Design Groups Melbourne

Shipping with AI

// OVERVIEW The Shipping with AI meetup (formerly UX Design in SaaS) has partnered with the [Outlook AI Conference 2026](https://theoutlook.io/events/outlook-ai) to bring you an in-person evening as part of the conference activities. Shipping with AI is a meetup for designers, product managers and engineers who want to move past the hype and learn how AI is actually being used to build and ship real products. No theory-heavy keynotes. Just demos, real workflows and practical tips you can take back to your team the next day. // WHAT IS HAPPENING Our three speakers come at AI from different angles: delivery in regulated industries, engineering and AI agents, and design quality. They'll each share how their teams are shipping with AI right now. That includes the tools, the workflows, what's working, and what they've learned the hard way. Expect presentations, live demos, Q&A, drinks, food, games, prizes and plenty of time to network. // WHEN 6:00 – 8:30pm, Wednesday 11th November // WHERE Nintex Offices, Level 14, 530 Collins Street, Melbourne VIC 3000 // WHY COME ALONG * See it, don't just hear about it. Live demos of real AI workflows, not slides about the future. * Practical takeaways. Tips and tricks you can try with your team straight away. * Three perspectives in one night. Delivery, engineering and design, so you get the full picture of what it takes to ship with AI. * Ask the hard questions. How do you keep AI output on-brand? How do you bring AI into regulated businesses safely? How do you give coding agents the right context? * Meet your people. Connect with Melbourne designers, PMs and engineers working through the same challenges. * It's free, and there's food, drinks and prizes. // OUR SPEAKERS ANASTAS MANOJLOVSKI – Technical Director, Whitefox Cloud Consulting Anastas has spent 20 years where customers, sales and engineering meet. He specialises in turning messy problems into solutions that actually get delivered. At Whitefox he leads sales and delivery for clients in financial services, insurance, health and logistics, and oversees 25+ engineers across Australia and offshore. His work includes governed Claude adoption with human review and audit trails for financial advice provider Padua, and AI road-defect detection models running in production. Before Whitefox, he spent nine years at Whispir, including five as AU/NZ Head of Solution Architecture. Anastas brings a grounded view on getting AI into regulated businesses without creating new risk. TOM PETERSON – Co-Founder, ctxpipe.ai Tom is a builder who orchestrates local and cloud AI models to get things done, fast. He is co-founder of ctxpipe.ai, an open-source, Git-backed context layer for coding agents and software factories. He is also Head of Product at TRU Rec AI, building computer vision analytics with open-source models. With 15 years in tech across project management, business analysis, design, product and founding, Tom is passionate about developer experience and building tools that make engineers' lives easier. Previously, he co-founded Appear, an API discovery and automation tool. HAMISH O'NEILL – Founder, UI Rules Hamish is a multi-award-winning design leader with more than two decades in digital product design across retail, telecommunications, finance and digital marketplaces. He is the founder of UI Rules, a governance layer that serves brand and design system rules to AI coding tools like Cursor, Claude Code and v0, keeping AI-generated interfaces on-brand. Previously, Hamish was Head of Design Systems at Carsales, where he led the team behind the Torq design system. Before that he was Design Chapter Lead and Design Lead for the Brand & Design System at ANZ. // OUTLOOK AI CONFERENCE The [Outlook AI Conference 2026](https://theoutlook.io/events/outlook-ai) is on Thursday 12th November in Melbourne and is not to be missed. [Tickets are on sale now](https://theoutlook.io/events/outlook-ai#block-tickets-62bf87ad-1efc-4e26-91e6-cd62d9c8affb). // SPONSORS A big thank you to Nintex, our amazing sponsor, for making this event happen.

Becoming Zen with CSS

From tables, to floats, to flex, to grid, from Bootstrap to Tailwind to CSS modules and more, CSS has evolved and changed a lot over the years. Whether creating a design system or just trying to center a button, CSS is a powerful and often misunderstood part of software development. In this session we will go back to basics, learning the fundamentals of CSS and applying them in your very own CSS Zen Garden project. CSS Zen Garden was introduced in 2013, all designs start with the same HTML file and rely on just the power of CSS to make unique and eye catching designs. No experience with CSS or HTML or code is required. Participation requires minimal set up as it has been designed to empower everyone to create an entry by the end of the session that is unique to them. **Agenda:** 5:30 - 6:00 Networking 6:00 - 7:00 Workshop 7:00 - 7:30 Networking **Sponsors:** This event is sponsored by Stile Education. Thanks for empowering women and allies to excel in their technology careers 💙

SEEK's CTO on AI transformation: a lunchtime fireside chat with James Ross

Join us for another exciting **in-person** Product Tank event! The event is free, but seats are limited—secure yours now for a fantastic opportunity to meet the speakers and connect with the community. **Event outline** James Ross, CTO of SEEK, sits down for an informal fireside chat on AI transformation. No slides, just questions: • What building with AI on the side has changed about how he thinks about engineering at seek • What's been tried, what's worked and what hasn't • Where it's hardest: people, process or tooling • The experiments he's most excited to run next • His advice to other leaders **About James** James has spent about half of his four decades in tech as a programmer and tech lead, and the other half as a senior manager and leader across startups, scale-ups and corporates. He's had more luck than he thinks is fair, and is one of the only people you'll meet who's written a book you can buy on Amazon, music you can listen to on Spotify and software you can buy online as well. He's very excited about getting his coding mojo back thanks to AI and although he failed to get either of his daughters into tech, he's going to try again with his two grandkids! Don’t miss this opportunity to gain invaluable insights and network with industry experts! **This is an in-person only event.** Doors open 12:15pm, core session from 12:30-1:30pm. See you there, Product Tank Melbourne Team

Fabulous 70s: Floor talk with fashion designer Jenny Bannister

A11y Allies Roundtable: Accessibility Horror Stories

October topic: **Accessibility Horror Stories** 👻 Proudly supported by **Builure**. *Free event* We’re giving our monthly roundtable a Halloween twist. Bring along an “**accessibility horror story**” — an **#AccessibilityFail** you’ve experienced, encountered or spotted in the wild — and let’s unpack what went wrong and, more importantly, how it could have been avoided or improved. This isn’t about naming and shaming. It’s about learning from accessibility failures, sharing different perspectives and workshopping better solutions together. *Spooky hats are completely optional…but definitely encouraged.* 🎃 Whether you work in accessibility, advocate for inclusion, have lived experience, or simply want to learn more, you’re welcome to join the conversation. * No presentations * Open, facilitated discussion * Share experiences and ideas * Workshop practical solutions * Make genuine connections **Date:** Tuesday 27 October 2026 **Time:** 5:15pm – 7:30pm *Light refreshments will be provided. Please let us know in advance if you have any dietary requirements so we can accommodate them where possible.* **Location: [Tank Stream Labs](https://share.google/EFqphtpudwJQM5c3u)** Level 5, 440 Collins Street, Melbourne VIC 3000 The venue includes: \- A quiet\, private event space \- Wheelchair access \- An accessible toilet on Level 6 **Building entry** * Enter the building via the Collins Street entrance. * Elevator access to Level 5 is available until 5:45 pm. **Running late or unable to access Level 5?** No problem. Send us a message on chat with your estimated arrival time or let us know if you’re waiting in the lobby near the red couches, and one of our organisers will come down to meet you. **Accessibility questions or requirements** Creating an inclusive and welcoming event is important to us. We’ve included accessibility information in the event FAQs to help you know what to expect before attending. If you have an accessibility requirement, concern or question that isn’t covered in the FAQs, please contact us before the event. We’ll do what we reasonably can to support you and help you feel comfortable participating in the roundtable.

Temple of Desire + Post show party

Welcome to the next 2026 AWS Melbourne Well-Architected User Group Meetup!

Hi Architects, Welcome to our next AWS Melbourne Well-Architected User Group Meetup for 2026, including more exceptional speakers and topics! :-D At each meetup we covered off various pillars in detail, best-practices and insights from industry leaders that specialise in the Well-Architected Framework. And giving away drones, of course. Lots of drones. **Please also note that AWS Security now requests a company name and company email where it is available. If you are a student, please list your institution and your student email address at that institution 👍** We'll be announcing more speakers on [https://well-architected.me](https://well-architected.me/) and previewing presentations during the coming weeks - our speakers and details this month include: * **Michael Taylor, Lakebase Specialist, Databricks** **How Lakebase provides a well-architected platform for next generation application and AI development.** Come and hear how Databricks experts show how customers run applications and agents on Lakebase; serverless Postgres governed by Unity Catalog. See instant branching, scale-to-zero, point-in-time recovery and synced tables in action. The Databricks team will also give a first look at LTAP; one open, governed copy of data for transactions and analytics, with no ETL in between. * **Mystery Speaker** **The AWS AI Competency - can automation support?** Achieving the AWS AI Competency can unlock many benefits for AI customers. In this talk, we explore if achievement of a competency can be automated. This month's menu will include: * Pizzas * Beer * Wine: Big and red 🤤 NB: Please check in up the stairs from the ground floor to the Mezzanine Level. So come join us at 5:30 for a 6pm start, followed by beer, wine, pizza and friendly networking after our talks :-) Tired of Linkedin’s "thought leadership”, spam and advertising? Join https://well-architected.me/ , the AWS community built for architects, developers and cloud professionals. * Connect with experienced AWS practitioners * Preview upcoming AWS Meetups and relive past content * Create and review beautiful AWS case studies in minutes * Prepare for AWS certifications with curated quizzes * Show your manager and reports you’re well-architected (Please note that by registering to attend you agree to your details being shared as and where required with Amazon Web Services and AWS Well-Architected User Group partners) in

Art, Aesthetics, & Appetites: A Double Treat with Mei!

Indian.

Careers in a Changing Market and Building Better Teams (Hybrid Event)

This meetup event will be a hybrid event (online and in-person) 🎤 Jade Bennett, Founder of Middleton Executive, will discuss what employers are hiring for, why candidates may be missing out, and how professionals can position themselves in today’s market. 💬 Gretchen Pitt, product builder, will share insights on moving across organisations of different sizes and how AI is changing jobs and role expectations. 🌐 Alexar Pendashteh, product builder, innovation consultant and President of the Linux Users of Victoria, will discuss un-careering in a world dominated by AI and automation. 🤝 Connect with people interested in product, technology, innovation, careers and organisational transformation. **In-person Venue:** Inspire9 [https://www.inspire9.com/](https://www.inspire9.com/) * Melbourne’s original coworking space (est. 2008) * Conveniently located next to Richmond station **Online attendance:** This meetup event will be streamed live via Big Blue Button. Link will be visible on the day

Denim and Lingerie Workshop

Deep Work - The Aesthetic Advantage

**THEME** At this Deep Work event we'll explore **The Aesthetic Advantage** \- how we are all artists at heart\. The Aesthetic Advantage invites us to see ourselves as craftspeople, whatever our job title: bringing care, beauty and excellence to every detail, even the ones no one will ever see. **TIMING** \*Please arrive by 7:00PM for a 7:15PM start. The event will conclude at 8:45PM. **SETUP** You will be seated in small groups of about 5 people. We encourage you to sit with people that you don't yet know. :) **TICKETS** Tickets are $20. We're happy to provide full refunds for cancellations received with 48+ hours notice. **PROGRAM** Through carefully selected quotes and interactive discussions, we will: * **Explore** and notice where in our own work we bring artistry and refinement * **Share stories, laughter and insights** of moments work when we felt the quiet pride of making something well, or were moved by someone else's work * **Create casual and fun art** * **Develop practical ideas** to bring more craft into our everyday work, through how we finish, how we attend to the unseen, and how we honour the work of others Come ready to discover the craftsperson in you, whether you sweep streets, write code or lead a company. You'll leave inspired to carry excellence all the way through to the back of the drawer, equipped with fresh perspectives on care, patience and the quiet dignity of work done well. **PARKING** 2P parking is available at the venue. [Use this link to navigate there.](https://maps.app.goo.gl/wruty3s4V4pQLmaZ8)