Consumer app / iPhone / health and fitness

Ground & Return_

A quiet 28-week daily yoga syllabus built around alignment, sequence, and steady repetition.

My role: Product designer
Platform: iPhone, iOS 17.0 or later
Released: April 2026
Price: 7 days free, then one unlock
Developer: Colorblast LLC
Status: Live on the App Store

Ground & Return’s Today screen for Monday 19 October: Good afternoon, week 1 of the Foundations phase (Standing. Aligning. Rooting down.), a card for day 1 of 196 with a 15-minute, 15-pose practice and its first poses, a Begin practice button, and the arc from Foundations to Completion. — Today: the week’s theme, today’s practice and the 28-week arc.

A practice screen, pose 1 of 15: Samasthiti, Equal Standing Pose, a line illustration of the pose, five numbered alignment cues, the next pose named at the bottom, and back and next controls. — Practice: one pose per screen, with numbered alignment cues.

The reference for pose 33 of 110, Triaṅga Mukhaikapāda Paścimottānāsana (Three-Limb Forward Bend): an illustration, what the pose teaches, and tabs for method, props, caution and where it appears. — A pose reference, with method, props, cautions and where it appears.

Summary

Open Today for your next sequence, follow the pose illustrations and alignment cues, and choose when to move to the next pose.

Ground & Return lays out a 196-day path of scheduled practice and rest days. The path runs 28 weeks in five phases, and each week carries a short theme; the first is “Standing. Aligning. Rooting down.” A practice can be paused and resumed the same day.

1Foundations
2Building
3Integration
4Refinement
5Completion

How a practice works

Today. The week, today’s practice (15 minutes and 15 poses in week 1), a preview of every pose and one Begin practice button. Tapping a pose opens its method.
Practice. One pose per screen, with its Sanskrit and English names, an illustration and numbered alignment cues. The next pose is named at the bottom, and the practitioner chooses when to move on.
Method. 110 illustrated pose references with method notes, props and cautions, searchable by English or Sanskrit name and filtered by pose family. Each pose shows how often the syllabus schedules it.
Journey. The path week by week, with scheduled practice and rest days.
You. Current focus, progress and a practice notebook for observations, with an optional daily reminder and the option to save eligible completed sessions to Apple Health.

The Method tab, Asanas, 110 postures: this week’s 15 poses, a search field for Sanskrit or English names with a Refine button, and the standing poses, each with its English name and how often it is scheduled. — The method: 110 postures, searchable by Sanskrit or English name.

The Journey tab, The complete arc, 28 weeks in 5 phases: this week’s seven day boxes, with no days on the mat yet, counts of days, sessions and the current week, and phase I, Foundations, with week 1 in practice. — Journey: this week on the mat, and the path by phase and week.

The You tab for a practitioner on the mat since October 2026: current focus, quiet progress at 0 of 196 days, full access unlocked on this device, and the practice notebook. — You: current focus, quiet progress, access and the notebook.

The design

Ground & Return is drawn in black on a warm off-white ground. Poses are line illustrations, and each name keeps its Sanskrit diacritics (Ūrdhva Hastāsana) with the English name beneath it (Upward Salute).

Text is set in a clean sans serif, with small letterspaced capitals for labels such as the day, the phase and the pose count. Status sits in thin outlined tags (Week 1, 15 poses, In practice, Active). On Today, the one solid button is Begin practice, and a floating, pill-shaped tab bar holds four tabs: Today, Method, Journey and You. Light and dark appearances are both supported.

Progress is kept low-key. Journey shows the week as a row of empty day boxes, and the You tab calls it quiet progress: a thin bar and a plain count, 0 of 196 days complete.

Privacy and price

No login. No login is required, and the App Store privacy label reads Data Not Collected.
One unlock. The first 7 days are free. After that, the app is unlocked once, with no subscription, and the You tab shows when the full 28-week arc is unlocked on the device.
Beyond iPhone. It also runs on Mac (M1 or later, macOS 14.0 or later) and Apple Vision (visionOS 1.0 or later). Its age rating is 9+.

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