I started by making things.
And learned that the thinking behind them mattered more.
Like most designers, I began with the visible stuff.
Identity.
Editorial.
Campaigns.
Digital experiences.
Products.
Over time, the interesting questions moved further upstream.
Why are we making this?
What problem are we actually solving?
Who needs to understand it?
What needs to be true for it to succeed?
The work became less about designing the answer and more about helping organisations ask the right questions.
My role got bigger. So did the problems.
Design leadership changes what you're responsible for designing.
Eventually, you're no longer just designing products or brands.
You're designing teams.
Processes.
Systems.
Conversations.
Ways of working.
You're creating alignment between people who see the same problem differently.
You're building environments where other people can do their best work.
That's where my view of design really changed.
Then AI changed the tools again.
But it made the fundamentals more important, not less.
We can now explore, create and iterate at a speed that would have been unimaginable only a few years ago.
That's exciting.
But when making becomes easier, knowing what to make — and why — becomes more valuable.
Understanding.
Taste.
Judgement.
Curiosity.
Clarity.
These aren't being replaced by AI.
They're becoming the advantage.
Fraime
Part philosophy. Part evidence. Always evolving.
Fraime is where I'm bringing those ideas together.
Some of it comes from experience.
Some from things I'm learning now.
Some I'll probably change my mind about.
That's the point.
This isn't intended to be a definitive theory of design.
It's a way of thinking about how design can help people and organisations understand complexity, make better decisions and move forward.