From Observation to Creation

I loved Voice Memos for its simplicity — one red button, press and record. But simplicity only works until your library grows.
Once you have hundreds of recordings, it stops feeling like a notebook and starts feeling like a box of unlabeled cassette tapes. You know your memories are in there somewhere, but you can’t find them when you need them most.

That was my problem. I wanted to quickly find the voice of a family member who’s no longer here, or an idea I captured in the middle of the night. Sometimes I even record short messages to my future self. But when everything looks the same, those recordings lose their meaning.

It’s hard to find any memories when they’re all labeled New Recording 1898 — or whatever random number comes next.

Designing for Rediscovery

After years of frustration, I decided to design an app that could make sense of this chaos.
Every part of Sound Library is built around a simple principle: help people find meaning in their recordings again.

Instead of one endless list, Sound Library introduces Collections, a structure inspired by how Apple Photos once let you navigate your visual history effortlessly.
Here’s how it works:

• Recents – shows your most recently played or recorded audio, so you can easily return to what’s fresh in your memory.
  
  

• My Albums – lets you manually group related recordings, creating personal archives.
  
  

• Sounds – automatically categorizes audio by type (music, voice, ambient, ideas), making exploration more intuitive.
  
  

• All Recordings – presents every file chronologically, organized by year, month, and day, turning your library into an actual audio timeline.
  
  

• Trash – because editing your past is part of rediscovering it.
  
  

This layout helped me — and hopefully others — transform what was once a list of forgotten files into an actual story.

Listening Visually

Waveforms tell you where the sound is loud or soft — but they don’t tell you what it is.

That’s where Sound Library is different.

Each recording is analyzed for its sound characteristics and broken down into labeled sound segments that help you visually understand your audio.
You’re no longer staring at abstract peaks — you’re seeing your recording in context.

Color and naming also play a big role. Each recording gets a distinct color and memorable random name, turning your archive into something alive and easy to recall. Albums inherit those colors, creating a rhythm and pattern that helps memory through visuals — not just sound.

Search That Understands Context

Finding a single recording among hundreds can be overwhelming — especially when all you have is a list.
That’s why Sound Library includes a powerful search with dynamic filtering.

You can search by recording name, date, or sound type, and the results instantly filter across your collections without breaking the structure of your view.
This means you never lose your place — you stay inside your current context, whether you’re browsing Recents, Albums, or All Recordings.

You can even search inside sub-collections, narrowing results until you find exactly what you’re looking for. It’s fast, focused, and built to mirror how people actually remember things: through time, place, and type of sound.

A Library for the Sounds That Matter

Sound Library isn’t about producing new content — it’s about reconnecting with what’s already there.
It’s about hearing your life again: your family’s laughter, half-finished songs, forgotten ideas, the quiet of places you’ve been.

Audio doesn’t take up much space, but it holds entire emotional worlds.

This app gives those worlds a way to be seen, organized, and revisited with purpose.