Building a Thriving Design Community in Chicago
Chicago is more than a skyline. It is a living studio where architecture, civic tech, and everyday products are shaped by people who care deeply about how others move through the world.
The Chicago Design Community
I did not fall in love with Chicago because of the skyline.
Do not get me wrong, the skyline is iconic. You can stand on the riverwalk, look up at the glass and steel, and feel the weight of a century of architecture staring back at you. But what made me stay, what made Chicago feel like home as a designer, came in quieter moments.
It was the first time someone I had just met at a meetup stayed late to look at my portfolio. It was the way a senior designer casually said, "Send me your case study, I will mark it up for you." It was the feeling of riding the Blue Line after an event, notebook full of ideas, knowing I was not the only one on that train thinking about type scales and task flows.
Chicago is a place where design is not just an aesthetic. It is a way of caring for other people.
This is my attempt to capture what makes the Chicago design community special, from its roots in architecture and the New Bauhaus, to the meetups and mentorship that keep the city quietly pushing design forward today.
A City Built On Design, Not Just Skyscrapers
If you live here long enough, you start to see the city as a layered design system.
You notice how the grid and the lake orient you without an app. You feel how the L wraps the Loop like a navigation pattern, how the alleys function as backstage systems that keep the visible experience clean. You stand on State Street and realize that, long before "user centered design" became a buzzword, Chicago was already experimenting with form, function, and human movement.
Chicago architecture is the most obvious example. Louis Sullivan, often called the father of the skyscraper, spent a good piece of his life here, and is widely associated with the phrase "form follows function." His work, and the Chicago School of architecture, helped define what modern buildings could be when design is honest about purpose instead of hiding behind decoration.
But Chicago’s design DNA did not stop at the skyline.
It moved into product, graphic design, and eventually digital experiences. If you care about UX today, you are quietly standing on top of all of that.
From Bauhaus To The L: Chicago’s Design Roots
When the original Bauhaus in Germany was forced to close in the 1930s, its ideas did not disappear. They crossed the ocean.
In 1937, Bauhaus master László Moholy-Nagy founded The New Bauhaus in Chicago. It eventually evolved into what is now the Institute of Design at Illinois Tech (ID), a graduate school focused on human centered and systemic design.
The New Bauhaus brought a philosophy that still feels shockingly modern. It treated design as experimentation. It blurred the boundaries between art, technology, and everyday life. It expected designers to care about systems, not just surfaces. That mindset took root here and never really left.
At the same time, Chicago became a quiet engine of corporate and graphic design.
Walter Paepcke and the Container Corporation of America built a reputation not just for packaging, but for investing heavily in design and visual communication. Their advertising campaigns and commissioned posters set a precedent for serious, concept driven corporate design long before "brand" became a staple in every pitch deck.
If you squint, you can see a thread running through all of this.
- •Sullivan argues that form should follow function.
- •The New Bauhaus and Institute of Design embed experimentation, systems thinking, and human experience.
- •Corporate pioneers in Chicago commit to design as a core part of communication, not an afterthought.
All of that becomes the soil. Modern UX in this city grows out of it.
From Posters To Pixels: The UX Layer
Today, you might not think about the New Bauhaus when you open a Chicago based product, book a service, or log into a logistics platform that quietly keeps freight moving. But that influence is absolutely there.
Modern Chicago UX work often lives in places that never make the front page of design blogs:
- •Internal tools that keep supply chains from grinding to a halt.
- •Platforms that help nonprofits manage programs and communities.
- •Civic tech projects that help residents understand data, policy, and power.
- •Enterprise dashboards that save someone two hours a day by fixing a confusing workflow.
It is not always glamorous. But it is deeply human.
That is what I love about designing here. The city attracts people who care less about flashy Dribbble shots and more about making the experience of work, transit, and public life a little less painful. Chicago is full of product designers, service designers, and researchers quietly untangling complexity for others.
Where The Community Actually Meets
If you are new to the Chicago design scene, the good news is that you do not have to search in the dark. There are anchors you can grab onto.
Here are some of the places and groups that consistently show up for the community:
- •
AIGA Chicago
The local chapter of AIGA, the professional association for design, with events that range from talks and workshops to community initiatives.
Website: https://chicago.aiga.org - •
UXD Chicago
A large UX community on Meetup focused on the future of design, innovation, and technology, with curated speakers and networking.
Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/uxdchicago - •
UXPA Chicago
A local group associated with the User Experience Professionals Association that leans into user research, information architecture, and strategy.
Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/uxpachicago - •
UX Book Club Chicago
A relaxed meetup that uses books as a backdrop for conversations about product and UX design, but is friendly even if you did not finish the reading.
Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/uxchicago - •
UX Synergies
A volunteer run community that brings people together around UX, CX, AI, and the wider digital design world, with a mix of talks and networking.
Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/uxsynergies - •
Chi Hack Night
A weekly civic tech meetup that has been running for years, where designers, developers, and community members build and discuss tools for Chicago residents.
Website: https://chihacknight.org
There are more, and they change over time, but if you show up to any of these consistently, you will start to see familiar faces.
If you want a general hub to browse what is happening right now, start here:
- •Meetup – UX and design events near Chicago
https://www.meetup.com/find/us--il--chicago/ux-design
Treat that link as your living directory. New groups appear, others go quiet, but the underlying pattern is constant: people in this city keep carving out spaces to make better things together.
A Personal Map Of Belonging
Communities are not built by organizations. They are built by moments.
Some of the most impactful moments in my own Chicago design journey did not happen on stage or in a conference hall. They happened in the gaps around the "official" content.
- •The quiet walk back to the train after an event where someone admitted they were feeling burned out and we talked honestly about boundaries and burnout in UX.
- •The first time I brought a rough case study to a portfolio night and someone offered real critique instead of polite praise.
- •The coffee shop conversation where a designer in a completely different industry helped me see a logistics problem in a new way.
- •The message that started with, "Hey, I saw your question in the chat, can I share something that helped me when I was learning this?"
Chicago has a reputation for being a "Midwestern nice" city, but the design community goes deeper than that. There is a kind of shared understanding that we are all learning, we are all stumbling, and we can still help each other ship better work.
I have been in rooms here where junior designers, senior ICs, managers, and freelance folks are all trading stories about the messy parts of the job. No one is pretending they have it all figured out. That mix of humility and craft is very Chicago to me.
Mentorship As A Quiet Superpower
If you stay here long enough, you start to see how much of the design community runs on informal mentorship.
You will not always find it in official programs. You will find it in:
- •Slack channels and Discord servers where someone says, "Drop your portfolio here and I will review a few each month."
- •Senior designers who send you a Figma link full of comments on your work, even though their own calendar is packed.
- •Peers who bring you into their projects, not because they need extra hands, but because they remember someone did that for them.
Some of the most meaningful growth I have experienced came from Chicago designers who did not know me well, but still took the time to open a door.
It might be a recommendation for a role. It might be an introduction to someone they think you should meet. It might be a simple "Have you considered framing this case study in terms of business impact, not just user flows."
Mentorship here often looks like friendship plus accountability. It is not about hero narratives. It is about mutual uplift.
Chicago’s Flavor Of Design: Practical, Grounded, Human
If you compare Chicago to places like the Bay Area or New York, the differences show up in the design culture too.
Chicago has its own flavor:
- •
Practical over performative
We care deeply about craft, but there is usually a business problem, a civic challenge, or a human pain point driving the work. It is less about winning awards, more about "did this actually make life better for someone." - •
Systems and service thinking baked in
Maybe it is the influence of the Institute of Design and years of large organizations, but a lot of designers here naturally think in systems, services, and long lived products. We are often designing for ops teams, frontline workers, and residents who do not care what "delightful" means, they just want things to work. - •
Cross pollination between disciplines
Architects, product designers, developers, researchers, service designers, and civic organizers bump into each other often. If you go to something like Chi Hack Night, you will see people who do not call themselves "designers" still actively shaping experiences. - •
A respect for history without being trapped by it
The city honors its architectural and design heritage, but the people doing work today are not stuck in nostalgia. They are asking, "What does good design look like for this community now, with the constraints we have."
If you are wired to care about impact, about real people and real constraints, Chicago feels like a very natural home.
How To Step Into The Community
If you are reading this from within the city, wondering how to plug in, here is a simple path that has worked for me and others.
1. Pick One Anchor Group
Look at the list above and choose one that feels closest to where you are right now.
- •
New to design or early in your career
Try UX Book Club Chicago or UXD Chicago. - •
Focused on research and strategy
UXPA Chicago is a good fit. - •
Want exposure to different disciplines
Chi Hack Night and AIGA Chicago events are great places to meet people who work outside traditional product roles.
Commit to attending three events from that group within a few months. Relationships grow from repeated contact.
2. Show Up Fully
When you go, resist the urge to hang back against the wall the entire time. You do not have to be the loudest person in the room. Just:
- •Introduce yourself to one person.
- •Ask them what kind of work they are doing.
- •Be honest about where you are in your journey.
You would be surprised how often that leads to introductions, advice, or even future collaboration.
3. Share Your Work, Even If It Feels Messy
One of the best things about the Chicago design community is that it has a high tolerance for in progress work. Use that.
- •Bring a rough portfolio to a review.
- •Share a draft case study.
- •Talk about a problem you are stuck on.
You are not wasting anyone’s time by being honest about what you are trying to learn.
4. Offer Something Back
Community is not a service you consume. It is something you help maintain.
Even if you are early in your career, you have something to give.
- •Take notes at an event and share them in the group Slack or Discord.
- •Connect two people who might benefit from knowing each other.
- •Volunteer to help with check in or setup at a meetup.
- •Share resources, book recommendations, or templates that helped you.
Those small acts build trust and make the space better for everyone.
Why Chicago Still Matters To Designers
In a world where you can technically work from anywhere, it is fair to ask: does being in Chicago still matter?
For me, the answer is yes.
It matters because when you walk through this city, you can feel layers of design history under your feet. It is not abstract. It is physical, visible, and lived.
- •You can stand in front of buildings that changed how the world thinks about architecture.
- •You can visit the institutions that carried Bauhaus ideas into American design education.
- •You can sit at a meetup next to someone designing logistics software, while another person is working on a civic project, and realize you are all part of the same ecosystem.
Chicago is not just a backdrop. It is an active ingredient in how many of us practice design.
It asks us to be practical and ambitious at the same time. It pushes us to care about people who will never know our names. It reminds us that good design often hides in plain sight, in the little frictions removed and the quiet hours saved.
A Quiet Invitation
If you are a designer in Chicago, or thinking about becoming one, consider this an invitation.
Come to an event. Share your work. Ask the question you are afraid is too basic. Offer feedback when someone is brave enough to show their portfolio. Take the long way home after a meetup and let the city sink in a little.
The Chicago design community is not perfect. No community is. But it is real, it is resilient, and it is full of people who care about making things that help others move through the world with a little less friction and a little more dignity.
And if you ever see me at a meetup, feel free to say hi.
We are all still designing our way through this city together.