In June 2026 I had the chance to present at the Pixel Pioneers event. Here is the corresponding blog post.
Being a designer often comes with the assumption that we can clearly picture the outcome before it exists. We may be expected to have a vision, imagine the outcome, and “see” the solution early on.
But what if you can’t? Not all designers work that way, and in this post, I’ll explore ways to design without relying on mental imagery or a fully formed vision. Drawing from my experience with aphantasia and enterprise B2B design work, I’ll show how replacing imagined outcomes with structure, language, and shared artefacts leads to clearer decisions, better collaboration, and understanding.
What do you see when you think of apples?#
Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily visualise mental images. It is a neurological variation that affects how people think, remember, and learn. People with Aphantasia have limited to no “mind’s eye”. The mind’s eye is helpful when you read books or count sheep, or perhaps think of apples.
Now, if you did think about the apple in as much detail as you can; colour, texture, shape, etc. What did you see? If you saw a hyper-realistic apple, you most likely don’t have aphantasia. Aphantasia is a sliding scale so you might even see the shape and colour of an apple. Aphantasia is a spectrum so perhaps you saw an apple in less detail or an apple with no detail. Or maybe, like me, you saw nothing. If you saw nothing, well, you just might have aphantasia.
Aphantasia affects about 1% to 4% of the global population, that’s about 1 in 25 people. But there can be implication to daily life. Memory is used to store lists and fact, not visual cues like photos or movies. Saying that, people with aphantasia can recognise faces, remember experiences, and solve problems. To work around this people can use words, concepts, or experience.
You would be forgiven in assuming that the design industry is full of people who can “see their ideas”. But the creative visionary is a stereotype and as we all probably know, not everyone sees things the same or, in some cases, at all.
So how can a person with aphantasia design?#
The first step is to set limits and you can’t design for what you don’t know.
Start by understanding your constraints, this could mean getting a realistic timeline or understanding the tech or design limitations. Fundamentally you need to define what the design can’t be before deciding what it should be. Using existing solutions can limit the scope, for better our worse, and working on legacy products can mean that you inherit limitation. Even if they are not the best solutions you still need to work with them.
Where you are not dealing with archaic tech debt, you can use design systems. Design systems shine in regards to creating order and understanding limitations, especially if you want to scale products and design decisions.
Use what you know#
When working on a green field project on something where there are less limitations, you need to work a little differently. UX design has been around for long enough for mental models to be established, use these where necessary. Better yet, bake them into your design system. Additionally, if like me, you’ve been working for a little while, you’ve acquired a fair bit of knowledge. Tacit knowledge in your domain can help you design solutions confidently when you can’t visualise them. But if you don’t know something for sure, remember user research still plays an important role in the design process.
Create order#
You can start creating order by using structure and facts, this can initially be done by writing. Writing things down before you start working on Figma, or wireframes if you are old fashioned, can help cement your limitation and understanding of a the brief. It highlights what you know and more importantly what you don’t.
Speaking the same language establishes shared vocabulary to prevents silent misalignment across teams, documentation can help with this. This also creates a sense of tangibility because you are able to name things, which helps a great deal in the absence of a mind’s eye. Sharing artefacts, like documentation and design files build shared understanding. Artefacts replace assumed shared vision, the earlier the better to clear any misunderstanding or assumptions.
Overview#
There are some natural advantages to having aphanastia; firstly you are less likely to be emotionally attached to your ideas, this makes it easier to pivot or change tact where necessary. You can create more inclusive work as you rely less heavily on a fixed vision. Additionally, your documentation might be clearer and better established. This has the added benefit of sharing more reliable documentation with other stakeholders. You even can write well structured AI prompts with supporting documents because of the need to establish facts early.
Being a visual thinker is not the only way the think when you are a designer and aphantasia does not stop someone being creative or hinder innovation, the creative process just changes.