Founding Design Engineer: UI/UX Lead & Frontend Architect

Own Sophia's visual identity and user experience — and bring it to life in code.
Full-time role
Location flexible (Chicago, Miami, or New York preferred; remote possible)
About Sophia
Sophia is an end-to-end agentic matchmaker using advanced language, voice, and vision models to deliver deeply tailored introductions.
Role Overview
Lead the design and front-end implementation of Sophia's product experience. You think in systems, craft with care, and can ship your own work — bridging the gap between beautiful design and production code.
About Sophia
We harness AI to help people forge deeper, more meaningful relationships.
Sophia was founded by two successful serial entrepreneurs, incubated in their venture studio, with leading high profile founders as advisors and investors.
Role Overview This role is design-first. You'll own the end-to-end experience — from visual identity and interaction design to the front-end code that delivers it. You'll sit in on real user sessions, feel the friction firsthand, and translate your observations directly into refined, production-ready interfaces.
Set the visual language and UX standards for a product people trust with their personal lives.
Be the bridge between how Sophia feels and how it works.
Core Responsibilities Experience Design & Visual Identity
Own Sophia's design system — typography, color, spacing, motion, and component library.
Design and iterate on core user flows: onboarding, matching reveals, member profiles, and ongoing communication.
Maintain a high bar for craft — every interaction should feel considered and intentional.
Front-End Implementation Build your designs in code, primarily in React and TypeScript.
Collaborate closely with engineers to ensure design intent is preserved all the way to production.
Own the front-end component library and ensure consistency across the product.
User-Embedded Research & Iteration Join live onboarding calls and member sessions to observe behavior firsthand.
Identify UX friction and turn observations into immediate, high-quality improvements.
Advocate for the user in every product and engineering discussion.
Cross-Functional Collaboration Work directly with founders to align design direction with product vision.
Partner with engineers on AI-driven flows — voice interfaces, dossier previews, and match reveals.
Contribute to product decisions with a strong design point of view.
Requirements Design Skills
Strong portfolio demonstrating UI/UX design — especially for consumer or high-touch digital products.
Deep fluency with Figma, including component architecture and design systems.
Excellent visual sensibility: typography, layout, color, and motion.
Experience designing for emotional or high-stakes user experiences is a strong plus.
Proficient in React and modern front-end development (TypeScript, CSS, animation libraries).
Comfortable reading and contributing to a production codebase.
Enough back-end familiarity to understand API contracts and data shapes.
Who Thrives Here A designer who codes — not a coder who designs.
Highly opinionated about craft, but low-ego about collaboration.
Curious about people: why they behave as they do, what they feel, what they need.
Comfortable working in ambiguity and iterating quickly toward clarity.
Engagement Full-time role; contract-to-hire or W2 options available.
Location flexible (Chicago, Miami, or New York preferred; remote possible).
Ready to join our team? Send your resume to our team and we'll be in touch.

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