Ash Cornette
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The app skips the question

Redesigned Arc'teryx's favourite modal to turn a dead-end save into activity-specific gear planning.

concept UX research & design Figma Emily Carr University
01: problem

Walk into the Vancouver flagship and a staff member asks what you're doing: alpine day, ski tour, climbing. They build a layering recommendation around the answer. That's the brand experience.

The app skips it. You favourite a product, a modal says "successfully added," and you land in a generic pile. Trail ends.

The favourite modal is the highest-intent moment in the entire app, and the current design wastes it.
5 of 12 core features supported: tied for fewest in the competitive set
0 of 5 competitors offer activity-specific saved kits
02: strategy

The in-store experience layers context: brand → activity → kit → product. The app skips to the middle. A favourite without an activity, without a bag, without a system.

One decision fixed it. Replace the dead-end CTA with three activity-specific ones. View Favourites stays. Add to Trail, Add to Climb, and Add to Ski & Snowboard join it. Same modal. Same heart tap. Different destination.

03: the solution

The modal

Current vs new: the favourite modal gains three activity CTAs: Add to Trail, Add to Climb, Add to Ski & Snowboard: beneath the existing View Favourites, tied to the heart-tap on the product page.
current vs new: the favourite modal, redesigned

Three new CTAs sorted by activity. Tap one and the product joins that gear bag. You've started planning a trip without realising you started.

The gear bag

The Explore tab with a new Gear Bag section added beside Favourites and My Feed, showing Trail and Climb activity bags. Navigation flow: shop, explore, plan.
the gear bag lives in Explore: shop › explore › plan

Each CTA routes into a bag the user can review before a trip. One tap away inside the Explore tab, alongside Favourites and My Feed.

Prototype

tap through it: heart-tap → activity CTA → gear bag

Before / After

beforeafter
One CTA: View FavouritesFour CTAs: favourites + three activities
Generic favourites pileActivity-specific planning bag
Modal closes a loopModal opens one
App opened twice a yearReason to open between purchases
Cross-sell feels like upsellCross-sell reframed as "what's missing"
04: outcomes
05: lessons

Tools work only if the moment is right

The modal already existed. The heart tap already existed. Activity kits were already happening in-store. The gap was between them. Closing it took three CTAs and one new tab.

The assumption is the risk

The whole redesign rests on one observation. If the favourite modal isn't actually the highest-intent moment for most users, the concept loses its grounding. A diary study with 5–8 outdoor enthusiasts would test it directly.

Ship the edge case on Day 1

Trail / Climb / Ski maps to Arc'teryx's marketing categories, but people build mixed kits. The custom bag can't be a stretch goal.

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