The Project That Humbled My Design Confidence

The call came from Tharindu [AKA Gappiya] about designing an app for "one of the oldest businesses in history" - lending. I thought I knew what that meant.

I was completely wrong.

The Complexity That Humbled Me

My first few days on the Brolly project were brutal. Here I was, confident in my design abilities, completely lost in a maze of financial terminology and business logic I'd never encountered.

Wallets within wallets. Borrowing limits that shifted based on behavior. A 30-day grace period system that somehow needed to feel motivating rather than threatening.

I spent those initial days nodding along in calls, frantically Googling terms afterward, and feeling like I was designing for a world I didn't understand.

Then Tharindu did something that changed everything - he simplified. Not the business model, but his explanation of it. Suddenly, the complexity wasn't overwhelming; it was a puzzle I could actually solve.

The Onboarding Breakthrough

Once I grasped the fundamentals, the onboarding design flowed in 1-2 days. But that speed wasn't about my design skills - it was about finally understanding what users needed to feel confident in this unfamiliar financial landscape.

The real challenge was waiting: the wallet system.

When Gamification Became the Answer

The wallet concept initially felt like a UI nightmare. How do you make 100-1800 individual loan wallets feel manageable rather than overwhelming?

But the deeper I dug into human psychology - particularly in Sri Lankan financial culture - the clearer it became that avoiding fees wasn't enough motivation. People needed positive reinforcement, not just penalty avoidance.

That's when gamification stopped being a trendy buzzword and became the solution.

Points for early repayment. Unlockable borrowing tiers. Achievement-based progression. Suddenly, managing debt could feel like personal growth rather than financial burden.

The Collaboration That Taught Me Scale

Four weeks in, I realized something important: great design isn't a solo journey. Bringing Bavan onto the project wasn't admitting defeat - it was acknowledging that ambitious timelines require collaborative thinking.

Together, we transformed the interface into something that balanced serious financial responsibility with engaging user motivation. The UI became semi-gamified - playful enough to encourage positive behavior, serious enough to handle people's money.

The Moment Everything Clicked

Twelve weeks later, something remarkable happened. The Figma prototype we presented didn't just demonstrate our design thinking - it secured AUD $500k in funding for Brolly.

That presentation wasn't about showing off polished screens. It was about proving that we understood both the business opportunity and human psychology well enough to create something truly valuable.

What I Learned About Designing for Trust

We'd completed the full MVP design within that ambitious 12-week timeline, creating a market-ready product for successful launch. But the real outcome wasn't the screens we created - it was understanding how design can reshape centuries-old business models.

Lending has existed for millennia, but never quite like this. We weren't just designing an app; we were reimagining how people relate to borrowing money.

The points system, the progressive unlocking, the visual feedback loops - these weren't just gamification features. They were trust-building mechanisms that helped users feel empowered rather than indebted.

The Shift That Matters

This project taught me that great design happens when you stop thinking about what you're building and start understanding why people need it built.

I didn't design a lending app. I designed confidence for people navigating financial uncertainty.

That's the difference between designing screens and solving problems.

And sometimes, when you solve the right problems in the right way, the world responds with half a million dollars of validation.