I build design systems that actually get used.
Lead product and systems designer with 11 years at Hotels.com and Expedia Group. I work at the intersection of design and engineering — building systems, tooling, and strategy that designers and developers actually want to use.
Project KES
Rebuilding Hotels.com from the ground up — lead product designer on a complete PWA relaunch, covering search, property pages, and global navigation across four breakpoints and a new visual brand language.
Unified Hotels Design System
Built a design system from zero — establishing tokens, components, motion principles, and a governance model that transformed 5 products and set the foundation for what became EGDS.
Expedia Group Design System
Scaled a multi-brand design system to enterprise level — 55 graduated components, 15+ brands, full accessibility and dark mode support, a tiered governance model, and a docs platform driving adoption.
1,000+ active designers · Tens of millions of daily usersFigma Plugins — Discover & Auditor
Identified that adoption — not components — was the real problem, then built two Figma plugins to solve it. Discover lets designers browse, theme, and drop components in seconds. Auditor surfaces drift before handoff.
150+ active users · Published to Figma CommunityDesign and engineering, bridged.
I sit at the intersection of design and development — technically fluent enough to have real conversations with engineers about implementation constraints, and design-minded enough to make systems that feel right to use. That range closes gaps that specialist teams leave open.
Works autonomously.
I led the services domain within EGDS independently — discovering problems worth solving, shaping pitches, presenting to senior stakeholders, and delivering with developers. I don't wait to be pointed at a problem. I find it, frame it, and fix it.
AI proficient.
I actively work with AI tooling as part of my design and systems practice — using it to accelerate research, prototype faster, and think through design problems at a different pace. This is becoming part of how good systems work gets done.
"Joe is a rare unicorn with excellent design taste and instincts coupled with deep technical and code understanding. He's perfectly suited for creating both agentic and human product solutions."
Andrew Wade
Principal Designer, Expedia Group Design System
"That kind of design and engineering alignment is hard to find, and any team building or scaling a design system would benefit from having Joe bring that to their work."
Niall Johnson
Senior Engineering Manager, Expedia Group
"Heeran and Joe delivered the robust design system that we have today. I don't say this lightly — this is a fantastic piece of work that they sweat blood, tears, and a significant amount of alcohol over."
Craig Melbourne
Principal, Product Experience Strategy & Design, Hotels.com
Design and engineering, bridged.
I'm a systems design leader based in London. For 11 years at Hotels.com and Expedia Group, I've worked at the intersection of design craft and technical implementation — building systems that don't just look right, but actually work in production at scale.
I think in systems, write code when it helps, teach when others need it, and build tooling when the process is the problem. Currently looking for Staff or Principal level roles in London, or remote.
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