Headless store,built solo.
A freelance build for a brand that needed a storefront matching its own identity rather than a themed template. I built a fully custom front end on Shopify's GraphQL API, with real product data and motion-led browsing, and ran the project end to end myself.
01 — The problem
The brand's identity was too specific for an off-the-shelf theme, but the business still needed everything Shopify gives you for free: inventory, checkout, payments and orders that non-technical staff can manage.
As a solo freelance build, it also had to be maintainable by one person and handable to the client without a developer on retainer.
The real constraint
A storefront earns its keep or it doesn't. Every design flourish had to survive the question: does this help someone buy?
02 — My role
Everything: scoping, design decisions, build, launch and client communication. A solo engagement from first conversation to live site.
Scoping and client communication
Custom front end on the Shopify Storefront API
Product, collection and cart interfaces
Performance, motion and responsive behaviour
Decisions & trade-offs
03 — what I chose, what I gave up01
Headless, not a theme
The front end is custom and talks to Shopify over GraphQL, so the brand controls every pixel while the client keeps the Shopify admin they already know for products, orders and payments.
02
Motion that serves browsing
Transitions and reveals are used to make browsing feel considered, but they're tied to real interactions rather than decorating idle screens, and they never delay a product image or a price.
03
Handover as a design goal
Because the client has no in-house developer, content that changes often, meaning products, imagery, copy and collections, stays in Shopify, and only structural change needs code.
04 — How it’s built
- Front end
- Next.js · TypeScript · Framer Motion
- Commerce
- Shopify Storefront GraphQL API
- Content
- Products and collections managed in Shopify
- Delivery
- Solo build, scoping to launch
- Quality
- Responsive, performance-budgeted, accessible
05 — Working solo
No design partner, no reviewer, no product manager. The interesting part of this project was the process, not just the code.
- Client comms
- Translating brand instinct into scope, and saying no to what wouldn't help sales.
- Own reviewer
- Reviewing my own work honestly, with checklists standing in for a second pair of eyes.
- Scope control
- Shipping a strong core rather than a half-finished wishlist.
- After launch
- Ongoing support and changes, as the site is still evolving with the brand.
06 — What I’d do next
A design pass, before anything else. I made the design decisions on this one myself, and I am a developer who has never taken a design course, so the site works but it is not as strong as it could be. Mobile in particular needs rethinking rather than adjusting.
I'd also add basic analytics instrumentation on the browse-to-cart path, so design changes can be argued from data rather than taste.