Horizon Theme

What I did

Horizon is a theme I led alongside our lead designer (Charlie Portier), product manager (Lindsey Fogle), and engineers from multiple teams. It was our answer to longstanding feedback that Discourse was too bland & confusing for non technical forum administrators. Over six months, I ran weekly collaborative design sessions, pushed for all progress to be shared transparently on our internal forum, and worked iteratively. We tested our work first on our own site, then with beta customers before a public launch.

Why it mattered

This project was about more than creating a theme. I saw it as an opportunity to show that designers could successfully lead major technical initiatives at an engineering-focused company. I guided our team in tackling critical challenges like designing for non-technical users who couldn't customize themes, writing maintainable code, and building better tools for future creators. Most importantly, I demonstrated how inclusive feedback loops build organizational trust and improve outcomes.

The impact

Horizon became the default theme for all new Discourse sites, but the real victory for me was the process. I established a template for future initiatives and influenced how our organization approaches product development with Design now having a stronger voice in major technical decisions.

If you'd like, you can learn more about the design processes we used by reading my blog post about it.