Ryan Brock

DIY

Product Design

UX + UI Design

Web Design

Branding

Illustration


Lead Designer

2013 – 2015

DIY is an awesome community for kids with a huge library of learning content and hands-on projects. Kids can share share photos and videos, learn from real mentors, and track their progress.


While leading design at DIY, we worked through multiple product cycles and experiments. I enjoyed designing a first-of-its-kind community experience, focusing on social features, learning content, and safety.

With over 100 skills and 1000s of projects, kids could earn real patches for completing learning challenges and sharing with the community. Much of the learning material emphasized real-world skills like farming, science, making, and hacking. The best part was seeing kids learning new things and making progress on over time.


We developed creation tools like in-camera editor, stop motion film maker, and social profiles on iOS.

After learning so much from our awesome free community, we set out to try a new way for kids to learn directly from our full-time skill mentors. We designed a new app called DIY Camps. From claymation to space exploration, kids could join a virtual camp every month.


Project ideas and challenges were posted daily, with friendly mentors available live to share feedback and encouragement.

Look and feel


Kids have varying levels of exposure to technology. Our approach to evolving the visual identity and interaction design was minimalistic, to emphasize the content and functionality as visually as possible.


This cultivated a fun, accessible, and approachable experience that appealed to kids of all ages.

Design Lead

Ryan Brock


Senior Designer:

Hartley Miller


Creative Directors / Patch Illustrations:

Isaiah Saxon + Daren Rabinovitch