The design pipeline that now powers WestEd's fastest, on-brand web builds

Role: Lead UX Designer — originated, designed, and led build
Platform/Stack: Figma (component library + design tokens) → custom WordPress (theme.json, Gutenberg native and custom blocks); WCAG 2.2 AA (accessible interaction patterns via USWDS, Van11y, and custom plugin)
Team: 4-person in-house design/dev team, with rotating contract contributors; component specs implemented by front-end developer
Timeline: Originated during a funding downturn; adopted across 5+ projects and counting
My Deliverables: Project initiation and leadership, Figma prototype, component library & token pipeline

Overview

WestEd builds a high volume of public-facing sites for state agencies, federal grantees, and educational nonprofits — each traditionally designed and built from scratch. During a federal funding downturn, I built the business case for a reusable design system — a Figma component library with a built-in token pipeline, paired to a WordPress Gutenberg template — and led a cross-functional team to design, build, and roll it out.

New project sites now launch at roughly 20% of the cost of a custom build, with design and development time cut in half or more. It also gave WestEd its first real mechanism for calibrated brand cohesion — tight adherence for signature products, deliberate flexibility further out for more distinct child brands.

Purpose & Context

The idea wasn't new — the team had agreed for years that building every site from scratch was unsustainable. A funding downturn changed the math: with less billable work in the pipeline, the cost argument for a template system was suddenly the strongest it had ever been. I built the business case, tied it to the moment, and got it funded.

Objective

Build a system flexible enough to handle WestEd's actual range of service sites — while being fast and cheap enough to beat a custom build. The hard problem wasn't visual design; it was figuring out what was genuinely repeatable versus what needed to flex.

[Figma screens: component library, theme.json/Gutenberg pairing, and the three sites across the spectrum — Disciplinary Literacy, Board of Directors, Math Pathways and Pitfalls]

The Results

• ~20% of the cost of a custom build
• Half or more off design and development time
• 5 projects adopted in year one, more underway
• WCAG built in at the component level, speeding up every accessibility audit since

"The WordPress template product stands out as a significant achievement — she recognized a gap in our service offerings, built stakeholder support, and created a scalable solution that directly addresses budget and timeline constraints for project teams." — Vanessa Scheirer, UX Lead & Manager

[Full case study coming soon →] (links to downloadable long-form write-up: full discovery process, the spheres-of-influence brand model, and reflection)

In the meantime, check out how the Template works in the wild: Disciplinary Literacy or Math Pathways and Pitfalls.