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Personal experiments and prototypesExperiment & Prototype
Happy Birthday, John — Interactive Wishes & Scrapbook
A custom-designed digital birthday surprise featuring a photo scrapbook lightbox and random wish generator.
My RoleDesigner & Developer
01 / The Problem or Idea
Group birthday messages in chat threads quickly get buried. I wanted to create a lasting, personal digital gift where a friend could scroll through every wish and memory in one place.
02 / Purpose
Design an intimate, joyful web experience celebrating a friend's birthday with photos and messages from everyone who cares about him.
03 / My Exact Role
Designed the layout, curated the wishes and photography scrapbook, and built the interactive lightbox and 'read a random wish' feature.
04 / Key Decisions
- •Kept the copy conversational and warm ('N people left you a wish. keep scrolling. and every single one is for you.').
- •Added an interactive photo modal and a random wish shuffler so revisiting the page always feels fun.
05 / Tools & Stack
Web DesignInteractive ScrapbookLightbox UIVercel
06 / Lessons Learned
Some of the most rewarding things to build on the web aren't commercial products at all—they are small, thoughtful experiences made for the people we care about.