Web application / 2026
Tide atlas
A small atlas for paying attention to a changing coast.
The question
The project began with a notebook, not a map. A fictional coastal field station had observations from volunteers, each recorded with a place, a date and a short description. The original question was how to make those notes readable without giving every sentence the visual authority of a scientific measurement. I built a prototype that places the observation before the coordinates. A reader can move through a quiet chronological list and open the associated place only when that extra context matters.
The decision
The first version filled the screen with a map. It looked like a finished product and made the text feel incidental. In the second version I inverted the hierarchy: a simple reading surface occupies the main column, while the map is a supporting view. This changed the development work as well. Keyboard movement, stable headings and links that survive refresh became more important than smooth camera transitions. The design records uncertainty in ordinary language beside the note, rather than hiding it inside a tooltip.
The implementation
Each observation has a permanent identifier and a plain-text summary. Filtering uses the same collection as the visible results; the number shown is a count, not a decorative metric. A location can be absent. A date can describe a range. These decisions were modeled before the interface because they affect almost every rendering state. The browser prototype uses native URL parameters for shareable views and maintains the original document order for screen readers.
What changed
I discarded an animated shoreline reveal. It was attractive in a recording but delayed the exact thing a returning reader wanted to see. The final interaction is smaller: a selected observation gains a clear focus outline, its associated place is brought into view, and the browser back button returns to the same list. This case is a fictional self-directed study, not a deployed monitoring service. The useful result is a more careful account of what the interface knows and what it does not.