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UX Design

Rebel against the bland: moving toward more personable designs

September 4, 2023 2:45 PM

Long Lecture

🇬🇧 English

Wisła

About

Design systems have become a staple of product design, and product designers have increasingly become systems thinkers. While a systems-led approach can simplify the design process and improve collaboration, it often leads to a decrease in personality in the products we build. Curiosity and exploration get tucked away in favour of a lazier approach, and detaching a Figma component feels like an act of rebellion. This talk explores the challenges of designing products that are not only functional but also both cohesive and unique, with real life examples from companies like Hotjar as well as design students. We will talk about embracing possibilities, and emphasize the importance of learning the rules to then break them.

Talk by

Photo of Alessio Laiso, Staff Designer at Hotjar

Staff Designer at Hotjar

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From the recording

Talk in brief

Mature design practices can make interfaces usable and consistent while also making them visually and emotionally interchangeable. This talk argues for restoring personality without discarding proven interaction patterns. Through branding, typography, organizational maturity, education, and design-system governance, it shows how teams can move beyond bland defaults. Distinctiveness comes from understanding rules well enough to bend them intentionally, giving designers permission to propose new visual language, and evaluating personality as part of product quality rather than optional decoration.

Key takeaways

01
Usability standards are a foundation
Established patterns reduce unnecessary invention, but they should support rather than erase a product’s character.
Watch from 2:27
02
Problem solving and expression must coexist
Design loses strategic value when teams discuss only efficiency and omit delight, recognition, and emotional distinction.
Watch from 7:24
03
Brand systems can guide product personality
A coherent voice, illustration style, and visual language help product decisions express recognizable values.
Watch from 12:55
04
Context changes how aesthetics perform
Typography and other expressive choices should be tested in the specific product setting instead of judged through universal assumptions.
Watch from 18:15
05
Governance should permit new pieces
Design systems work best when they enable consistent invention instead of limiting every solution to the existing component box.
Watch from 34:20

Video chapters

2:27How best practices became visual sameness
Interface conventions improve usability while encouraging products to converge on familiar forms.
7:24The missing expressive side of design
Business and engineering fluency should not silence discussion of delight and distinctiveness.
12:55A brand language with recognizable character
Voice, illustrations, and visual guidelines demonstrate a systematic route to personality.
18:15Typography depends on product context
Font-performance examples challenge simple claims about universally trustworthy visual choices.
23:22Personality across design-maturity levels
Organizations face different expressive constraints depending on their foundations and processes.
28:52Learn the rules before breaking them
Design education is used to explain disciplined exploration beyond obvious first solutions.
34:20Design systems as platforms for invention
Governance can preserve consistency while allowing teams to create the new components a concept needs.

Read edited transcript highlights

These concise notes were edited from automatic captions and checked against the talk structure. They are not a verbatim transcript.

Convention solved friction but created convergence

Designers no longer need to debate every login, form, or navigation pattern from first principles. That shared knowledge is valuable, yet it also makes it easy to assemble products from the same safe choices. When every team optimizes only for familiarity, interfaces become technically competent but difficult to recognize, describe, or care about.

Watch from 2:27

Design value includes more than efficient problem solving

Designers benefit from understanding technology, business, and delivery constraints, but they should still be able to argue for design’s expressive contribution. A product can solve the task and remain forgettable. Distinction, delight, and emotional tone are not opposites of utility; they can make a useful experience more understandable and more strongly associated with its maker.

Watch from 7:24

Personality becomes scalable through a system

A successful rebrand does more than replace a logo or illustration. It defines qualities such as directness, optimism, practicality, and conversational warmth, then translates them into repeatable visual and verbal decisions. Clear guidelines give product teams a shared direction so personality survives beyond the launch campaign.

Watch from 12:55

Aesthetic effects are not universal constants

Experiments with typography show that a typeface can produce different reactions in banking, news, retail, or other contexts. Aggregate rankings hide those differences. Designers should test expressive decisions inside the product and audience where they will operate, rather than treating a fashionable font or style as inherently trustworthy or engaging.

Watch from 18:15

Consistency should not mean a closed component box

A design system gives teams reusable pieces, but it can become a constraint when every problem must be solved with what already exists. Designers need permission to ask whether the current component is appropriate, borrow from another pattern, or create a new piece. Governance should review and integrate thoughtful invention instead of preventing it.

Watch from 34:20

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