Interview with Frontend Lead: Scaling Design Systems 2025/26
From prototype to platform: the evolution of design systems
In recent years, design systems have matured from simple component libraries to integral platforms for company-wide consistency. Once introduced merely as a means of increasing efficiency, they now form the backbone of digital brand management and product development. Between early prototyping and fully integrated platform solutions, there are numerous challenges and decisions to be made. The central question: How can companies manage design systems efficiently and align them specifically for growth and complexity up to 2025/26?
Anna Fischer, Frontend Lead of an international eCommerce group with decentralised development teams, has accompanied this journey. She looks back on seven years of design system development - from the first tests to the current organisation-wide platform strategy. In this interview, Anna shares her insights and outlines how structured design system work keeps pace with the times and how modern corporate structures are adapting to it.
The following sections highlight Anna's practical experiences, common industry challenges and the methods her team uses to establish sustainable, collaborative design system strategies.
Systematisation as a basis: why components are not enough
Anna vividly describes why a design system is far more than just a collection of technical building blocks: "Our first version consisted solely of individual components without any binding guidelines. We soon realised that functions were being built twice and the visual appearance was drifting apart. Resources and effort were increasingly wasted."
The establishment of clear design principles, a token-based style system and governance tools for quality control brought about a fundamental change. The team deliberately added documented UX guidelines, versioning and systematic tests for accessibility and responsiveness to the technical basis. This gradually resulted in a central, reliable point of contact for all product teams that goes far beyond mere component management.
Organisation grows: the design system scales with it
The scaling of a design system brings with it new facets. With increasing team size, diverse applications and growing integration points, complexity also increases. Anna sees communication as a key aspect: "Scaling is more than just technology. The better we understand and address the needs of the product teams, the more our system will be accepted."
Flexibility in interfaces and extensions is key. "We develop specific solutions for mobile-first, progressive web apps and internal tools, but always build on a common base layer." The trick is to tailor further development to different requirements through targeted versioning and separate development branches without fragmenting the overall system.
Toolchains for 2025/26: the new stack for sustainable design systems
Design systems tools are constantly evolving. Anna and her team currently rely on Figma as the central design tool, Storybook for lively documentation and a specially configured token server based on Tokens Studio. At the front end, they rely on React and TypeScript to ensure reusability and typing.
Using the example of a React component, Anna shows the integration of design tokens:
import tokens from '@company/tokens'; function PrimaryButton({ children }) { return ( ); }Automated pipelines ensure that design changes - for example in colour palettes or typography - remain synchronised between Figma, GitHub and npm. In the coming years, Anna expects AI-based design review bots, personalised onboarding processes and API-first architectures to further accelerate system integration and simplify the development of various product lines.
Focus on usability and accessibility
Anna and her team are focussing on the consistent integration of accessibility standards and user feedback. Automated checks - for example with axe-core - supplement manual tests with screen readers and contrast tools directly in Storybook. "Past deficits in individual components have sharpened our awareness of how important it is to prioritise and continuously improve accessibility."
One best practice: accessibility is established as a mandatory release criterion and thus integrated into the CI/CD process. In addition, the team regularly obtains feedback from different user groups in order to further improve actual usability.
Collaboration: the team model for scaled design systems
As the number of stakeholders in the design system increases, so does the number of users. Anna describes a hybrid model for this: a central group controls the architecture and governance, while so-called product champions act as multipliers in each feature team. This structure promotes decentralised further development and makes new ideas more accessible.
Open pull request rounds, regular RFCs and Q&A sessions contribute to a lively community. It is crucial that responsibility and expertise remain within the teams. Innovation impulses and quality management thus develop continuously and are not limited to a centralised instance.
Challenges and pitfalls on the way to a scalable system
Interdisciplinary collaboration brings with it typical hurdles. Anna cites examples such as demarcations between design and development, diverging interests and the well-known "not-invented-here" syndrome. "If there is a lack of clear roles and processes, review processes come to a standstill and decisions are delayed."
She sees solutions in participative further development: contributions are recognised, for example through internal badges or targeted awards. This keeps motivation high. It is also helpful to transparently collect and regularly communicate KPIs such as the adoption rate, reduction of individual components and the speed of releases.
Trends and forecasts: What will the next few years bring?
Numerous further developments are on the horizon for the period up to 2025/26. Anna expects a stronger fusion of design and code, made possible by new interfaces and AI-supported generators. "In future, prototypes can be transferred to the development environment in just a few steps. Static style guides are increasingly giving way to API-controlled platforms with live preview and real-time documentation."
Sustainability aspects are also influencing architecture decisions: Minimising code, increasing performance and supporting different display modes such as dark mode are becoming key requirements. Anna recommends planning tech debt refactorings into the roadmap at an early stage and continuing the institutionalised exchange between the user community and developers.
Conclusion & outlook
Design systems are developing into strategic platforms that companies are increasingly viewing holistically. Those who emphasise collaborative processes, consistent accessibility and the close integration of design, development and product management today will create a stable basis for future success. The experience of Anna Fischer and her team makes it clear: scaling is an ongoing task that requires flexibility and open dialogue. In the coming years, design systems landscapes will become more agile, more networked and offer a wide range of opportunities for improved software quality and more efficient processes within large organisations.
