At Station A, we’re committed to creating tools that empower users to decarbonize commercial buildings with clarity and ease. Our redesigned portfolios product reflects this mission by combining thoughtful design principles with user-centric functionality. Read on for a deep dive into the four main principles that guided our development process.
🛠️ Build Tools That Mirror Familiar Interfaces (Excel), But Better
We understand that many users are accustomed to tools like Excel for managing data. To bridge familiarity with innovation.
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The Table view offers a clean grid layout reminiscent of spreadsheets but enhanced with features like filtering, sorting, and dynamic labels.
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The Kanban view provides intuitive column-based organization for tracking project statuses—a format widely used in tools like Trello or Jira.
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For other views, such as the Map and Gallery views, we can learn from our other favorite consumer products and how they achieved intuitive experiences.
By combining familiarity with advanced functionality, we’ve created an interface that feels approachable yet powerful.
🚀 Challenge the Status Quo
The Kanban view visually organizes your location pipeline and helps you track progress.
Software and creative UIs enable capabilities that go beyond traditional spreadsheet-based workflows, allowing for speed, scale, and interactive visualizations that transform how users evaluate portfolios.
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Interactive maps provide spatial context to understand a location's data. For example, the Markets tab in the Location Page allows you to visualize geographically correlated market data.
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The Gallery view allows users to identify and refine geographic-based input data at a moment's glance.
- The Kanban view allows users to move locations and track their progress through a portfolio and into the Station A Marketplace.
By embracing the strengths of software, we empower users to analyze, compare, and act on portfolio data in ways that static tools simply can’t match.
💻 Structure Data Based on a Visual Hierarchy
Visual hierarchy is essential for organizing information in a way that guides users intuitively. In our portfolios product, we used size, color, and alignment to emphasize key metrics like the total number of locations, annual electricity bills, and rooftop solar potential at the top of the interface. This ensures users immediately see the most critical data upon opening a portfolio.
For example:
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Larger headers and bold colors highlight summary metrics.
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Subtle contrasts and spacing separate actionable data from contextual details.
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Consistent alignment ensures users can scan information effortlessly across different views (Table, Map, Kanban, Gallery).
This approach aligns with best practices in visual hierarchy design, ensuring users can quickly focus on what matters most.
📊 Lead With Simple Metrics
The Markets tab in the Location page allows you to gradually dive deeper into a location's context.
We designed the interface to prioritize simplicity upfront while enabling deeper exploration as needed. For instance:
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The top-level portfolio view displays high-level metrics such as annual electricity bills and solar potential.
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Users can drill down into specific locations for detailed insights like system size, upfront costs, and payback periods (as seen in the redesigned offers tab).
This layered approach mirrors the inverted pyramid structure often used in dashboards—key performance indicators (KPIs) are presented first, followed by trends and detailed data. This ensures users aren’t overwhelmed initially but have access to granular details when required.
🌈 Make It Feel Like A Discovery
The Map view makes exploring your portfolio's footprint fun and intuitive.
Exploration is an integral part of our product philosophy. We designed the portfolios product to make data navigation feel engaging:
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The Map view integrates an ever-present summary card alongside location pins, encouraging users to visually explore their portfolio across geographies.
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The Gallery view showcases rooftop outlines for each building, helping users identify optimal solar installation areas while adding a sense of discovery.
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Labels and Statuses (e.g., “Onboarding,” “Qualified”) provide dynamic feedback that keeps users informed while interacting with their portfolio.
This playful yet functional design encourages curiosity while maintaining focus on actionable insights.
The Gallery view provides a unique, at-a-glance look at your portfolio's buildings.
🔑 In Conclusion
The redesigned Station A portfolios product is a testament to how thoughtful design can transform complex data into an intuitive user experience. By structuring information hierarchically, simplifying metrics presentation, leveraging familiar tools, and fostering exploration, we’ve created a platform that empowers users to make informed decisions about building decarbonization.
We hope this redesign inspires others in the clean energy industry to rethink how they present data—making it not only accessible but enjoyable to engage with.
