Client - None(school project)

Sector - Antique markets

Responsibilities - Research & strategy, service design, information architecture, UX/UI and visual design, business operation design.

Objective - Generate service design concept for the corresponding industry, following the theme "Future of Work" ,

Project duration - 3 months

Project Overview

ALIVE

To disrupt the current ownership system and create sharing economy within the antique market.

Alive is a subscription-based antique trading platform that allows all stakeholders within the antique market to better exchange product,information and the beautiful stories behind each antique. We aim to awaken sleeping antiques and their stories, to revive a virtuous cycle that can transform the market into a sustainable future.

Why Antique?

Uniqueness of the Antique Maket

Heritage

Each antique item has its own story and history

Experience

The process of finding and knowing an antique item can be a part of its value

Interaction

The market provides a natural way for people to communicate and gain knowledge

Research

We visited 7 different antique markets

and interviewed 30+ market traders & customers.

- Portobello Markets

- Camden Passage Market

- Apple Market

- Covent Garden Antiques Market, Jubilee Market

- Sunbury Antiques Market, Kempton Park Market

- Old Spitalfields market

- Adams antique fair

Different London market has its own main purpose, stakeholders, and target groups. We mapped them out according to different characteristics and categorize them into different market and stakeholder personas...

Market Position Matrix

Market Pesonas

Stakeholder Pesonas

Quantitative Findings (online+offline survey)

Main Sources of Trading Antiques

Qualitative Findings

personal connection is one of the important ways to find products that fit traders' taste
The information and knowledge are not transparent but in traders' memory.

"This job is not easy, but this is worth it. I hope there are more people to learn the exciting part of the antiques."

"Some people may just call this "rubbish" because they don't know anything about it..."

"I will go anywhere, anytime, without a fixed time to get things up. "

"I can do the pricing easily using my professional knowledge, but I don't have the effort to remember all the detailed stories."

Problem

After careful research, we manage to map out an ecosystem map of the current antique market and identify some gaps within it......

Eco-system Map

Problem Statement

The connection between each stakeholder and every single process to properly convey the information contained in the antique item and the item itself is very weak and unstable.

This is because all processes just depend on personal relationships, word of mouth, and personal memory without a proper system or sustainable model.

As a result,antique items and information contained in them are easily transformed and lost.

Solution

We would like to reform the Relationships, Roles, Rules of the current antique market.

In order to do so, we have to rethink what the essence and fundamental of the antique is.

The essence of the antique lies not only in the physical material itself but in the story and heritage contained in it.

Accordingly, the fundamental perspective of looking at the antique must be changed as well.

Problem-solving Aproach

Ownership of
Physical Object

Experience of

stories and heritage

of antique

Sharing...

Antique

To form a sustainable structure by returning the Items to the market after being used. Users can experience antiques at affordable prices, and traders can easily keep supplying new items and manage inventory.

To lower the barrier for people who feel burden (Lack of background knowledge and budget) to entry into the antique without burden through the curating the customized items and information.

To provide a platform for adding stories to each antique product, sharing knowledge, archiving information, and building relationships with others.

Information

Experience

Concept & Design

The creative concept for our solution is inspired by the Wunderkammer: which means the ' Cabinet of Curiosity '.

The name of our service concept is “Antique Alive” We aim to awaken sleeping antiques and their stories, to revive a virtuous cycle that can transform the market into a sustainable future. Through this, we believe that we can create a sustainable market and maximize the possibilities of antiques and their markets.

Subscription-based Business Model

Users can enjoy the experience of focusing on the story and heritage itself of the antique in return for paying the subscription fee.

Traders can diversify their business models by registering their collection items in the service and earn steady monthly income without worrying about inventory management, sales or storage.

Selected collectors can receive a certain fee by providing quality information and knowledge to the platform.

Platform Sturcture

The platform can be divided into 3 main sections:

The Cabinet of Curiosity, Community Hall, and the Antique Library.

a virtual space for users' personal antique collections, to showcase their knowledge and taste. Through multi-dimensional narration, the past of the antique becomes more vivid, which makes the process of understanding its story more interesting.

Other users can access this space and check each others' product information and stories.

each antique item has its unique storyline, people who had experienced the product can add stories to it, via visuals, text, and even audio.

a place that enables the communication between all platform users.

Traders and collectors can generate content based on their experiences, by writing articles and creating forums. Normal customers can also participate in these forums and comment on the articles.

Like what we did in an actual library, we borrow/subscribe the antique at a cost, for a certain period and return it back to the Library at the end. Of course, if you really like the object, you have the choice to purchase it at the end of your subscription.