Avexa
A multi-brand design system built to help product teams ship consistent interfaces without slowing down.
Northstar Labs' product teams kept shipping inconsistent interfaces and rebuilding the same components across brands. I built Avexa, a multi-brand design system with flexible tokens and well-documented patterns that scale across products. It lets teams move faster while keeping every experience visually and functionally consistent.
Year
Client
Work type
Foundations
The first phase established shared decisions for color, spacing, motion, and product language across three related brands that had drifted apart over years of independent work. Getting these foundations right was the difference between a system people adopted and one they quietly ignored.
Instead of treating tokens as documentation, I paired each foundation with concrete usage examples so teams could see when to choose one pattern over another. Showing the reasoning, not just the values, made the system feel like guidance rather than constraint.
Balancing brands
Each brand needed enough room to feel distinct while still drawing from a common core, so I designed the tokens as a shared base with deliberate points of variation. That structure let the brands express personality without forking the system.
I tested the foundations against real screens from all three products to make sure the shared decisions held up under pressure. The edge cases we found early saved the teams from painful exceptions down the line.
Component adoption
I audited high-traffic screens and prioritized the components that would remove the most repeated decisions from product squads. Focusing on frequency meant the system delivered visible relief in the places people worked every day.
The adoption plan combined migration checklists, regular office hours, and clear contribution rules so the system could grow without becoming a bottleneck. The aim was to make the right choice also the easiest one.
Sustaining momentum
To keep adoption from stalling, I set up a lightweight review rhythm where teams could propose changes and see them reflected quickly. Fast responsiveness signaled that the system belonged to everyone, not a single gatekeeping team.
Over time, contributions from product squads became the main source of new patterns, which was exactly the outcome we wanted. A system that the whole organization helps maintain is one that actually lasts.
