Originally from Estonia; I am a New York based interaction designer with a background in architecture. My career spans over 16 years in the industry building products, digital experiences, brands and simply fun and engaging things people love to use. For over 8 years I served as a creative director at Fantasy Interactive living in Stockholm, Sweden and New York City. For the past 5 years I create things at Anton &amp; Irene studio which I co-founded in Brooklyn. I’ve spoken at over 50 conferences around the world and I also teach on a regular basis at Harbour Space university in Barcelona, Spain.

Anton Repponen

For me, I started my career freelancing so personal style was a big focus. Historically, I’ve had difficulty toning it down when designing for big companies with conservative styles.

All that to say is, maybe you’ll never have a visual style, and that’s ok! :)

I’ve been literally living by this 🤣

I used to have a problem with that too, until I realized it’s ok wether you’re visuals focused and you develop your own style, or you’re more product focused and you adapt to a project. Also changes how you get jobs: people hiring you bc of your style or bc of your flexibility.

I dont have a design style per se. My ‘style’ changes from project to project based on the project need. I do have have design thinking/sentiments that carry over from project to project tho and that’s where I place most of the weight in my skillset.

Does anyone ever feel like they haven’t found their style in terms of design, but have been designing simply for what people want? How did you work through this, if you have?

oh thanks for sharing this! his website is so good too ❤️

So the real lesson here is to create volumes of work — over time, your personal style emerges and becomes apparent to you and everyone else!

The hardest part is deciding what to do first 💀

I was ~10 years into my career and worried I didn’t have a design style that was truly “mine.” Then one day a peer randomly mentioned “that’s definitely your style” in reference to a project. I’ve never worried about “having a style” since.

i feel like you can only have truly your style while working on personal projects. or when you have total freedom in some design request which rarely happens. also in my opinion having a unique style goes more for illustrators rather than designers.

I’ve always aspired for the ideal scenario, where taste and style can be used as tools to achieve a goal.

Examples include:
- Feature films (Kubrick, Scorsese, Wes Anderson)
- Fashion (Virgil and luxury streetwear)
- Music (producers leaving their mark on each song)

I’ve never thought about it in that way! That’s an excellent point though. Changes my perspective for sure.

I’m of the opinion that the designer should not have a specific “style”. The designer must be able to employ their own techniques in order to satisfy the requirements of a project. 

In other words:

Unless a client goes to you to create something in your way. But that requires a trusted voice already.

Example: I can almost always recognize work of repponen.com.

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