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A design system is not a component library. It is an agreement between designers and engineers about how decisions get made — and agreements need maintenance.
Start with the ten screens you actually have
Systems fail when they are designed in the abstract. Build the components the current product needs, in the order it needs them, and let the library grow out of real screens instead of a hypothetical catalogue.
Tokens before components
Colour, type, spacing and motion as named values, shipped to code before anyone draws a button. Every component you build afterwards inherits the decisions instead of re-litigating them.
One owner, one hour a week
The systems that survive have a name next to them. An hour a week of triage — what got added, what drifted, what should be deleted — is the difference between a system and a graveyard.
Motion is part of the system
Durations and easings belong in the token set. Without them, every team invents its own timing and the product feels like four different products.
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