from joining it to selling in it. Each card shows the part of the delivered screen that does it.

  1. Join under a username

    Joining asks for no personal details: a username, then a password typed twice.

    Part of the Nerd Town Sign Up dialog: the Username, Password and Repeat password fields, each filled in and masked, with no email field.

  2. Know the seller

    A buyer can check a stranger before paying: the seller's card under the item, with their sales, followers and join date, and Profile or Complain.

    Part of a Nerd Town listing, below the item: the seller's card with a photo, the user name and Seller, items listed now, items sold, followers and the date they became a member, above Similar Items in this category.

  3. Bitcoin Cash at checkout

    Paying in Bitcoin Cash works like any checkout: the cart adds up the order in BCH, and Buy submits it.

    Part of the Nerd Town cart: the item with its price in Bitcoin Cash, a quantity stepper and a delete button, the note on how the order is processed, the total in BCH, then Close and Buy.

  4. Finish the purchase

    A buyer finishes without leaving the shop: the payment is confirmed, and the seller is told to arrange shipment or pickup.

    The Nerd Town purchase confirmation: Successful purchase!, the item with its price in Bitcoin Cash, the note that the payment was received and the seller notified, then Close and List item.

  5. Where the money stands

    Each sale or purchase has its own row in the wallet, with its status or the next step to take, under the balance and the money in and out.

    Part of the Nerd Town wallet's history: four rows, each with a time and date, an amount in or out in Bitcoin Cash, and its status or next step: Pending approval, a parcel tracking number, Enter PTN and a receipt number.

  6. Both sides of the shop

    Selling happens in the same shop: a seller lists an item on one form, with its details, its category and a price in Bitcoin Cash.

    Part of the Nerd Town List new item form: the item's name and description, its category and subcategory, and its price in Bitcoin Cash.

Solution

A shop where a sale can finish, with crypto in the background

I designed the product from the catalog and the listing to the cart to work the way online shops usually do. For the wallet, the hold and the sign-in, neither other shops nor crypto apps had an answer that fit, so each got one of its own.

  1. Design process
  2. Where Bitcoin Cash lives
  3. When the money moves
  4. How you sign in

0104

Design process

The hard part of each step, in the order a collector meets them.

  1. Narrowing without getting lost

    A breadcrumb over the grid shows where you are, the filters in use stay highlighted in one row, and Clear filters takes them all off.

  2. Judging a figure on screen

    The listing opens on a large gallery, with the description and the item specifics beside it.

  3. Delivery without a name

    The cart takes the delivery address as a country, a city and a street, and no field asks for a name.

0204

Where Bitcoin Cash lives

Where does Bitcoin Cash live, if the product is a shop and not a wallet?

Judged on three tests

  1. Someone with no Bitcoin Cash yet can start with the items.
  2. A seller sees what a sale brought in without leaving the shop.
  3. A listing still looks like a listing.
  1. A

    Checkout only

    Connect, pay and forget: the shop keeps no balance.

    Fails test 2: every payout is someone else's problem.

  2. B

    Wallet first

    The home screen is a balance, with the catalog behind it.

    Fails test 1: the collectibles come second to a balance.

  3. Chosen

    A wallet beside the shop

    A wallet page of its own behind the header's icon, and a price in Bitcoin Cash on every listing.

    Passes all three tests.

  • Why this one

    People come for an item or for a sale. The balance is the account behind both, so it stands beside the catalog, not in front of it.

  • Trade-off

    Two things to learn on a first visit: a shop and an account, not one screen.

  • Risk

    The wallet turns into a second product that the shop never mentions.

  • Reversibility

    The wallet can shrink back to a checkout later; growing a checkout into an account is the bigger change.

0304

When the money moves

When does the money actually move, if the other party is a stranger?

Judged on three tests

  1. A buyer has a reason to pay an unknown seller.
  2. A sale can go ahead before any parcel is tracked.
  3. The hold is a screen, not a sentence in the terms.
  1. A

    Instant transfer

    The money goes to the seller at checkout: the fastest way, with nothing held.

    Fails tests 1 and 3: nothing is held, so nothing protects the buyer.

  2. B

    Hold until delivered

    The money waits until the parcel is marked as delivered.

    Fails test 2: every sale would wait on parcel tracking.

  3. Chosen

    Hold for the seller's Approve

    Buy and the success screen come first; the seller then approves the sale, and a tracking number may follow.

    Passes all three tests.

  • Why this one

    With no email and no bank between buyer and seller, the hold is how the shop earns a buyer's trust.

  • Trade-off

    A purchase is not over at the success screen: the buyer waits on the seller.

  • Risk

    A seller who never approves keeps the buyer's money waiting. The plan was for the hold to expire on its own.

  • Reversibility

    The hold can be made shorter later; taking it away would remove the buyer's only protection.

0404

How you sign in

How do you sign in to a crypto shop that does not want an email address?

  • Not an email login

    With an email login, the inbox becomes a second way in: anyone who gets into it can reset the password and take over the account.

  • Not a wallet login

    Signing in with a crypto wallet would ask a collector to have one before they could even join.

  • What a lost password costs

    A forgotten password can lock away more than an account here: the wallet sits behind it.

  • Adding email later

    An email field can be added later. Taking it away from people who signed up with one would be much harder.

The shop has three jobs. The main page opens on two of them, Buy Stuff and Sell Stuff; paying runs through the wallet.

Buy a collectible

The first screen of the Nerd Town main page: the logo and the cart, wallet and profile icons in the header, the green Buy Stuff and Sell Stuff doors either side of an isometric city, Explore categories with a card for each category, its photo, its name and its count of items, then the catalog’s first row with Category, Search and the Search button.
Main page: the two doors, Explore categories and the top of the catalog.

Explore categories on the main page

Below the main page’s two doors, Explore categories shows how many items each category holds. Under the item, a listing shows Similar items and Recently viewed. In the cart, a stepper changes the quantity and a delete button takes the item out.

Sell a collectible

The first screen of your own page in Nerd Town: your avatar in the header, your card with a photo, the user name, the items listed and sold and the date you joined, List item and Edit profile, About seller and Seller policies, then Category, Search and the filters, Status first.
Your own page: your card with List item and Edit profile, Seller policies and the filters over your items.

List item on your own page

Your own page has List item and Edit profile on your card, beside the items you have listed and sold. Seller policies set out your returns, shipping and delivery, and a Status filter narrows your items.

Pay and get paid

The first screen of the Nerd Town wallet: the wallet icon filled in the header, Total, Income and Spending in Bitcoin Cash, Deposit and Withdraw, the Status, Year, Month and Transaction type filters with a search, and the first rows of the history, each with a person, an order, a time, an amount in or out, and its status, a button or a receipt.
Wallet: the totals, Deposit and Withdraw, the filters and the first rows of the history.

The wallet’s history and filters

Status, Year, Month and Transaction type narrow the wallet’s history, and a search finds a single row. Deposits and withdrawals are rows of that history too, each with its receipt number, among the sales and purchases.

Marketplace, in outline

Popular items

Collectibles from people like you, priced in BCH

Browse figures, helmets, cards and coins, each with its price in BCH.

Fill in the delivery address in the cart and press Buy: the payment is processed and the seller is notified.

Deposit, withdraw and approve a sale from the same wallet, where each order keeps its tracking number and receipt.

List your collection

Put a figure, a helmet or a card up for sale in BCH. Buyers pay from the in-app wallet, and the sale waits for your approval.

Logo
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of service
  • About us
  • FAQ

Flow

From a category in the menu to a parcel on its way

  1. Pick a category

    Open the menu and choose a kind of item.

    Nerd Town category menu: under the header with Back, the logo and the cart, wallet and profile icons, one panel of category headings in capitals, each with an arrow and a short list of kinds of item under it; the pointer rests on one entry, green and underlined.
    The menu opens as one panel over the page. Each heading is set in capitals with an arrow, a short list stands under it, and the entry under the pointer is green and underlined.

  2. Open the item

    Add it to the cart, or to Wishlist.

    Nerd Town listing: the first screen of an item’s page, with Category and Search under the header, the breadcrumb, the item’s photo, its title and its price in Bitcoin Cash, Add to cart and Wishlist, and the start of the Description, with Item Specifics below it.
    Category and Search stay at the top of the item’s page, and the price sits right above Add to cart and Wishlist, each button with an icon of its own.

  3. Send the order

    Check the cart, then press Buy.

    Nerd Town cart with a delivery address: the header’s cart icon filled, then one card with the item’s photo, name and price, a quantity stepper and a delete button, the cart’s note, the total in Bitcoin Cash, Country, City and Street, and Close and Buy.
    The cart is one card, read top to bottom: the item, a note on what happens once the order is sent, the total, the delivery address, then Close or Buy.

  4. Approve the sale

    The seller sees the item, then approves.

    Nerd Town escrow: Approve the sale, a question on one card under the header with Back, holding the item’s photo and name, its price in Bitcoin Cash and the number of items, then Close and Approve, on an otherwise empty page.
    One card on an otherwise empty page asks “Approve the sale?” Under the question come the item, its price and the number of items, then Close or Approve.

  5. Add a tracking number

    The seller can add the parcel’s number.

    Nerd Town tracking number: the Add Parcel Tracking Number dialog under the header, with the item’s photo, name and price, a line saying the seller may enter the number for the item sent to the buyer, the number’s field filled in, then Close and Add.
    The dialog keeps the same item and its price, says the seller may enter the parcel’s tracking number, and has one field for it, then Close or Add. Once added, the number shows on the buyer’s and the seller’s wallet rows.

States

Beyond the happy path

  1. Your own listing

    Opened by its seller, an item shows List item and Edit item where buyers see Add to cart and Wishlist.

    Part of a Nerd Town item’s page as its seller sees it: the item’s price in Bitcoin Cash over two buttons, List item and Edit item.

    The page ends after the seller card, with no Similar items.

  2. Confirm or refund

    An item already bought has a dialog of its own, with Cancel & refund beside Confirm.

    Part of the Nerd Town Purchased item dialog: the item’s photo and name on a card of their own, with no price, then Cancel & refund and Confirm.

    The dialog names the item and leaves its price out.

  3. Sending money out

    Before Bitcoin Cash leaves for another wallet, the dialog asks to double-check the address.

    Part of the Nerd Town Withdraw dialog below its address field: a paragraph on sending Bitcoin Cash to another wallet, ending on a reminder to double-check the address, then the sum You will send.

    An address, it warns, is a long string of letters and numbers.

System

A shop that handles money needs one visual language

Most screens of Nerd Town ask for a decision: open an item or keep browsing, buy or close, approve a sale or wait. Colour, type and controls are decided once, so each choice looks the same wherever it comes up, in the catalog, in a dialog or on a wallet row.

The style guide sets a green primary with a dark ink and a pale mint, and Poppins for headings and body. On the screens the green is the step forward and money coming in, the mint is the choice beside it, and a grey-green sage carries the details. A deep red marks money going out, and orange is kept for the Bitcoin Cash mark beside an amount.

Colours

Pick a colour on the wheel

  • Inner ring: the primary and its greens, lightest to ink
  • Outer ring: the wallet’s red and the coin’s orange, at their own hues

Type

  • Top sellersH1 · Poppins Black 32The main page’s section headings
  • Successful purchase!H2 · Poppins Medium 20The dialogs’ titles
  • Unique items from nerds like youBody · Poppins Regular 16Running text
  • Item conditionCaption · Poppins Medium 14The filters’ labels
  • BUY STUFFDisplay · Passion One BoldThe main page’s two doors
Poppins
  • Regular 400
  • Medium 500
  • Black 900

Components

  • Button pairFilled green and pale mint, one size
  • PriceThe mark first, the figures in bold
  • Filter chipsEach opens a list of its own values
  • Buy and sell doorsOne solid, one outlined, on the shop’s green
  • Seller cardComplain in a red of its own, on a pale fill
  • Wallet rowsAn arrow and a sign before each amount

Delivered

A marketplace you can browse, buy in, and pay from

What “complete” means here

  1. CatalogFrom the front door to an item’s own page.
  2. CartWith and without the delivery address.
  3. EscrowThe phone adds the parcel number to approval.
  4. WalletOn the phone, each row is its own card.

Each step has screens of its own; the admin dashboard the brief also named has none.

The delivered design connects the catalog, the listing, the cart, the Bitcoin Cash wallet and seller approval in one experience. I owned the UX and UI across them, from the brief to the detailed screens.

Delivered designThis covers the delivered design for desktop and phone: marketplace, listing, cart, wallet, escrow, seller and account screens.

Marketplace

Popular items

Collectibles from people like you, priced in BCH

Browse figures, helmets, cards and coins, each with its price in BCH.

Fill in the delivery address in the cart and press Buy: the payment is processed and the seller is notified.

Deposit, withdraw and approve a sale from the same wallet, where each order keeps its tracking number and receipt.

List your collection

Put a figure, a helmet or a card up for sale in BCH. Buyers pay from the in-app wallet, and the sale waits for your approval.

  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of service
  • About us
  • FAQ

Reflection

What I’d keep, change and validate next

  • What I’d keep

    The hold behind every step

    After Buy, the success screen’s promised update, the wallet’s statuses and the parcel step all rest on it.

  • What I’d change

    One rule for both sides

    The Sell Stuff door says to wait for the highest bid, yet no buyer can bid. I’d add a bid next to Add to cart.

  • What I’d validate next

    Trust, with no data

    Is a seller’s card with no reviews enough to pay a stranger? Does Pending approval tell a buyer enough?