Case study: Nordstrom mobile web redesign

Overview

Nordstrom engaged Ubermind to design the next generation of their mobile commerce experience. Their existing mobile site was built for low-bandwidth environments and older devices, while a new experience was needed for rapidly growing iPhone and Android traffic. The goal was to create a more premium, high-performance shopping experience for higher-value customers while maintaining support for legacy users.

The opportunity: premium mobile experience at scale

Nordstrom was experiencing a surge in traffic from modern mobile devices and needed to evolve beyond a constrained, low-fidelity mobile web experience.

  • Dual-system challenge: Maintain a legacy low-bandwidth site while launching a premium mobile experience

  • Rapid mobile growth: iPhone and Android traffic was accelerating quickly

  • Brand expectation: Translate Nordstrom’s high-end retail experience into mobile

  • Functional parity goal: Preserve rich desktop merchandising and filtering on mobile

The opportunity was to define what a premium mobile fashion commerce experience could be under tight technical constraints.

The process: fast execution under technical constraints

We had an 8-week timeline to design and deliver the front-end experience ahead of Nordstrom’s major seasonal sale.

Work was split across parallel efforts:

  • One designer focused on translating desktop homepage merchandising modules

  • I led the design of mobile filtering and product discovery experiences

A key challenge was preserving Nordstrom’s highly detailed filtering system while working within mobile performance constraints.

  • Desktop filters included extensive attributes such as color, size, fabric, and more

  • Heavy JavaScript solutions were ruled out due to performance and bandwidth limitations

  • We explored multiple interaction models to balance depth with usability

Key decision

We ultimately designed a full-page filter experience optimized for clarity, performance, and mobile usability, allowing users to access the full richness of Nordstrom’s catalog without compromising speed or reliability.

I also partnered closely with engineering to build HTML5 templates that integrated cleanly with Nordstrom’s existing backend systems, ensuring the new experience could scale within their infrastructure.

Results & impact

While formal metrics were not shared due to the agency model, the redesign was strongly received within the industry.

  • Delivered full desktop-level filtering functionality on mobile, uncommon at the time

  • Created a performant, mobile-optimized experience aligned with premium brand expectations

  • Established a pattern for mobile commerce filtering used as a reference by other fashion retailers

  • Strengthened Nordstrom’s position in high-end mobile retail experiences during a period of rapid device-driven growth