Erica Hellbe[email protected]

Founding product designer · New York

I turn product
ambiguity into
systems people get

From social experiences used on college campuses to AI tools that help teams decide what to build next, I design the system, not just the screen.

LinkedIn

DoorList · Product Design

Turning an event utility into a more social experience.

Friends Activity made the social behavior already happening on DoorList visible, giving students another reason to return between events while showing the value of building a network.

My role
Product definition, interaction design, visual design and experimentation
Core question
Could visible social activity make DoorList more valuable between events?
View DoorList case study
DoorList event creation with cover art, music and event details DoorList guest list with group invitations and guest approvals DoorList event feed with photos, reactions and music
Event creation, guest management and the event feed.

Pilot · Founding designer · B2B AI

Making noisy product signals feel actionable.

Pilot watches analytics, customer sentiment, shipped code and competitors to surface product opportunities. The design challenge is not displaying more information. It is helping a team understand what deserves attention and why.

My role
Founding product design across product strategy, UX, UI and design systems
Design problem
Build trust in an AI product by keeping its evidence legible and decisions reversible
View Pilot case study
Pilot suggestion detail showing an event-sharing problem, annotated interface and ticket creation controls
A suggestion keeps the product problem, interface context and next action together.
Pilot Product Tracker showing shipped changes, search coverage trends and metrics by product area
Product Tracker connects shipped changes to KPI movement across the product.

Designing for trust

01

Compress, don’t conceal

Lead with the takeaway while preserving the evidence behind it.

02

Make hierarchy do the explaining

Separate urgent signals, recurring themes and ambient context.

03

Keep people in control

AI proposes; product teams decide what deserves action.

About

A designer who likes being early.

Portrait of Erica Hellbe

I’m a product designer drawn to the stage where the product, the team and even the problem are still taking shape. I work closely with founders and engineers to frame the right question, test the risky assumption and build the system that lets a product grow.

I earned an athletic scholarship to study Interaction and UX/UI Design at Academy of Art University, where I competed in both tennis and soccer. Originally from Stockholm, Sweden, I am now based in New York, where I bring the same discipline and range to work that unites product strategy with thoughtful craft.

More about me
Product strategyUX & UIDesign systemsExperimentation0→1 products
Erica playing collegiate tennis for Academy of Art University
On the court with Academy of Art University.

The work I care about lives between behavior and business: finding the product decision that makes an experience more valuable, then making it feel inevitable.

Have an ambitious product?

Let’s connect.

[email protected]