🤿 crank

Ryan Stephen is a product designer at Microsoft, but the reason I wanted to interview him is because he's the man behind some of my favorite design experiments on Twitter.

So in this episode Ryan gives us a behind-the-scenes look at his creative process, the tools in his stack, and how he approaches effective storytelling in design.

Some highlights:

• How Ryan sparks creativity

• The power of putting your work on Twitter

• How Ryan thinks about investing in his career

• Ryan’s mental model for fidelity and prototyping

• The lessons Ryan’s learned about effective storytelling

• The tools and techniques Ryan uses to make ideas feel real

• + a lot more

Watch on YouTube, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts 👇

🤝 WITH PAPER

Everybody knows about Paper Shaders…

It feels like every time I open Twitter I see somebody creating a new beautiful halftone effect.

But did you know Paper uses real CSS as you design? That means your layouts are already code.

You can just one-click copy as React and paste into your coding agent of choice.

Paper is shipping more of their core editor every week and it’s becoming so clear to me that this is what the future of design tools should look like.

So if you haven’t tried it yet, click the link and start designing today 👇

🔗 FEATURED RESOURCE

Software is still about thinking

In “Design Careers in the Age of AI”, Hannah Hearth talks about the potential risks of compressed shipping timelines.

So I want to share this article from Ryo Lu (Cursor’s Head of Design).

He says that “coding with AI today creates a new trap: the illusion of speed without structure” 🎯

AI doesn’t replace systems thinking — it amplifies the cost of not doing it.

Ryo has always been one of my favorite systems thinkers to learn from so this breakdown is definitely worth a bookmark 👇

 🔗 FEATURED RESOURCE

If I had to rebuild my design career in 2026, I’d do this

Adrian from DesignMe shares a decade of lessons that are perfect for freelancers, solopreneurs, or designers who want to advance their career by putting themselves out there online.

His story is one of perseverance and it’s a good one :)

🔗 FEATURED RESOURCE

The case against conversational interfaces

Remember when we got to hear from Julian the storytelling lead at Linear?

He’s one of my favorite writers in all of tech and I want to share one of his articles from last year that makes the case against conversational interfaces.

There’s a lot of hype on Twitter right now about how UI is dead (🫠). So I think it’s important to have a more well-rounded perspective :)

🧃 INSPIRATION JUICE

3 things I saved this week

1️⃣ Wabi orb cards

Everything that is coming out of Wabi right now is ridiculously well-designed.

Just look at the orbs on these cards 👀

I finally got them onboarded to the Dive Talent Network so if you’re interested in joining a stacked team in SF I can probably help :)

Check it out →

2️⃣ Creative footer

I did a double take on this footer when scrolling Twitter the other day. Incredibly creative work from Fred and team.

Check it out →

3️⃣ Glowing icon

Mike Rundle is one of those designers who I will probably never be as good as and I’m ok with that.

But at least I can copy the tips he shares on Twitter 😅

Check it out →

Meet the Dive partners 

I made a list of my favorite products and asked them to come on as sponsors of the newsletter/podcast. They said yes 🥹

The #1 way to support Dive Club is to check them out👇

Framer​ → How I build my websites

Genway → How I do research

Granola → How I take notes during CRIT

Jitter​ → How I animate my designs

Lovable → How I build my ideas in code

Mobbin → How I find design inspiration

Paper → How I design like a creative

Raycast ​ → How I stay in flow while I work

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