Tokyo Design: Your Best UX Career Buddy in Japan

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About us

🌵 Tokyo Design is an AI-native, design-led community hub dedicated to empowering product designers, developers, and builders through hands-on practice and collective learning. Based in Tokyo with a global reach across Europe, the UK, and North America, we bridge theory and practice through workshops, design jams, hackathons, and expert-led keynotes.
Our pillars:

📒 Continuous, practical expertise
Deliver actionable insights through hands-on workshops that help designers level up job-hunting skills and tackle real-world workplace design challenges.
✨ AI-native product design excellence
Support rising designers in creating high-quality AI-native product experiences by embedding best practices into their workflows and ensuring outstanding AI user experiences.
➰ Rapid idea validation for builders
Help builders quickly validate product ideas through iteration, usability testing, and structured brainstorming—driving clearer decisions and stronger business outcomes.
🧑‍🎨 Design & builder talent pool
Connect designers and builders with the right clients, roles, and companies—creating meaningful matches that benefit both talent and organizations.

Upcoming events

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[Online] Portfolios That Get You Hired In The Age of AI
Sat, Nov 7 · 7:00 PM JST
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Online
Online
Hey, Product Friends! ✨
Welcome to Tokyo Design Community, one of the most active AI-driven and career-focused product design communities in Japan, where design meets technology, business, and the tools shaping what comes next. We're focused on AI-native practical insights, real-world experience, and learning together.

This time, we're bringing one of the most followed voices in design careers straight to you: Aneta Kmiecik, the design educator and hiring partner trusted by a community of 200K+ designers worldwide. She has reviewed thousands of portfolios and coached 1,000+ designers into their next role. Now she's joining us live to answer the question that matters most right now: What kind of portfolio actually gets you hired?

🎁 BONUS: Live Portfolio Critique with Aneta! 🎁
Anyone who submits portfolio will have the chance to get it critiqued live by Aneta during the session! ✨

Over the past year, AI has reshaped what companies expect from designers. Roles are shifting, responsibilities are expanding, and the hiring bar keeps rising. So many of us are reacting the same way: trying every new tool, vibe coding side projects, rebuilding our portfolios again and again, hoping something sticks.

But here's the truth: doing more is not the strategy.
Building aimlessly costs you time and energy, and it often leaves you with a portfolio that looks like everyone else's. The designers getting hired today aren't the ones who do everything. They're the ones who know what the market needs and focus on exactly that.

Are you:
💡 Spending hours on new AI tools and side projects but still not getting interviews?
💡 Getting rejected after portfolio reviews with zero feedback?
💡 Unsure which skills and projects are actually worth your effort right now?

You might be wondering:

• What do hiring teams and founders really look at in the first few seconds?
• Which AI skills are becoming baseline, and which ones will set you apart?
• What should I stop doing, and where should I double down?
• How do I tell a clear story instead of showing everything?

✨ Event Highlights:
🎯 Insider view from the hiring side: what makes a portfolio pass or fail, from someone who reviews them for startups
🔥 Focus over noise: how to stop chasing everything and invest in what the market needs from designers today
🤖 Proving your AI skills: what to show, and how to show it, in a portfolio
💬 Live Q&A: bring your toughest portfolio and career questions

🎙️ Featured Speaker:
Topic: There's No Right Portfolio, Only Your Own?

![img](https://images.lumacdn.com/cdn-cgi/image/format=auto,fit=cover,dpr=2,quality=75,width=800,height=800/uploads/9j/b7202782-d3b3-423b-860a-00855694f585.jpeg)

Aneta Kmiecik (She/Her)
Designpreneur | Founder of Be Your Own Design Team | Creator of the uxportfolio.co | Design Hiring Partner

Aneta is an independent designer, founder, and educator one of the most recognized voices in design careers today on a mission to help creatives grow their careers and find their own paths, with 96K+ followers on LinkedIn and a 200K+ followers as @ux.aneta.

Through Be Your Own Design Team, her education platform, she has coached over 1,000 creatives on portfolios, job search, and career growth, and taught 800+ students in her UX Portfolio Course. With 15+ years across architecture, graphic design, and UX, she also partners with startups to hire designers. Aneta has lived and worked across Poland, Japan, and Norway, and shares design and career insights with 200K+ followers as @ux.aneta.

Her career spans 15 years across architecture, graphic design, and UX. She worked as an architect in Poland and Japan, became a Senior UX Designer in fintech at Vipps MobilePay in Oslo, and then went independent. Today she also works as a design hiring partner for startups, so she sees what gets designers hired, and what gets them rejected, every single week.

This is a rare chance to learn directly from someone who sits on both sides of the table. Don't miss it.

Our Community: Where Curiosity Meets Opportunity, Theory Meets Practice 💫
We're a diverse, welcoming collective of:
👩‍💻 Product Managers
🎨 Designers & Creators
🧑‍💼 Builders & Entrepreneurs
🛠️ Developers & AI Engineers
📈 Marketers
📚 Students
✨ A supportive, judgment-free zone to exchange ideas and grow together

🙌 We'll check in with everyone beforehand to ensure a smooth, delightful experience!

🗓 November 7 (Sat), 7:00 PM JST / 11:00 AM CET, Online
22 attendees