I don’t always know what an elegant design solution should look like. If I did, my job would be very easy. I also struggle to articulate what I’m looking for. When I look at someone’s work, I’ll often think, that’s good, but something’s not quite right.

Most of the time, we figure something out and get to a good enough solution. We pick something and move on. We don’t have the time to iterate forever. That’s where goals, design principles and other frameworks help a lot. At the very least, we can make sure the work reaches a decent benchmark of usability.

But every once in a while, a designer shows me a concept and I think,
“that’s it.”

I’m pretty sure every designer knows that feeling. It’s a near-instant moment of recognition. All of a sudden, the constraints and loose threads get tied together. No answer is perfect, but this is a really good one.

How to spot it

1. It’s instant. You’ll have an almost instinctual reaction. You don’t need to think about it much.
2. It speaks for itself. You’ve been taught to provide context when you present your work. That’s always useful, but if the solution is good enough, it doesn’t need much help.
3. It’s often something you didn’t think of. You’ll find yourself asking “why didn’t I think of that?”, usually because it’s something you already knew. Sometimes it’s an earlier iteration you moved past too quickly.
4. The medium doesn’t matter. It could be made with code, LLMs, pen and paper, a sticky note or a scribble. It might be polished, but it often stands out despite being rough. That’s why high-fidelity concepts can be harder to judge, since they can look resolved when they aren’t.

Great artists steal

Earlier in my career, I’d try to reverse engineer these moments. Great artists steal right? I’d try and figure out, was the solution great because it used the design system, or because it broke the rules? Was it what they removed, or something special they added? Was it something about Apple or Stripe or companies like that? What’s the trick?

I could list a bunch of things that might be “the trick,” but I’d probably be wrong. For most of us mortals, we have to rely on design methods and just doing the work.

In the meantime, there’s one thing you can do: notice that feeling when it happens, and ask yourself:

• What led up to it? How did we get here?
• When did I last see it, in my own work or someone else’s?
• Why does this solution stand out so much more than the others?