Built a Journal That Doesn't Feel Like a Journal

Aayushi Rajesh — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 06:30:50 +0000

Have you ever found an old photograph, a forgotten note, or a message from years ago and suddenly felt yourself transported back to that exact moment?

Not because you were looking for it. Because you stumbled upon it.

That feeling is what I wanted to recreate.

The idea

Most journaling apps organize memories into folders, lists, and timelines. Practical but memories don't feel that organized in real life.

I kept thinking:

What if revisiting memories felt less like opening a notes app and more like wandering through a dream?

So I built Memory Palace, a journaling experience where memories become floating gates drifting through an endless space. Each gate contains a moment, a feeling, a photograph, or a story waiting to be rediscovered.

Building it

I used React, Framer Motion, Supabase, and Tailwind. The stack was straightforward — the hard part was making things feel right.

Getting the gates to float dreamlike rather than mechanical took a lot of tweaking. Too much motion felt chaotic. Too little felt dead. That middle ground is surprisingly narrow.

Try it

Live: memorypalaceapp.vercel.app
GitHub: github.com/aayushirajesh/memory-palace

Contributions are welcome! Whether it's a bug fix, feature idea, or just a star — it all helps.

A small note: the experience is designed around exploration. While you can create a single memory, the palace really begins to come alive once several memories are drifting through the space together.

Would love any feedback. 🌙

DEV Community: Aayushi Rajesh

Built a Journal That Doesn't Feel Like a Journal

The idea

Building it

Try it