Treat state as content
Trading state cannot be relegated to color or a transient toast. Labels, hierarchy, feedback, and timing have to explain what the system knows, what it is doing, and what remains unresolved.
AtlasCase 03 / 07DeFi market infrastructure
Sorella Labs
Making market infrastructure understandable
Angstrom is a DeFi trading and market-infrastructure product. The design problem was not to make complexity disappear. It was to reveal the right state, constraint, and consequence at the moment a person needed to act.
LeadProduct design
Protocol → productCore translation
Flows + statesCore design work
The problem
Trading products compress protocol rules, market movement, account state, and irreversible action into a small number of moments. When those moments are vague, visual polish cannot manufacture trust.
I partnered with founders and engineering to translate protocol and implementation constraints into product flows, information architecture, interface states, and specifications the team could build against.
Comprehension before commitment.
How it fits together
See the consequence before you commit.
Explore the system
Make the action and its object unmistakable.
See it in the workPools and swapSurface the system rules that can change the result.
See it in the workThe deposit caveatShow expected execution, state change, and uncertainty.
See it in the workThe vault decision surfaceClose the loop with a durable, intelligible record.
See it in the workThe swap receipt
Key decisions
The choices that shaped the work.
Make confirmation part of the product
A signature request is not the end of the experience. Confirmation needs to reconnect intent, execution, and resulting position so the user can verify what changed.
Prototype against engineering reality
I used working prototypes and code-aware tools to test interaction behavior against engineering constraints, then shared decisions in a form the team could inspect.
The work
01 / 07Vault detail. Yield, TVL, target pool, and your position sit above the fold; the deposit panel states its settlement caveat before you commit.
The work
02 / 07Pools and swap. Protocol TVL, volume, and fees lead the pool index; on the phone, the swap keeps sell, buy, and the full receipt in one column.
The work
03 / 07Vaults. Managed strategies compared by TVL, curator, target pool, and APY, on desktop and in the phone's single column.
The work
04 / 07Selected public material from the Angstrom engagement. The identity documents part of the system; it does not stand in for the product work.
The work
05 / 07A restrained base palette gives functional feedback colors enough contrast to carry meaning.
The work
06 / 07Display, system, and technical voices are separated so interface information can remain clear under density.
The work
07 / 07The expressive layer is deliberately distinct from the product’s functional layer.
What this case shows
What the public work can show
The public material does not include adoption, conversion, or revenue data. What it can show is the design work: protocol and engineering constraints turned into clearer flows, detailed states, and specifications.
What the work delivered
- 01
Clarified product decisions around order flows, trading states, confirmations, and confidence in high-consequence actions.
- 02
Connected protocol behavior, product language, and the interface.
- 03
Used code and AI tools to prototype, test, and communicate interaction behavior.
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