Tutorial

Developing Taste

Emil Kowalski, a design engineer at Linear, reflects on taste and some of the practices necessary to develop it. As competition increases, so does the bar for quality. Simply shipping a product isn't enough. What makes a product stand out is the design and the overall experience.

How do you train taste?

1. Great taste comes with Expertise;
2. Surround yourself with great work;
3. Find people who are respected in the field and see who they admire;
4. Think about why you like something;
5. Practice your craft, and as you practice, seek feedback from others.

Tutorial

Websites worth waking up to

Mirek Nisenbaum, a partner of Base Design first reflects on the standardization of the web and that many of the sites fail to evoke emotions. While sites that evoke emotions typically have some distinct personality and a concept of “digital magnetism” as Mirek called it. In order to achieve it, your site should have: authenticity, energy, charisma and beauty.

Resources

Fresh Design Resources

Zephirfrom $12

14 unique shapes, high resolution, and seamless integration — ready for any project.

by Сraftwork Studio in 3D Assets

from $12

Uniorityfrom $12

Collection of modern 3D illustrations, designed with smooth forms and a futuristic touch

by Сraftwork Studio in 3D Assets

from $12

PrimePath - CV or Resumefrom $69

A sleek, minimalist Framer template designed to showcase your expertise with elegance

by Coco Design in Framer Templates

from $69

Slimer

Free

16 high-quality 3D illustrations, each designed with sleek curves, smooth bends, and a minimalist approach

by Сraftwork Studio in 3D Assets

Free

Vellox SEO Agency Templatefrom $39

Vellox is a modern SEO agency Webflow template designed for lead generation.

by Omakase in Framer Templates

from $39

Inspiration

Curated Design Websites

1. Chargetrip | Routing revenue

2. Wildy Riftian | A collection of visual works.

3. 1X Technologies | Safe, Intelligent Humanoids.

4. MAKING SOFTWARE | A reference manual for people who design and build software.

5. Basedash | The AI-native Business Intelligence Platform

Tool

Liquid Metal Effect

An app that breathes new perspective into your logo by adding a “liquid metal” effect. The cool part is that it’s really smoothly animated!

AI Tool

Browser by Perplexity Announcement

Perplexity has announced that they are working on their AI browser, which would have AI agents by design. An interesting competitor considering that the Arc browser is losing traction.

Research

5 UX Best Practices for Apparel E-Commerce

A study done by Baymard University where they analyzed popular e-commerce sites and defined the best practices:

1. Provide Sufficient Sizing Information;
2. Always Allow Users to Navigate across User Reviews via Reviewer-Submitted Images;
3. Use Buttons for Each Size Variation;
4. Provide Images of Apparel Products on a Human Model;
5. Always Provide an Aggregate “Fit” Subscore in the Reviews

Tutorial

Creating beautiful backgrounds in MidJourney

A step-by-step tutorial by Kuba on how to create stunning generated backgrounds using Midjourney.

Book

Pricing Design — A book by Dan Mall

Dan Mall, a husband, creative director, designer, design systems expert (and much more), has published a free book on pricing design – a perfect resource for designers struggling to evaluate their work in monetary terms.

Tutorial

Style is the answer to everything

Tobias van Schneider reflects on why style is essential, drawing inspiration by Charles Bukowski's poem from "Tales Of Ordinary Madness" (1981). Style is more than what a person wears, what brand they design, it is about "how you carry the weight of being alive. It is not what you do, but how you do it, and that cannot be taken away.

AI Tool

Chat GPT 4.5

Open AI releases GPT-4.5 – its biggest and best model yet. It has improved the ability to draw connections, recognize patterns, and generate creative insights without reasoning.

AI Tool

Webflow AI Site builder

Webflow has finally stepped into the AI race by introducing their site builder that allows to build a website in seconds just with a product vision.

AI Tool

Wan 2.1

Krea AI has implemented the latest Alibaba model in its platform. The advanced model allows to generate smooth videos and understands complex user prompts.

AI Tool

Grok 3

X introduced their most advanced model yet - Grok 3. As of now, it outperforms DeepSeek-R1, Gemini 2.0 and o1 in several benchmarks. Like other models, Grok also showcases reasoning capabilities.

AI Tool

Claude 3.7 Sonnet

Claude presents its new model - 3.7 Sonnet, one of the most intelligent models on the market for programming and especially for front-end development.

Compilation

Open Design Roles

At the end of the fourth design issue, we wanted to share some open roles for those looking for new opportunities, so here we go:

1. Senior Designer - Brand and Web at Daybreak (they were one of the design studios who helped Dropbox shape their branding guidelines, a really inspiring work)
2. Motion Designer at TUX
3. Creative Director at Wedge
4. Design Intern at Analogue Agency
5. Senior Designer at Analogue Agency