Decision Book
Long case studies often hide the “why.” My decision book keeps it clear: concise rationale and real design decisions, shaped by 7+ years on a leading project management app.
5 categories
productivity tools
not the what
Three decisions worth reading first.
When Ideas Come Alive with the Touch of AI
How integrating AI into the design process changed not just the output — but the way the decision itself was made.
Hue Knew? Create Systematic Color Palettes
Building a palette that survives dark mode, brand drift, and three product teams — without collapsing into a pile of hex codes.
Accessibility by Design — and by Default
When accessibility stops being a checklist and starts being a constraint that improves every other decision in the system.
The whole story,
one entry at a time.
A short note on how integrating AI into the design process changed not just the output — but the way the decision itself was made.
→ 02 UI Design Watch it FlexOn responsive layout decisions, fluid tokens, and the quiet choreography that makes an interface feel native at every width.
→ 03 Product Design Zoom Notes, Before Zoom NotesA small pattern, hiding in plain sight for years — and what it taught me about paying attention to the things users already do.
→ 04 Design System Select Under ConstructionRebuilding the humble select from first principles — states, edge cases, and the compromises you only see once you ship it.
→ 05 Build with AI From Image to InsightBuilding CaptionCraft AI in two minutes — a small helper that turns any uploaded image into a clean, objective alt text.
→ 06 Product Design Degrading with DignityDesigning a Calendar for both web and mobile — what graceful degradation looks like when the screen shrinks but the intent shouldn't.
→ 07 Design System Read Between the LinesBuilding a typographic system from the ground up — relative units, tokens, scale, and the quiet levers of weight and color that guide the reader's eye.
→ 08 Design System Hue Knew? Create Systematic Color PalettesBuilding a palette that survives dark mode, brand drift, and three product teams — without collapsing into a pile of hex codes.
→ 09 Build with AI A-Musing Photo AlbumA small visual study — the kind of side piece that exists mostly to remind you why the craft matters in the first place.
→ 10 Design System Naming a Design System with CareA name is the first structural decision. What happens when you treat it as rigorously as the components themselves.
→ 11 Product Design Earn the Next LayerDesigning the User Card — a study in progressive enhancement, where each new layer has to justify its place before the interface earns it.
→ 12 Product Design A Redesign Under the HoodA solo side project on ActiveCollab's Projects page — how smaller type, lighter icons, and tighter chrome gave the content room to breathe.
→ 13 Design System Documenting the Design PatternsWhat to write, what to skip, and why docs are a product surface of their own — read far more often than any dashboard.
→ 14 UX Research Diamonds Are ForeverOn the double diamond — what it quietly gets right, what teams routinely skip, and how to keep the discovery half honest.
→ 15 Product Design Evaluating New Product Feature SuccessA small framework for asking, a month after launch, whether the thing you shipped actually moved the needle you chose.
→ 16 Build with AI Vibe Check on GigsPrototyping a local gig feed with Firebase Studio — and what Facebook's locked-down data taught me about the limits of AI-assisted building.
→ 17 UI Design Crafting the Dashboard BlueprintStarting from the question — not the chart. How hierarchy, grouping, and restraint decide whether a dashboard is useful.
→ 18 Product Design The List of My ResourcesA living toolkit — the handful of books, plugins, and models I keep returning to when the work actually has to ship.
→ 19 UX Research Rivals, Research, RepeatCompetitive research as a rhythm, not a one-off — and why the real insight rarely comes from the first teardown.
→ 20 Design System Accessibility by Design — and by DefaultWhen accessibility stops being a checklist and starts being a constraint that improves every other decision in the system.
→More than essays.
A way of thinking.
If the decision-making behind these essays resonates, there's more where that came from — in the full portfolio.
View full portfolio →