Design Engineer

Writer; United States; Hybrid; USD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Parental leave

Hybrid work culture

Stock options

401k plan

Learning stipend

Paid time off (PTO)

Office spaces in major cities

Job summary

Writer is seeking a design-focused frontend engineer to own the Writer Design System (WDS), ensuring production-grade UI components and surfaces are robust for both human users and AI agents.

You will partner with designers, PMs, and engineers to shape the design-to-code workflow, ship polished design-led features, and drive WDS adoption across the org.

Qualifications

• 4–8+ years building production frontends with TS and React.
• Own a design system or surface end-to-end.
• Expertise in animation & motion principles.
• Proficient in Figma with auto-layout, variants, and code connect.
• Experience with AI product surfaces and design-to-code workflows.
• Track record influencing design/engineering direction beyond the immediate team.

Responsibilities

• Own the Writer Design System (WDS) from sketch to ship.
• Design and build production UI components and features, owning surfaces end-to-end.
• Ship design-led work with polish passes, micro-interactions, and brand moments.
• Architect new primitives and extend core components, keeping docs and Storybook in sync.
• Uphold front-end craft across accessibility, motion, and consistency.
• Shape design-to-code workflows and tools for org-wide productivity.
• Partner with designers, PMs, and engineers to measure WDS adoption.

Skills

TypeScript

React

Design systems

Figma expert

Animation principles

Framer Motion

GSAP

Lottie

Accessibility

Ownership

Tools

Storybook

Figma

Job description

• As a design engineer at WRITER, you'll own the Writer Design System (WDS) - how it's built, how it's maintained, and how both humans and AI agents use it to ship product
• This role matters more now than ever. AI coding agents write more of our production code, and they ship whatever they find. A design system that's incomplete or inconsistent doesn't just slow designers down; it gets compounded at scale by every agent that builds against it
• You'll make sure WRITER's core UI library is complete and trustworthy enough to build on, working closely with the designers, PMs, and engineers who rely on it every day
• You'll help shape the surfaces that define how our product feels to use, and help set the standard and process for how the EPD org ships product
• This role will be reporting to the Director of product design
• Own the Writer Design System (WDS) as your primary domain - agentify and maintain it, ensuring it's optimized for both humans and AI agents building with it
• Design and build production-quality UI components and features, owning surfaces from sketch to ship
• Ship design-led work that wouldn't survive an engineering backlog - polish passes, micro-interactions, and brand moments that make the product feel alive
• Architect new primitives and extend the system's core components, shaping its technical direction while keeping documentation, examples, and libraries in sync across Figma, .md skills, and Storybook
• Uphold the bar for front-end craft across accessibility, motion feel, consistency, and quality, ensuring accessibility is baked into every design system component
• Help shape the design-to-code workflow, researching the latest tools and practices to unlock org-wide productivity and democratize workflows across the EPD organization
• Partner with designers, PMs, and engineering leads to measure WDS adoption, close gaps, and make sure shipped features meet design system standards

Benefits

• Health: Selection of employer-covered medical plans, plus dental, vision, life insurance, and FSA.
• Family-friendly: Competitive parental leave policy, working parents can truly own their schedules.
• Hybrid culture: We're built around a mix of in office collaboration and remote work when needed.
• Finance: Company stock options, plus a 401k plan with employer contributions.
• Growth: Learning and development stipend and generous PTO.
• SF/NY/London office space: Three beautiful sunny offices in three incredibly exciting cities.

• 4-8+ years building production frontends with TypeScript and React, with a track record of owning a system, platform, or surface end-to-end rather than individual features
• Solid instincts for animation principles including easing curves, choreography, anticipation, follow-through, interruptibility, and perceived performance
• Fluency in Figma at expert level - auto-layout, variants, variables, and code connect - and proficiency with design engineering technologies like framer-motion, gsap, and lottie for web-based animation
• A genuine commitment to WRITER's values of Connect, Challenge, and Own
• A demonstrable obsession with craft, backed by a portfolio, side projects, GitHub, or production work that includes systems-level work and not just feature work
• Experience with AI product surfaces - tool-call UIs, streaming responses, agent state, and dynamic UI rendering - and comfort navigating ambiguous, cross-team problems with good judgment about when to loop others in
• Experience driving adoption of a design system or shared platform across an engineering org, with a track record of influencing technical or design direction beyond your immediate team