Lightning Labs

Giving the Lightning Network an interface

Lightning Labs builds infrastructure for the Lightning Network, a protocol for moving Bitcoin through payment channels. When I joined, most of the work happened in the command line and the products were built mainly for other engineers.

My job was to design the layer people would actually use.

The hard part was choosing what to explain

Channels, routing, liquidity, and nodes are unfamiliar concepts for most people. Hiding all of that would make the product feel unpredictable. Showing all of it would make the product unusable.

The design work was about finding the right boundary: what the interface should explain, what it could handle quietly, and when an operator needed to make the call.

What I worked on

• iOS Lightning Wallet: Designed an early mobile wallet for the Lightning Network when there were few established patterns to borrow from.
• Lightning Terminal: Turned command-line workflows for channel liquidity into a desktop interface for node operators.
• Brand system: Evolved the visual identity as Lightning Labs grew from a protocol team into a product company.
• Website: Redesigned the company site around the updated brand and product story.

This was foundational product work. We were not polishing a familiar category. We were deciding how a new technical system should present itself to the people trying to use it.