The Big Screen Experience

A portfolio of brands that didn’t speak the same language

A+E’s networks each arrived on connected TV with their own visual language, navigation model, and content structure. For viewers the result was friction: every app felt like learning the remote again. For the business it meant duplicated design and engineering effort, with no shared foundation to ship on.

Three decisions that shaped the system

Each was a real decision point — and some cost something. Naming the tradeoff, where there is one, is the point: it's the difference between a gallery and a case study.

Bringing Brands to Life

I elevated the interface by prioritizing high-impact key art and integrated title logos. Bold typography and a conversational voice replaced generic channel-guide styling with something closer to a curated screening — see the before/after above.

Tradeoff → A single themed shell meant brand teams gave up some bespoke layouts. I held the line on a shared grid — consistency on a remote matters more than per-brand novelty.

A Conversational Interface

To drive engagement, I developed templates that balance entertainment with functionality. This design language is built to guide users through the catalog, making the act of discovery as delightful as the content itself.

Strategic Metadata & Discovery

I restructured the metadata display to prioritize scan-readability and clear Calls to Action (CTAs). By optimizing the information hierarchy, I created a discovery-first environment that helps viewers find their next favorite show with ease.

Tradeoff → This structure assumes a browsable catalog, not an infinite one — A+E's brands don't have Netflix-scale libraries, so I optimized for scan-and-decide, not endless algorithmic discovery. That's a bet that wouldn't hold if the content library grew by an order of magnitude.

What shipped, and what it moved

Reduced time-to-play from 5 steps (up to 7 in complex flows) to 1–3 steps, including single-step playback in the best case.

Shipped across 3 major television platforms — Roku, Fire TV, and Apple TV.

Eliminated legacy design debt: resolved layout inefficiencies and interface friction to stabilize performance, reducing application crashes on older Roku devices.