The significance of Spotify wrapped, how Figma designs us, and more.

📰 3 THINGS TO CHECK OUT

When Figma Starts Designing Us

• UX designer Rune Madsen argues that Figma’s shift toward engineering‑style features, while convenient, subtly nudges designers toward a structured, code‑centric workflow too early in the creative process.
  
  
• This rigidity can restrict exploratory, messy ideation—crucial in early design stages—and can lead designers to feel constrained when trying to freely iterate.
  
  
• “Figma is extremely powerful, but it is bending us toward a way of working that prioritizes structure over spontaneity. As designers, we should remain alert to this shift, not because Figma is inherently bad, but because the values it encodes can quietly reshape our practices.”

The Social Significance of Spotify Wrapped

• UX designer Bas Wallet explores how Spotify Wrapped—Spotify’s yearly recap of users’ listening patterns—has evolved beyond just a clever marketing tactic to become a cultural phenomenon.
  
  
• By turning data into shareable insights, Wrapped taps into nostalgia, social currency, and personal branding, encouraging engagement, excitement, and interpersonal connection.
  
  
• “Spotify Wrapped plays a vital role in keeping users. The mechanism is part of a social ritual many people don’t want to miss out on. Unsubscribing from Spotify means someone would lose their December habits, potentially at the detriment of social status.”

The AI-Native Designer

• Product designer Sharang Sharma argues designing in the age of AI is more than mastering tools—integrating AI intentionally and doubling down on uniquely human skills like taste, judgment, and creative direction should instead be emphasized.
  
  
• Ultimately, deep craft, strategic thinking, and human-centric design remain the enduring differentiators in a world increasingly co-created with machines.
  
  
• “AI fluency is the ability to confidently design and work with intent-driven, layered, and probabilistic systems. For product teams, it means understanding AI’s potential, navigating their complexity, and making informed decisions that shape responsible and impactful outcomes."

💜 PORTFOLIO INSPIRATION

Jullian Allen, a UX Academy graduate, comes up with a creative solution for waste management with her end-to-end app Wastewise, which focuses on empowering users to better understand what to do with items that need disposal, from electronics to medical supplies and more. She also showcases her sharp eye for visual design and understanding of user needs in her responsive redesign for Axiom Consulting, where site improvements contribute to a sleeker look and feel throughout the user experience.

Got a portfolio you love that you’d like to share with our audience? Email your suggestions to hello@designlab.com.

💡 INTERESTING STUFF...

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• Video: Presenting Your Case Study
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Have the confidence to fail. Persistence is key. — Jessica Walsh, designer

🧪 FROM THE LAB

🎤 Learn More About Our Advanced Courses

Are you a working designer who wants to level up their skills, but not sure what type of course is best? Join our Advanced Courses Webinar this coming Monday, July 21st, at 12pm ET. Whether you're looking to deepen your expertise with AI tools, better utilize advanced Figma features, or work more effectively with data, this session will walk you through all of our advanced course offerings.

We’ll discuss what you’ll learn, who our courses are for, and how they can help you grow your impact at work. Bring your questions and leave inspired to take the next step in your design career! Register here to attend live or receive a recording.

🚀Courses Launching Soon

Advanced Figma (Launching 7/25):

• Perfect for: Experience designers wanted to become more efficient with complex Figma features
• You’ll learn: Proficiency with Figma’s auto layout feature, reusable components, and design systems
• How you’ll do it: Asynchronous lessons and projects supplemented by consistent feedback, and live peer sessions facilitated by expert mentors

Prototyping in Figma (Launching 7/25):

• Perfect for: Experienced designers who want to leverage Figma’s more advanced prototyping features effectively
• You’ll learn: Rightsizing your prototypes, interaction design in Figma, making seamless animations, how to streamline developer handoff, and more
• How you’ll do it: Asynchronous lessons and projects supplemented by consistent feedback, and live peer sessions facilitated by expert mentors

AI for Visual Design (Launching 7/25):

• Perfect for: Entrepreneurs, designers, marketers, or anyone wanting to gain proficiency with industry-leading generative AI tools
• You’ll learn: Prompt crafting, working with complex visual ideas such as branding and storytelling, animating with AI, and more
• How you’ll do it: Asynchronous lessons and projects supplemented by consistent feedback, and live peer sessions facilitated by expert mentors

Design 101 (Launching 7/25):

• Perfect for: Marketers, educators, or other non-designers who create or collaborate on visuals. deliverables.
• You’ll learn: Foundational design principles that will have you designing better (and more effectively) fast
• How you’ll do it: Asynchronous lessons and projects supplemented by consistent feedback, and live peer sessions facilitated by expert mentors

UX Academy Foundations (Launching 8/4):

• Perfect for: Those totally new to UX design looking to learn the fundamentals in a supportive structure
• You’ll learn: Visual and UI design foundations, proficiency in Figma, how to iterate on design work, integrating AI, and more. Be fully prepared for UX Academy upon completion.
• How you’ll do it: Asynchronous lessons and projects, how-to videos and guides, and 1:1 expert mentorship.
• Course length: Flexible over four to eight weeks