Minsun Lee

ON: Where Emotions Bloom is an emotion-visualisation app designed to support young adults in gently reflecting on their emotional wellbeing.

My project explored how interaction design and visual metaphor can create safer, more expressive spaces for emotional care, especially for those who find it hard to articulate their feelings. I focused on non-clinical tools that could help users reflect on emotions privately, without pressure to “fix” or label them.

The idea came from my own experiences growing up in a culture where emotional suppression was common to protect myself from being seen “weak”. I wanted to create a space that felt gentle, visual, and emotionally safe. My final design, ON (meaning “warmth (溫)” and “calmness / stability (穩)” in Korean with Chinese characters), is an app where users talk with an AI companion rather than “logging” their mood, and their emotions are transformed into “Emotion Stones” that can be saved or/and anonymously planted in “Shared Gardens” to share other users.

Key features include voice/text journaling with AI companion, AI-generated summaries, emotion visualisation (Emotion Stones), community interaction (Shared Gardens), and personalised micro-actions (Self-Care Suggestions). I used Figma, AI tools (mainly ChatGPT), and human-centred methods including interviews and user testing.

This project offers a more poetic and private way to support emotional wellbeing – where emotions don’t need to be named to be seen.