Samuel FabayoProduct designer and design educator

Take your UX design portfolio from good to great in 60s

14 Feb 2024 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:00

In this concise instructional video, the speaker shares the three core patterns that distinguish outstanding UX design portfolios: strong visual design, effective storytelling, and a distinctive personality. For visual design, the speaker emphasizes mastering color, typography, and spacing, recommending the use of one or two fonts with consistent hierarchy via font weights and careful font pairing. For storytelling, the advice is to "show, not tell" by using images, prototypes, or animated videos instead of lengthy text. To convey personality, the speaker suggests adding unique, visually disruptive elements and enriching the About Me page with personal background, influences, reading habits, design principles, and other personal details that help viewers connect. Combining these three patterns can elevate a portfolio from merely good to truly great.

Chapters

What makes a great design portfolio? I've studied over 100 portfolios from top designers globally, and I've noticed 3 patterns on the outstanding ones. 1, strong visual design. 2, good storytelling. And 3, great personality. To introduce strong visual design into your portfolio, focus on 3 things: color, typography, and spacing. For typography, focus on using not more than 2 fonts, or if you can, use just 1 font and use the font weight to communicate hierarchy. If you're using 2 fonts, find good font pairing and be consistent with it. To introduce good storytelling into your portfolio, Make sure that you're showing, not telling. If you can show it with an image, a prototype, or an animated video, go ahead and don't write so much. To introduce great personality into your portfolio, introduce something that makes you unique, that could be visually disruptive but it still works, or focus on your About Me page by talking more about your background, what influences you, what you're reading, what your design principles are, what you're listening to, or any other thing that could make the viewer to connect with you more. If you're able to combine all these 3 patterns together, then your portfolio can go from good to great. You're welcome.