About
Hi, I'm Chaewon.
I got into design the way a lot of people do — by making things other people needed and realizing I cared more about how it felt to use them than almost anything else. What started as visual and graphic work grew into product design once I noticed the same question kept showing up: how do you take something complicated and make it feel obvious?
That question is still what I chase. Whether it's an e-commerce product page, a hospital wearable brief, or a research site trying to explain 20 years of work to funders, the job is the same: understand the real constraint, then design past it.
Education
Carnegie Mellon University
May 2028
Master of Design in Design for Interaction
New York University Steinhardt
May 2023
Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Arts — GPA 3.91/4.00
Experience
Design Department, Carnegie Mellon University
Research Assistant
Aug 2026 – Present
Konova Korea, Inc.
UX/UI Designer
Mar 2025 – Apr 2026
B2B SaaS Real Estate Platform
Design Lead
May 2026 – Aug 2026
CMU Information Ecosystem Communication
Product Designer Lead
Aug 2026 – Present
DMOS Art School
Web Designer & Program Coordinator
Aug 2023 – Dec 2023
CareArt, Chungnam National University
Graphic Designer
2021 – 2023
Morak Co. (KCDF-funded)
Venture Lead
Jan 2020 – Dec 2020
How I work
I lean on research and systems thinking before I touch a design tool — the fastest way I know to waste time is to polish the wrong solution. Lately that means bringing AI into the workflow early: as a research synthesizer, a rapid prototyping partner, and a way to test more directions before committing to one. But the tool doesn't replace the judgment — deciding what actually matters to a user is still the hard part, and still mine to do.
I care about work that scales past the prototype: design systems that hold up when three other people touch them, documentation that survives a handoff, and decisions I can explain to a funder, a developer, or a first-time user in the same sentence.
Off the clock
Before grad school I ran a small Korean traditional liquor startup (funded by the Korea Craft and Design Foundation) — designed the home-fermentation kit, ran live e-commerce shows to 5k+ viewers, and learned more about supply chains than I ever expected to. I still think about that project when I design for small businesses: the constraints are real, and the person behind the product is usually doing five jobs at once.
I speak English, Korean, and Spanish, and I'm currently picking up Python for the data-visualization side of research work. Based in NYC, splitting time with Pittsburgh for school.
Skills & Tools
Thanks for reading this far. I'm available for 2027 summer internships in design and product — reach out if something here resonates.