mara estalilla.

About me

years online. in product design. Still untangling.

I work where the constraints are real: fixed backends, fuzzy requirements, and decisions that still have to ship. I'm strongest at turning tangled problems into structure, and getting a room of people to agree on it. Outside of work, I'm usually untangling yarn, which is less different than it sounds.

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Mara sitting in front of a water lily paintingHi, that's me!

My story

The story so far,
in three chapters

Chapter one2007–14

The MySpace years

  1. 2007Discovered the internet early and got curious about how websites were made. Taught myself HTML and CSS, designed custom MySpace and Friendster layouts, built my first website, and learned Photoshop through online communities.
  2. 2009Turned curiosity into my first paid work, earning $10 for basic HTML and CSS services. Learned WordPress, PHP and MySQL, and started understanding how design and development fit together.
  3. 2011Shifted toward visual design, building celebrity fansites and refining my CSS and layout skills in Photoshop.
  4. 2014Began freelancing more seriously while in college, designing websites for small businesses and individuals.
Chapter two2018–20

The detour and the return

  1. 2018Returned to design after a brief hiatus with a stronger interest in product thinking. Joined design communities, studied design systems, and worked on early product-style projects like dashboards and content-heavy tools.
  2. 2020Landed my first UI/UX role at an e-commerce startup, designing multiple products end to end and occasionally contributing to front-end development. A fast, formative experience that built confidence and clarified how I wanted to work.
Chapter three2023–now

The enterprise years

  1. 2023Joined a major insurance company as a UX designer, working on enterprise-level products in a regulated environment where clarity, consistency and collaboration were essential.
  2. 2025Now in consulting, still focused on clarity, craft, and turning complexity into calm, usable experiences.

How I work

The rules I design by

  • Product strategy
  • UX research & design
  • UI design & systems
  • Prototyping & testing
i.People first.Every design decision starts with understanding the people who will use it.
ii.Remove before you add.The best solutions often come from removing complexity, not adding features.
iii.Details are the design.Great experiences are built on countless small decisions, made well.

My toolkit

The tools I reach for

Every day

  • DesignFigma · FigJam
  • AIClaude · Claude Code · Claude Design

    AI takes the grunt work (prototypes, research synthesis, gap mapping) so I can spend my time on strategy and ideas.

  • CodeVS Code · GitHub
  • ShipVercel

Also fluent in

  • Miro
  • Askable
  • UserTesting
  • Cursor

When I'm offline

A cabled knit panel in progress, with two balls of yarn

Knitting

Slow, hands-on, and honestly just untangling with yarn.

A bowl of tonkotsu ramen with grilled chashu and a soft egg

Good food

Tonkotsu ramen, always.

Khaokhao, a white cat, peering down at the camera, tongue out

My cat

Khaokhao, head of QA.

Got something
complicated?

That's my favorite kind of problem. Hand it over.

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© 2026 Mara Estalilla