Festa

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Inspiration

We were inspired by a simple question: Why is it so hard to just hang out with friends? Between endless group chats, social media overload, and awkward invites, spontaneity has been lost. Festa was born out of our desire to make socializing easy again—an app that helps people actually go out and connect in real life. Especially on college campuses, the need for simple, low-pressure social planning is huge.

What it does

Festa is a mobile social app that lets users create casual events, share them with selected friends, and join activities with just one tap. Once someone joins, they’re automatically added to a group chat with others attending. Friends can even re-share events with mutual friends—growing social circles naturally and authentically. Festa takes the ego and awkwardness out of planning by making invites broad and casual, encouraging spontaneous meetups and real friendships.## How we built it

Challenges we ran into

We faced challenges refining the UI/UX with very little time and limited resources. Design decisions like how events are shared or how chat groups work had to be made on the fly, and we had to debug our code integration extensively. We also ended up redesigning most UI components ourselves without external design support.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We built a working, interactive demo from scratch in under 24 hours, including: • Real-time event feed • Group chat integration • Dynamic event sharing between friends • Fully responsive mobile UI

What we learned

How to rapidly prototype and prioritize core features • React is powerful, but tricky under pressure! • Human-centered design matters. Festa worked best when we focused on people’s real needs, not just features • How to build something ethically, with intention and care

What's next for Festa

We plan to: • Add the event-only photo camera (no filters, likes, or influencers—just real moments) • Build event location verification for photo sharing • Add calendar syncing and smarter friend recommendations • Improve accessibility and inclusive UX for diverse users

Festa is just getting started. We’re building the most human social app where the only thing that matters is showing up.