James Knight

The prototype successfully secured VC funding, and the product has since progressed to a live testing phase in selected schools.

Role | Visual Design & UI Consultant — concept to MVP
Project | UI/UX Design, Early-Stage Product
Skills | Early-stage product design, Visual design systems, Stakeholder collaboration, Design thinking, Cross-audience UX

OurFutureAI.world is an ed-tech startup with a mission to equip children aged 8–12 with AI fluency skills before bad habits take hold. I joined the project at its earliest stage — before any engineering had begun — working directly with the founder to translate a compelling vision into a tangible, investor-ready product.

My brief was clear and time-pressured: create a prototype that could secure VC funding and demonstrate the app’s potential to both investors and prospective school partners. Working from the founder’s detailed pitch framework, I developed the complete visual identity and interaction design from scratch — establishing the colour palette, typographic hierarchy, spacing system, iconography, and overall look and feel that would define the product. Every design decision was made with two audiences in mind: children who needed something playful and intuitive, and adult stakeholders who needed to see a credible, scalable product.

The app’s UX is built around the STAR method (Stop, Target, Analyse, Reflect) — a core framework that teaches children to pause and think critically before trusting AI output. Translating this pedagogical model into clear, engaging user flows required close collaboration across multiple rounds of feedback and iteration, balancing the founder’s educational vision with strong design thinking.