Pioneering design systems for the UK government

Casestudy #1

Summary

The Home Office, a vital UK government department, delivers critical services that safeguard public safety and national security. With millions of people relying on these digital services, design plays a crucial role in ensuring accessibility and ease of use. Our team of 50 designers and researchers faced a significant challenge: maintaining consistency and efficiency as 20+ designers worked simultaneously across numerous services.

Problem

Government digital services were fragmented, with hundreds of projects progressing in silos. Despite design systems being a emerging concept, there was a clear need for:

• Standardised design patterns
• Reducing duplicate design work
• Better design efficiency

Solution

As the Lead Designer in the Home Office Design Ops team, I took a strategic, user-centered approach to developing the first design system in UK government.

Team: Eliot Hill, Charles Reynold-Talbot, Karwai Pun, Chris Taylor, Sue Spevack, Andrew Travers, Sara Vincent

Identified patterns

I researched with design teams across the Home Office to understand their workflows and challenges. As I spent time with the teams, I identified components and patterns with potential for use across services.

Scaling design

I prioritised usability and accessibility, testing components and providing code snippets and flow diagrams.

Collaborative

I created a GitHub board for transparent contribution, and collaborated with the wider government teams as well as GDS.

Outcome

I collaborated closely with the Government Digital Service (GDS) to develop a model for how design patterns and components could be shared from individual government departments and integrated into the broader GOV.UK design system, expanding their impact from a single department to government-wide use.

Key outcomes:

• Design system adopted across Home Office and wider government
• Components used in critical services like passport renewals and visa applications
• Created a community platform for government designers
• Bridged design and engineering needs

My work helped drive community, not just at the Home Office but across the UK government. Designers have a place to share work, discuss learnings and contribute to the wider delivery of good services.

Collaboration with GDS

I also collaborated with Government Digital Service (GDS) to model how design patterns and components are contributed from government departments. From being used in a single department to being used across government as part of the GOV.UK design system.

As part of my collaboration with GDS, I contributed new versions of the checkboxes and radio buttons to be used on GOV.UK. I designed the components and then worked with the team to write the guidance and code. The components are now used widely in services across GOV.UK.

Lessons learned

Developing a design system is not just about creating components. It's about:

• Building a collaborative design culture
• Prioritising user needs
• Creating scalable, accessible designs
• Continuous iteration and community engagement

More reading on design systems

• Crafting a design language for hundreds of services in government
• How we design Home Office services at scale