Sotheby's Metaverse

Sotheby’s Metaverse is a branded NFT marketplace (primary and secondary) built and powered by Mojito. Sotheby's works closely with unique artists to promote and sell their digital artworks exclusively through their marketplace.

My Role

RESPONSIBILITIES

User Experience Design
Systems Design
Visual Design
Product Design

COLLABORATORS

Raakhee Miller / CEO
Aimee Regur / UX Design
Alec Pomnichowski / Product
Baskar Natarajan / Engineering
Vivek Tamilarasan / Engineering

Sotheby's, one of the largest physical auction houses in the world, asked Mojito to create and power its primary and secondary sales on its own NFT platform called Sotheby's Metaverse. 

Working closely with both Mojito and Sotheby stakeholders, our Product, Design, and Engineering team brought Sotheby's vision to life. Since the launch of its primary marketplace, our work with Sotheby's has continued to lead industry standards of web3 marketplaces.

The Process

Our design process for building an innovative web3 NFT marketplace required careful planning, research, and testing to create a user-friendly and secure platform that meets the needs of both buyers and sellers in the NFT ecosystem.

We started by gathering feedback from potential buyers and sellers in the NFT community to understand their needs and expectations. We heard from many people who were frustrated by the complexity of existing marketplaces and the difficulty of understanding web3 transactions.

We focused on creating a marketplace that would be easy to use, secure, and offered Sotheby's the flexibility of managing a wide range of high-quality NFTs for sale. 

To make the buying process as easy as possible, we designed a simple and intuitive interface that allows users to easily browse, search, and filter NFTs by category, artist, price, and more. We also implemented a streamlined checkout process that allows buyers to complete their transactions quickly and easily, without any unnecessary steps or delays.

The Flows

To create an intuitive and easy-to-use interface, we started by mapping out the key user flows that our platform would need to support. This involved identifying the different types of users that would be using our platform (buyers and sellers), as well as the key actions that each user would need to take (e.g. browsing NFTs, making a purchase, uploading a listing, managing sales).

The Build

To ensure consistency and efficiency in our design process, we created a library of reusable design components that could be used throughout our platform. These components included things like buttons, forms, navigation menus, and icons but also included larger items like PDP pages, checkout flows, activity, and bid views.

By designing these components as independent units, we were able to create a consistent look and feel across our platform. This approach also allowed us to build pages more quickly and easily, as we could simply combine and arrange these components to create new layouts and interfaces.

Components for product description page

Improving web3 Experiences

Throughout the design process, we tested our prototypes with real users to gather feedback and identify areas for improvement. We observed how users interacted with our platform, asked them for feedback, and made changes based on their input. This helped us refine our user flows to ensure that every action was clear, intuitive, and easy to complete.

For example, when designing the checkout process, we focused on minimizing the number of steps required to complete a purchase but providing all necessary information and options to the buyer, as well as the user and payment information we captured complied with country and state regulations. 

Overall, by creating a library of reusable design components, we were able to streamline our design process and create a more consistent and efficient user experience for our NFT marketplace. This approach allowed us to focus on the underlying functionality and structure of our platform, rather than getting bogged down in visual details, which ultimately helped us create a platform that is easy to use, enjoyable, and reliable for our users.

The Marketplace

Now that Sotheby's Primary Marketplace is live, we're thrilled to see buyers and sellers using it to buy NFTs with ease and confidence. We've received great feedback from our users, who appreciate the simplicity and security of our platform, as well as the quality and variety of NFTs available for purchase.

The majority of the designs included in this study are from Sotheby's Secondary Marketplace, which is slated to go live in 2023. We anticipate this secondary marketplace to be the first of its kind in the NFT art world!