Hi, I'm Karolina,
I'm a Senior Product Designer with 8+ years building tools for high-stakes environments — the kind used by engineers and analysts — where unclear UX has real consequences.
Currently at Elastic, I lead design initiatives across the Observability suite, working cross-solution and on platform projects. My process is end-to-end: research, systems, interaction, and delivery — always in close partnership with engineering. My background spans fintech, healthtech, edtech, and enterprise SaaS.
AI is part of how I work: research synthesis, rapid prototyping, pressure-testing decisions, and the occasional code fix — before anything reaches stakeholders.
Portfolio
Leading design initiatives across the Observability suite — working cross-solution and on platform projects, end-to-end, in close partnership with engineering.
Case study
Principal (and sole) designer for a B2B SaaS platform — led the product redesign, co-created its first design system, and partnered with engineering to ship AI features ahead of the ChatGPT wave.
Case study
Built the first platform-wide design system and shaped video-centric features for an EdTech licensing platform serving classrooms worldwide.
Case study
Designed clinical trial tools during the COVID-19 pandemic — where usability decisions had patient-safety consequences.
Case study
Designed investment and payment experiences for one of Europe's largest banks; led concept work for a children's banking app.
Case study
An independent UX audit of Ryanair's booking flow, commissioned via a third-party contractor — plus conceptual UI work I produced afterwards to illustrate the findings.
Case studyContact
Feel free to reach out via LinkedIn or email — I'm always happy to connect, whether it's about a new opportunity, a collaboration, or just a good conversation about design.
karolina.kurstak@protonmail.com
P.S. This is Hero. You might spot him in some of my screenshots — he’s even snuck his way into public-facing materials. He’s very much real, usually attends all meetings.