Showroom to screen: redesigning an eCommerce experience to match a premium brand

My role

Lead designer, project manager

Responsibilities

End-to-end UX & UI, discovery, wireframing, brand, account management

Collaborators

Client account lead, engineers, marketing

Timeline

6 months

Overview

Oakleys’ old site was holding them back — visually outdated, hard to manage, and disconnected from their premium showroom experience.

I led a modern redesign that brought their brand to life online, and made it easier for customers to explore and engage with their products.

The problem

Oakleys Plumbing’s online presence felt dated and disconnected from their physical showroom experience. The site had visual inconsistencies, technical limitations tied to their old CMS, and no real ability to showcase their products.

Goal

Create a modern, user-friendly website that showcases Oakleys’ high-quality products and projects, aligns with their in-person showroom experience, and introduces a streamlined quoting system to support customer engagement.

Process & approach

Oakleys operated four showrooms around the South Island, all run somewhat independently but still tied to their main Christchurch showroom. Their marketing manager came to us with clear guidelines on how they wanted the site to work: four separate duplicate sites, each managed separately, with central office admin management.

While that approach made sense operationally, it created complexity in website management, product ordering and inventory, SEO, admin, and ongoing costs. To help them visualise this, I mapped out two proposed information architecture diagrams: one for their initial approach, and one for a unified site structure with four clearly defined locations under a single domain. After walking through the pros and cons, they aligned on consolidating to one central website.

With the new information architecture agreed, I created a set of wireframes covering the key pages — guided by both the revised sitemap and a comprehensive requirements list from the marketing manager, who had done a solid job researching competitors and outlining must-have features.

Brand positioning

After visiting Oakleys’ showrooms, I developed a refreshed colour palette that extended their mid-range blue with a deeper blue-black and muted greys. I presented a design reflective of contemporary home and architecture magazines. The palette created a clean, modern backdrop that complemented their product photography and elevated the brand’s premium feel online.

Design solutions

Once aligned on the direction, I mocked up high-fidelity designs for all key pages, using their product photography and the simple brand identity we’d established. As I worked through the designs I checked in with the client regularly. Aside from some minor tweaks on terminology, everything was approved quickly and we kept momentum right through to handoff.

The full homepage design — scroll within the frame.

Outcomes

• Delivered a strong online presence that matched Oakleys’ premium positioning
• Simplified management with one centralised website for all locations
• Established wishlist functionality as a future foundation for ongoing customer engagement
• Positive client feedback and quick approvals, thanks to close collaboration

Reflection

I moved on from hairyLemon just as the initial site was going live, so I missed the development and release of the project wishlist functionality.

What worked well:

• Engaged stakeholders meant the feedback loop was quick and productive
• Clear requirements and direction from the outset made it easier to stay focused
• We delivered a strong digital presence with a lean but effective brand identity

Challenges:

• The team’s enthusiasm brought lots of new ideas, so we had to keep an eye on scope and budget to stay on track