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Redesigning the festival discovery experience for Philadelphia



Overview
DiasporaDNA is a mobile cultural center dedicated to archiving, celebrating, and activating Philadelphia’s diaspora communities. As Philadelphia approaches its 250th anniversary in 2026, this project redesigned the Philly Festivals website, transforming it from a static listing into a more engaging, informative, and community-centered platform that reflects the cultural depth of the network.
    Info
    • Timeline:  Sep 2025 - Dec 2025
    • Team: Iris, Mengqi, Simran, Uraiba
    • My Role: User Interview, Competitive Analysis, Mobile & Desktop Redesign, Design system creation


    A quick view of Philly Fests’ brand new site




    The old Philly Fests’ website presented festival information mostly as long lists of links

     Also, the homepage lacks clear context about the platform’s purpose, value, and how it supports festival-goers and organizers.
    Cultural storytelling, accessibility details, and DiasporaDNA’s broader vision for festivals as community infrastructure are not clearly surfaced.

    We aim to redesign the website into a central hub that brings festival-goers and organizers together
    • Easy for user to discover festivals
    • Highlight the cultural significance of Philadelphia’s festivals
    • Better  support for the producers’ team

    Workflow Set up
    We learned from the users through 5 research methods

    • Competitive analysis of 50+ festival and event platforms.
    • Survey for festival-goers
    • Festival-goer interviews.
    • Festival producer interviews.
    • RICE prioritization of pain points across goers + producers.
    • Content audit of existing PhillyFest site and DiasporaDNA Story Center




    Competitive Analysis
    Survey responses from 16 festival-goers
    Affinity mapping from interviews with festival-goers and producers

    Festival goers rely on multiple platforms to decide whether attending a festival feels worthwhile, often lacking the clarity, social reassurance, and cultural context they need.



    Festival producers juggle fragmented tools, limited resources, and unpredictable promotion channels, making it difficult to reach audiences and tell their stories.




    “How might we create a centralized cultural hub that supports local festival goers, producers, and tourists by providing trustworthy information, cultural depth, and inclusive accessibility?”



    After brainstorming, we prioritized features using RICE scoring, and translated the UX strategy into a flywheel model


      Phase 1: MVP Flywheel (Core)
      At this stage, Philly Festivals does not yet have the resources to support user profiles, social features, or large-scale moderation. Instead, we focused on a flywheel that builds trust and repeat usage without requiring sign-ins. Features include:
      • Smart Discovery & Filters (RICE: 8.5) – Universal need, high impact
      • Festival Detail Pages (RICE: 8.2) – Foundation for trust
      • Schedule Builder (RICE: 7.8) – Unique differentiator from competitors
        Phase 2: Future Opportunities
        Once Phase 1 establishes consistent data, producer participation, and user traffic, more advanced features become feasible:
        • Producer Portal (RICE: 6.5) – High impact but smaller user base
        • Social Coordination (RICE: 6.2) – Addresses #1 barrier but requires community
        • User-Generated Content (RICE: 5.8) – High engagement but moderation-heavy

        Phase 3: Monetization & Sustainability (Future Stage)
        Only after a large and active user base is established does monetization make sense. Examples:
        • Ticketing Integration (RICE: 4.2) – Complex, low confidence
        • Marketplace (RICE: 3.5) – Out of scope for cultural mission
        • Exclusive offers


        Then we restructured the information architecture to make festival discovery the core experience
        New Information Architecture
        This aligns with our Phase 1 flywheel goal: making it easy for locals and tourists to discover festivals and build trust through clear, well-structured information.

        With the information architecture defined, we moved into the final design phase which supports the MVP strategy         Prototype 

        #1 Festival Discovery
        #2 Festival Details Page
        #3 Festival Lineup Experience

        #4 Producer’s Festival Submission Page
        #5 Design System for Consistency

        Design system (image, color, graphic, and typography)
        Components such as header, footer, and navigation bar

        Future Opportunities (Phase 2)



        Reflection
        What I learned 💁🏻‍♀️

        • The best design solutions emerge at the intersection of user needs and business constraints
        • How to balance the two different user groups (goers and producers)
        • Schedule Builder works because it delivers value to users (personalization without accounts) while solving a business problem (lead generation for producers)
        • Finding those win-win features is the mark of strategic design

        What we did well

        • All of our ideas are research-driven, making sure it really benefits the target audience
        • Using RICE prioritization to help us focus on MVP vs. “nice-to-haves” features
        • Feature innovation, such as Schedule Builder, a thoughtful filter system, producer form, and clear homepage design
        • Created a design system to keep everything consistent and adpts to varying content lengths
        • Strong collaboration with DiasporaDNA kept the cultural mission central

        What we could do better

        • Iterate more quickly and collect more student feedback
        • Think about the mobile version
        • Provide examples on other simulation types



        ©Iris Sun 2025