Designing AI × Design Mornings

We ran our first AI × Design morning a month ago, and expected the second one to be quieter once the novelty had worn off.

But 137 sign-ups for just 25 spots has blown us away.

I feel somewhat validated in some of the counterintuitive (annoying?) choices we made in how to structure it. So thought I’d share a few, and the thinking behind them, in case you’re curious or looking for tips on how to create space to grow your own AI chops.

1️⃣ Run it during the work day

People are already experimenting with this stuff on evenings and weekends, why not lean into that? As a parent of two young kids, evenings and weekends are the hardest times for this. Especially when you’re trading off against quality time with your family. This was perhaps the spiciest design choice though, but hopefully, since most companies want their people to accelerate AI learning right now, this is seen as a no-brainer.

2️⃣ Keep it small, and peer-group-like

Our goal isn’t quantity or scale. It’s about curating a discussion-sized space for like-minded people to meet others on a similar journey. Small groups mean real discussions and deeper, more vulnerable knowledge sharing, not one-to-many broadcasts. Focusing on senior+ designers and design leaders creates a shared baseline of company-wide potential, sparking new ideas regardless of where each organisation is on their AI journey.

3️⃣ Showcase real designers, working in the near future

There’s a lot of interest in this stuff right now, great events and countless podcasts. But a gap is appearing between basic prototyping with prompts and meaningful changes to organisation-level ways of working. That’s shaped how we think about speakers: find people really pushing the bar, but keep the friction for them to participate as low as possible. The work we showcase should feel mostly working but slightly unpolished. That’s kinda the point.

4️⃣ Encourage space for hands-on exploration, not just chatting

Inspiration is great. But in my experience, the greatest value lies in shifting how you think about these tools, if not rebuilding your entire mental model of design now that they exist. The only way to get there is immersing yourself in what they’re capable of, and what they’re terrible at.

During our last event someone got up and running with Cursor for the first time and built a basic prototype. A few weeks later they shared what they’d built since, now that they’d ‘caught the bug’. An incredibly intricate, design-system-driven prototype. You only get there from having the space to experience these tools yourself.

5️⃣ Run it first thing Monday morning and give people barely any notice 😅

Haha, I’m only half joking. This space moves so quickly, the content would be out of date if we planned it a month in advance. So my hope is that it’s fine to feel scrappy, as long as we’re holding a high bar and giving designers a meaningful space to shape the future of this craft together.