spectacle: new Music Service
Role: Pop-up experience design, service blueprint, user research.
Team: Visual Designer, Researcher, UX Lead
Timeline: 9 weeks
Recognition: Selected as the Service Design method example in Universal Methods of Design: Expanded and Revised (2019)
Most people who've never been to an opera actually enjoy it when they go. The problem isn't the experience — it's everything around it. The unfamiliarity. The effort. The feeling that it's not for them.
Spectacle is a service that curates personalized package experiences centered around a cultural music event, paired with dining and entertainment.
design PROCESS
We started broad — exploring how music shows up in people's lives across five territories: patterns, culture, access, inclusivity, and environments.
What kept pulling us back was the overlap between culture and patterns. Music as a way to explore cultures you don't know yet, or reconnect with ones you've drifted from. That became our focus.
Brainstorm after exploratory research
Defining the Problem
speed dating
Through our research, we found attendance at classical, jazz, dance, and opera performances had been steadily declining. The cultural arts need fresh audiences to thrive. We asked ourselves: How might a music service increase engagement with music genres that are struggling or falling out of fashion?
The more interesting finding came from our surveys: most people who had actually been to an opera enjoyed it. Many people are reluctant to attend due to false preconceptions about what they will experience or hesitation to invest time, money, and effort into something unfamiliar. The barrier wasn't the experience. It was getting people through the door.
We presented three service scenarios through speed dating sessions — gathering rapid feedback on what resonated. The touchpoints that excited people most became the building blocks of Spectacle.
interviews
We spoke with music instructors, Pittsburgh Festival Opera staff, and marketing directors to understand the supply side of the problem.
The key pivot: opera only runs a few seasons per year. So we expanded our scope to include all institutions of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust — symphony, ballet, and concert series — giving Spectacle a much richer canvas to work with.
Before Spectacle
service blueprint
I contributed to the service blueprint — mapping actors, touchpoints, and backstage processes across the full customer journey from awareness to return.
With Spectacle
Final Service Blueprint
value flow map
I mapped the value flow independently — tracing how money, data, and experience circulate between users, Spectacle, art organizations, partners, venues, and performers.
User test web app
We tested our service web app wireframes with target users — focusing on three questions: how comfortable people are sharing personal information, what we actually need to build a custom package, and how much of the experience should be revealed upfront versus kept as a surprise.
The user tests revealed two types of users: those who want full control over their evening and those who prefer a fully packaged VIP experience. Users appreciated minimizing the onboarding process and showed interest in event types like bars, ice cream places, coffee shops, museums, and parks. They suggested including illustrated people, generating different combinations, displaying reviews, and offering physical invitations, such as a boarding pass. The boarding pass idea came directly from users — and became one of Spectacle's most distinctive touchpoints.
physical Pop up design principle
Moodboard for Spectacle pop up experience
I designed the physical pop-up shop experience. Below are the design prinicples:
How users feel going in:
False preconceptions about what they'll experience
Desire to try something new
Uncertainty about the value of a packaged experience
What the space needs to do:
Open, welcoming space — whimsical and playful with bright colors
Clear service overview — dining, performance, entertainment
Lightweight and easy to transport
How that becomes physical:
Variety of choices — look, categorize, explore
Mystery — open, close, reveal
Autonomy — own, hold, take
Final RESULT
the pop-up
Spectacle is an end-to-end service that curates personalized experiences centered around a cultural music event, paired with dining and entertainment. It aims to revitalize interest in these music genres and provide a memorable, holistic experience for users. Each main touchpoint addresses the key problems identified in our research.
Tap to Reveal — the Mystery principle translated into physical interaction
THE WEB APP
The pop-up brings Spectacle into the physical world — giving potential audiences a taste of what we offer and a seamless path to onboarding through the web app.
THE INVITATION
Physical invitation serves as a passport to their experience
Concept Video
REFLECTION
Learned:
Collaboration across disciplines — working with a Visual Designer, Researcher, and UX Lead taught me how to navigate shared ownership across a complex service.
Sitting with ambiguity is part of the process — not every decision has a clear answer, especially when designing something that doesn't exist yet.
What I’d do differently:
User test the transitions between the four main touchpoints to understand where the experience felt seamless and where it broke down.
Explore more ways to onboard new audiences who have never engaged with classical or opera before.
Thinking forward:
Partnerships — How can we make it easier for new arts organizations across Pittsburgh to partner with Spectacle?
Data — Spectacle sits between new audiences and arts organizations. How might we use that to give arts orgs real intelligence about what actually brings new people in?
User Test Pop Up — How might we validate whether the pop-up felt the way we intended? Did the mystery land, and is there untapped business opportunity in the physical space itself?