No such thing as design systems

Rodrigo Tello

I don't believe in design systems. Or rather, I don't believe there's such a things as design systems. In the tech industry — which I actually think should not be called the tech industry but rather the internet software industry — what people refer to a design system is actually guidelines, styleguides and UI components libraries. I'll argue design systems don't exist. You can not create a system around a design, because design is a process to solve problems, and problems are by definition points in a timeline in which an entity, one or multiple people try to accomplish a state and there are factors blocking that state from happening, and design is the process of planning and comming up with solutions that will solve a problem with both technical and engineering problems AND using cultural and anthropological factors to deliver such solution. Design can't be systematized because design is usually re-invented at the moment a new problem arises. If a problem has been solved, then it's not a problem, just like we don't "design the hammer, nor we design how to use the hammer to put a nail in the wall", we just use the hammer. If there's such thing as a design system, then such thing is so big and amorphous that it can't be outlined, explained, transfered, or contained.