A refuge for the one who takes care of everyone else.
Refúgio is a mental health mobile app designed for solo caregivers, people caring for an aging or ill parent alone, without family support. Built as a portfolio project grounded in real clinical research and firsthand accounts. The focus was on emotional design, a color system tied to feeling states, and copy that never reinforces the hero narrative.
The caregiver is invisible. And she's exhausted.
1 in 3 caregivers develops depression. Existing mental health apps offer meditation, nothing built for someone grieving a parent who's still alive. Caregiver tools focus on the patient, not the person caring for them. The result is a user who keeps showing up for everyone else, with nowhere to rest.
A place to breathe. Finally.
Four pillars, each addressing one layer of the caregiver's experience. A daily check-in with one contextual question. A guided journal organized by emotion, not blank pages. An anonymous community feed where the only interaction is acknowledgment. A personal space to remember who she is beyond the role.
Research first. Design second.
Researched Reddit communities, clinical studies across 23 countries with 5,034 caregivers, and firsthand accounts. Defined three core problems before opening Figma: invisibility, isolation, and unprocessed guilt. Every design decision, color, copy, and interaction, was filtered against one question: does this reinforce the hero narrative?
Academic project. No live metrics.
Emotional design is not about making things look soft. It is about earning trust in a context where trust is already depleted. The hardest decisions were about restraint: no streaks, no celebration copy, no unnecessary data collection. My role: user research, problem definition, visual identity, emotional design system, UI design across five screens, and copywriting.
