What Happens to Design After AI?

AI is fundamentally reshaping the relationship between design and technology by automating routine tasks and enabling a new era of bespoke software creation. John Maeda and Paul Bakaus argue that while AI commoditizes average design, it simultaneously elevates the value of human taste, restraint, and conviction. Paul Bakaus’s tool, Impeccable, addresses the generic "slop" of AI output by providing a vocabulary-driven harness that allows designers to steer models toward unique, high-quality results. As the industry transitions from traditional User Experience (UX) to Agentic Experience (AX), the focus shifts toward designing for agentic affordances rather than just visual interfaces. Ultimately, the most valuable creative work will stem from human-led, opinionated design that leverages AI for execution while maintaining the accountability and trust inherent in human-crafted experiences.