A Maker Festival, Not a Hackathon
Figma's "maker" culture is a defining part of how the company operates. New hires are regularly invited to share their own maker stories during the weekly all-hands meeting, a tradition that quickly clarifies the company's definition of the term. It isn't about being an artist or a craftsperson; it's about expressing creativity in a way that feels authentic to each individual.
This philosophy is the foundation of Maker Week, a twice-yearly event where Figmates pause their regular duties to collaborate on passion projects. Unlike a typical hackathon, which can feel exclusive to technical teams, Maker Week is positioned as a cross-functional festival. It's designed to democratize the hackathon format, allowing people from all teams, product areas, and time zones to participate without requiring technical expertise as a prerequisite.
The History of Making
Since 2018, Figma has hosted five Maker Weeks, generating hundreds of projects. Many of these have evolved beyond internal experiments: some have shipped as core product features, while others have provided a glimpse into the company's culture. One could argue that FigJam itself is the culmination of several Maker Week projects over the years.
A look back at past projects offers a sense of the range and impact of these weeks:
Empathy Building Cards
To help Figmates better understand user challenges, a team created a set of beautifully designed cards that combine personas with various characteristics and situations. The goal was to give the company a tool to better contextualize the diverse problems users face.
Figma in 3D
Another project explored the idea of spatial software. An extension was built that projects layers off the canvas and allows users to orbit their designs with the mouse, offering a new way to navigate that resembles a 3D map.
User Collaboration Data Visualization
A map tool was developed to visualize how users in different countries collaborate within a specific domain. This project helps Figma understand how teams at a single company work together across various regions and time zones.
Mechanical Keyboards in Figma
In a nod to a common office obsession, one Figmate created a custom Figma keyboard—inside Figma, of course. The design was published as a community file so that others could design their own.
Indeed, some of Figma's favorite product features and initiatives began as Maker Week ideas. These projects have become integral to how the company operates, engages with its community, and plans for the future, with several recent projects currently moving into production.
A New Approach with 'Frames'
Maker Week #6 marks a shift in structure. Instead of anchoring the week around a single theme, it now operates within four distinct "Frames": Exploring, Refining, Learning, and Connecting. While a theme serves to spark inspiration, the Frames are intended to expand accessibility and anchor the work more closely to Figma's core values, giving every Figmate the opening to make something great. The company also acknowledges that many Figmates will still be on duty, ensuring high performance and supporting users throughout the week.
A few examples illustrate how the Frames come to life:
- Exploring: Tech talks are organized to spark inspiration, with topics like "Cowboy YOLO your dev cluster" and "Plug into Plugins." This Frame embraces the unexpected opportunities not evident in day-to-day tasks.
- Refining: This Frame is dedicated to hosting brainstorming jams focused on small improvements that have a significant impact on other Figmates, users, and the products themselves.
- Learning: Facilitating Figmates' intrinsic curiosity, this Frame includes a public speaking class, storytelling sessions, a session on the science of pizza baking, and data trivia hosted by the Data Science and Research teams.
- Connecting: This Frame is marked by homeroom-style morning announcements, hangouts with new hires, and meetings with users to foster community bonds.
The Frames provide both structure and permission for the week to be a period of reflection and action based on values like building community, loving one's craft, and running with ideas. It's a tradition that continues to evolve, with Figma planning to share progress and stories from the week on its social media channels. This maker ethos is one of the many ways Figma looks to make an impact, and the company is open to new talent that wants to contribute.
