Maya draws on her experience as a design systems PM at both REI and lululemon to explore what makes ecommerce design systems distinct. From the component library decisions to supporting editorial flexibility and brand storytelling, this episode digs into the real differences between ecommerce systems and other product contexts — and what's driving non-tech companies to invest in designs systems now.

Resources & Links

• Maya Hampton on LinkedIn
• Maya's writing on Medium
• Driving design system adoption
• REI Cedar system

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

There’s so much happening in the world of design systems: so much noise, so many new tools, and so much pressure. Where to start?

Building on what I wrote on the Zeroheight blog, in this minisode I’m offering tactical suggestions for cutting through the noise.

I cover the three areas you should be focusing on in your design system right now—MCPs, skills, and agents.md; how to get started designing with code; and defining design guidelines and semantic components—plus a detour into governance and ways of working.

But the bit that’s occupying my brain space right now is that I believe that design system practitioners are uniquely positioned to help organizations change how they work with AI, because we own the layer that says: this is how you build UI and how design and engineering collaborate.

Maybe the most important thing that you can be doing is thinking about how you can help your product teams think about what it means to build products today, and how we do it.

Resources

• My writing for Zeroheight:
  • AI in design systems: What’s changing in 2026
  • 3 practical ways LLMs can support design systems teams today (Oct 2025)
• Some Murphy Trueman hits:
  • The prompt you never wrote
  • Your next design system user is an agent
  • Your design system might be AI-ready. Your organisation probably isn't.
  • Your design system has opinions. They're just not being enforced
  • The AI feedback loop: When design systems train the models that critique them
  • The bidirectional design system: When code talks back to design
• Erika Flowers, Open Vector

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

Y’all know I am fully bought in on design-with-code tools, so I loved this episode with Robin Cannon, VP of Product at Knapsack and former IBM Carbon and J.P. Morgan Salt design system exec, on why he thinks the infinite canvas is obsolete, and what we might replace it with.

Robin chats with us about a future where software design happens in the same medium as production code, making the “infinite canvas” abstraction obsolete. But what does “designing with code” really look like today… and in the future? We explore a world with tools that could enable us to build with design-system rules plus broader product context. Plus we discuss why today’s design-with-code tools aren’t quite there yet, the enterprise barriers to working in new ways, and you as a designer can make this shift.

Links & References

• Robin Cannon on LinkedIn
• robin-cannon.com
• Building for coherence, not compliance, lessons from Baldurs Gate 3, by Murphy Trueman
• Erika Flowers, Zero Vector and Open Vector design approach
• Agentic Development is just MMOs for Coding, and I am LFG, Erika Flowers
• Knapsack
• Dessn and Mockdown

💖 Season 2 of On Theme is officially here! 🎉 💖 If you like what you're hearing from On Theme, hit subscribe in your favorite podcast platform and sign up to get episode release notes at designsystemsontheme.com! On Theme is sponsor free and listener supported, so please support the show with a monthly donation.

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

Noelle joins me again for some 2026 predictions trend encapsulations, and we try to unpack the absolute madness of the first two months of 2026.

1️⃣ Designing with code is in, making pictures of UIs is out.

2️⃣ The new critical deliverables for systems teams are design guidelines, agent rules, tokens, and semantic APIs.

3️⃣ We're gonna see a real focus on brand expression, but also on one-offs.

4️⃣ Design system teams, you do organizational behavior change.

5️⃣ The next chapter of the design system narrative is around quality rather than efficiency.

Plus: the rise of the design engineer and a return to the early 2000s ways of working? I hope so!, nothingburger brands, and design systems gatekeeping.

Season 2 of On Theme is officially here! 🎉 💖 If you like what you're hearing from On Theme, please hit subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. On Theme is sponsor free and listener supported, so please support the show with a monthly donation.

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

My very first minisode of the entire podcast was some 2025 predictions, and a lot has changed. (Honestly, what was I thinking trying to make predictions in the era of AI? fml) Noelle Lansford joined me for Season Two's official first episode to recap my 2025 predictions with me and look back on the trends and themes we saw in design-systems-land last year.

Stay tuned for part two where we dive in to our 2026 predictions!

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

I'm back from Zeroheight's Converge conference in Bristol, UK, with my recap and thoughts. In this minisode, find out my three major themes from the event: reducing complexity, shifting towards code to design, and the narratives "framing our future".

Resources & Links:

• Zeroheight's Converge
• 3 practical ways LLMs can support design systems teams today, on the Zeroheight blog
• From Promises to Practice: the Future of Design Systems, my talk at Converge (video coming soon)
• John Voss's talk Framing the Future (coming soon)
• US Section 174 R&D Tax explained

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

Surprise minisode! In this quick episode, hear a few ways AI tools are useful for design systems now, my new favorite design-eng handoff tool, and three can't-miss industry events this fall.

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show

Chat, this is the last episode of season one! Thank you for listening and supporting the show! There's no better way to wrap up, IMO, than an optimistic and curious exploration of what it means to be a creative human in an increasingly technological world.

So to wrap up season one, Natalya Shelburne joins me to explore how design leaders can cultivate creativity in an era of rapid technological and organizational change. Drawing from her degree and research in creativity, Natalya shares insights on fostering innovation, overcoming fear-driven management styles, and why embracing artistic thinking is essential for teams navigating the age of AI. She explains the importance of creating safe environments to unlock creative potential and why outdated corporate structures simply can't compete. Plus, flow state, goats, expansive thinking, and hobbies.

Links & References

• Natalya Shelburne on LinkedIn
• GitHub Primer
• Natalya's talk at Beyond Tellerand, Channeling Chaos: Role of the Artist in the Age of AI
• Twilio's Paste design system assistant
• Research and books mentioned:
  • Lev Vygotsky on cognitive development
  • Lauren Sosniak on phases of learning
  • Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's classic book Flow and an overview
  • Oliver Burkeman's Four Thousand Weeks
  • The Extended Mind

💖 On Theme is a brand new podcast, so if you like what you're hearing, please hit subscribe and sign up at designsystemsontheme.com!

🎨🎟️ Into Design Systems is May 25-28
Get your ticket at intodesignsystems.com/ontheme

Into Design Systems is back with their annual virtual conference, May 28-30, 2025. Get your ticket now for three days of practical, hands on sessions showing the what, why, and how of design systems. This year, the conference is focused on developer handoff, accessibility, multi brand theming, and governance. You'll get hands on knowledge you can put to use at work immediately, files and resources to take away, and hear from very well known industry speakers.

📲 Send me a text!

Support the show