Case Study: Optimizing one’s experience in the bathroom

10 min readAug 27, 2022

This Design Thinking project aims to comprehend the gaps in the user’s experience and develop appropriate solutions.

This is something, I created as a part of the growthschool curriculum, under the guidance of Anudeep Ayyagari. This case study basically explains the method I used to attempt to address a problem that existed in a “Bathroom”

During the first week of the course, we were introduced to our first project. The parking lot, the terrace, the living room, the home office, the dining room, the kitchen, the bedroom, the bathroom, the storage areas, and the utility area were all given as problem areas to our eight-person teams. Each group member had to select a different problem area, so we had to make sure that no two people shared the same issue. So I chose “bathroom” at random for my area and decided to proceed without giving it any thought.

The project’s importance lies in its use of the Design Thinking methodology, which would provide a distinctive problem-solving strategy.

Problem area chosen- Bathroom
Number of users interviewed- 5
Duration- 3 weeks
Tools- Pencil, Paper, and Figma

Design Thinking: What is it?

Design thinking is a process for solving problems by prioritizing the consumer’s needs above all else. It relies on observing, with empathy, how people interact with their environments and employs an iterative, hands-on approach to creating innovative solutions.

Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test are the steps to begin the design process. There were key rules to keep in mind while working on the process: It was important for me to understand that I am NOT the user and that I must keep my personal experiences separate from the insights I receive from my users.

Empathize

At this stage, the designer must understand the user. The designer must understand the user’s basic behaviour and the reason for that behaviour; the designer must understand the user’s perspective as much as possible.

The first step at this stage was to prepare questions to collect information from the users. After preparing the questions, I invited the users to participate in a user interview with me at any time convenient. During the interview phase, I tried to make my users feel at ease and free to answer my questions without bias.

So, I prepared a list of questions before the meeting and followed our mentor’s guidance by not mentioning my own solutions to their problems while speaking with them.

Here are the questions:

Brief about yourself (user).
Define your bathroom. (Attached or Separate/ Walls/ Door/ Floor/ Structure/ Spacious/ Area around it)
The thing that bothers you the most in your bathroom?
When was the last time you used some other bathroom and had a good experience? And how is it different from what you experience using your own bathroom?
Do you have any storage space there?
What things do you have in your bathroom?
Where do you keep your products like soap, shampoo stuff and also the clothes you carry with you?
Tell me about the door and the ventilation.
How many family members use that bathroom?
What’s the condition of the bathroom usually when you enter to take a shower at your usual time?
One thing that you would change about your bathroom.
What's that one thing that you like about your bathroom?

I interviewed five users in order to gain insights by understanding them. The user’s response is summarised below:

Define

It’s time to accumulate the information gathered during the Empathize stage. Here we analyze our observations and synthesize them to define our identified core problems.

So during this defining stage, I took notes on the insights gathered during the user interview, and using these insights, I attempted to think from the user’s perspective and frame problems.

Along with the problems, it is important to understand why the problem is a problem for the user. The problems are as follows:

Lack of storage space (for utility items): It is very common for users to have a small bathroom area, so they do not have that dedicated separate space to keep the utility items. Some keep it on the racks, some in the small compartment area beneath the basin, and some right on the basin. Unorganized drawers make it difficult to find things when one is already late, resulting in the user arriving at her destination extremely late.
Lack of space to hang/keep clothes: Some users were only able to carry a few pieces of clothing with them because they only had hooks to hang their clothes on, and a few of those hooks were already occupied with the clothes of the person who showered before the user. When you step back into your room after taking a bath, it becomes dirty, and if you want to try on different clothes- you have to go back and forth to find and take the clothes, try; making the room untidy.
Lack of proper ventilation: Some users reported that it becomes suffocating when the temperature rises, and that rain makes their bathroom humid. Showering, flushing the toilet, and washing hands creates a discomfort experience for the user.
No proper drainage: Users are uncomfortable after taking a bath because their hair gets stuck on the covered drainage area. This occurs more frequently when they share the bathroom with other family members. They find it very unhygenic and feel that it may increase germs there.
Fear of slipping: Some users, even after having rough textured flooring, are afraid of slipping and falling in the bathroom after taking a shower because it is difficult to wipe the rough textured floor with a wiper. The user’s family members who are 65 or older have the highest injury rate, that’s why they are worried.
Choking of pipeline: Water does not flow properly through the taps and shower because the pipeline in their apartment is shared by all the floors in the building and frequently becomes clogged with dirt and waste. As a result, water flows improperly and more time is spent filling buckets.
Uncovered pipes: The bathroom appears unfinished and unpleasant to some users. Insect, lizard, and bacteria breeding grounds

Ideate

The third stage is ideation, it is the process where you generate ideas and come up with solutions.

Now is the time to consider all possible solutions to the problems our users encountered. The following are some ideas that came to me:

Curtain layer with pockets that would hang on the hooks at the bathroom door and items could be stored in it.
The storage area at the basin’s bottom with a sliding panel to cover it.
Drainage stickers with gaps/ holes on them that can be applied, peeled and discarded after use.
Doors with built-in vents for airflow.
Broom viper: a viper with many bristles that wipes away water through rough flooring.

These are the top three ideas that I finalized among all the others to go forward with.

Curtain-like layer/sheet with pockets that would hang on the hooks at the bathroom door and items could be stored in it.

The reason I chose this idea: During the user interview, I discovered that it is very common for users to have hooks at the back of their bathroom doors. When hanging the curtain layer to the hooks, you can make use of the multiple pockets as well as the hooks themselves.

2. The storage area at the basin’s bottom with a sliding panel to cover it.

The reason I chose this idea: Another common issue to address. This could provide them with more storage space for the users’ items.

3. Drainage stickers with gaps/ holes on them that can be applied, peeled and discarded after use.

The reason I chose this idea: Another common problem encountered by users is hair becoming entangled and stuck in the drainage, particularly when sharing a bathroom with other members of their family.

Idea 1 was developed further for the prototyping and testing stages.

Prototype

In the prototyping phase, we are ready to design an early version of the solution to our problem.

Problem Statement: As users usually have a small bathroom area, so they do not have that dedicated separate space to keep the utility items. Some keep it on the racks, others in the small compartment beneath the basin, and still others directly on the basin. So find a way to assist users in optimising space; managing and organising their items efficiently. Also, keep in mind to avoid unorganised drawers that make it difficult for the user to find things when he or she is already late, resulting in the user arriving at her destination extremely late.

Idea 1 focuses on finding a solution to the problem of a lack of space and better organisation of items.

So I decided to create a curtain-like layer/sheet of laminated plastic with numerous pockets for the user to store their items. And this entire layer/sheet could be hung on the door’s hooks, which are located at the back of the door. Idea is to keep this whole curtain-like layer/sheet of laminated plastic as a multipurpose storage unit.

Here is a sketch of my prototype:

This idea provides a solution to maximize limited space.
No extra efforts are needed to apply or set up.
Could be used and hung behind any kind of door.
Made up of transparent plastic material through which users can easily have a look at the items.
Flaps on pockets keep items dry and safe from water.
Hooks at the back still could be used to hang the clothes.

Testing

The prototype will be tested by users at this stage, and the product will be modified if necessary based on the feedback provided by the users.

I asked my team members, especially my users, to join the group call. Then I presented my solution to my team members, who provided me with extremely helpful feedback. The responses were as follows:

What if there are the hooks that are already there in the bathroom don't match the distance between the holes of the curtain layer/sheet? Then, how would you hang it?
What would be the length of the curtain layer/sheet; what if the door is just the same size or shorter; or if the hooks are not installed at a proper height?
One of the users had a double door for the bathroom, so what in that case?
What if water gets collected in the pockets?
What if I need to place it from bathroom 1 to bathroom 2, do I need to carry it with all the bottles and items? If yes then, what if it gets heavier?
What if there are no hooks in the bathroom?

Revised Prototype

I understood some of the key points that I needed to incorporate into my design after receiving feedback.

Dividing the whole curtain into parts; now they come up in unit divisions and you keep attaching them together to form a chain.

Now keep attaching the unit compartments together as per you need and space available at the back of the door. And yes it's easy to carry now. Plus say you just have a couple of items with you, then you just need one unit of the curtain layer to hang and if you want to introduce more items, attach the other part of it.

Removing the holes from the top of the curtain layer and replacing them with a single cavity space.

Now users don’t have to worry about the distance of the hooks and the holes. The single cavity is provided just to solve that and fits to almost any kind of hooks that are there.

Holes were added at the bottom of the pockets.

Now if there's any water collected in the pockets it would be allowed to pass from the holes.

Individual pieces of the curtain units could also be used in separate bathrooms.

Form a chain of 2 in one bathroom and the other 2 in another bathroom.

If gets introduced to the market: one whole pack would consist of 4 compartment units, that could be attached to form a chain.

My Learnings from the project

Dig deeper: When interviewing users, always ask “Why?” for any statement, likes, dislikes, or habits revealed by the user.

How to get many ideas: Your ideation is more dependent on what we do when we’re not doing the ideation, i.e. we should focus on the time when we’re just sitting and doing other things. Focus on keep filling our head with relevant and irrelevant information about products around us at all times: just read things, observe things, observe how other apps are doing, what other people are doing, how the world is changing, and this way subconsciously we train our mind to ideate well.

Stick to analysing the problem, not solutions: The interviewer should never give the user a solution right away because this causes the user to give biased answers.

Thank you for your time! Please let me know in the comments if you enjoyed this article! All feedback is greatly appreciated.