Evolutionary Design Systems
summary
Argues for treating a design system as a product and building component libraries with evolutionary architecture using measurable fitness functions: combines Lighthouse CI and manual audits into an accessibility score ≥95, tracks a design system Time to Update (80% rule) measured from release to 80% of downloads, and sets goals like reduce prototype lead time by 20%. Describes technical artifacts (Figma UI kits, Storybook docs, component registry), adding React bindings to web components, and shows fitness failures trigger revert, refactor, or policy trade-offs.
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chapters (16)
- 0:00Evolutionary Design Systems
- 2:33Design System is the Product (at least in this talk)
- 3:22Design System Artefacts
- 5:03Promises of a Design System
- 9:55Start from the Business Goal
- 10:42Structure the Problem Space
- 13:22The Solution Space: Writing Hypotheses
- 16:32Guiding change using Fitness
- 17:43Guiding the Architecture of a Design System's Component Library
- 20:31Example 2: Brand Compliance
- 21:59Example 2: Time To Update 90 days
- 22:52Example from Real World: Time To Update
- 24:51Embrace Change An example: Company Acquisition
- 26:17Evolutionary Architectures support change while preserving what matters
- 26:55How to follow up on failing fitness functions?
- 28:17Recap How do we build an Evolutionary Design System?
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