About
A studio with a face.
Distinct Vintage is led by Mara Thorsrud, a design leader who uses psychology and systems thinking to reduce complexity and support confident decisions at scale. Her work sits at the intersection of data, human behavior, and business constraints. The focus is always the same: trust and clarity in high-stakes products.

Where the judgment comes from
Twenty years of leading design in-house, before founding Distinct Vintage.
Estée Lauder Companies
Director of UX, Brand Experience (consultant)
Aug 2023 – Apr 2026
Sleep Number Corporation
Head of UX/Product Design, SleepIQ
Feb 2022 – Aug 2023
Shutterfly Inc.
Head of UX Design & Research, Lifetouch
Sept 2018 – Feb 2022
CaaStle, Inc. (Gwynnie Bee)
Head of Creative Services, Founding Designer
Feb 2013 – July 2018
Speaking, teaching & press
One through-line: the psychology driving great experiences.
Speaking
- UX-360 Virtual SummitPresenter
- UXPA MinnesotaMultiple speaking engagements
- Propeller, In Your Experience speaker seriesEcommerce session
Teaching & advisory
- University of Minnesota, College of DesignGuest lecturer
- College of Design mentorship programMentor, 2023–2024
- Mankato State UniversityAdvisor, Fall 2025 – Spring 2026
Press & podcasts
- UX CollectiveHow do you deal with an executive demanding features? Create a hypothesis.
- Beyond UX PodcastInvisible Influence: The Psychology Driving Great Experiences
- Untangled PodcastFeatured guest
What people say
From clients
I've worked with Mara on several projects, and she is awesome. She consistently delivered thoughtful, thorough work that helped us unlock product opportunities we would not have seen otherwise. She brings strong design judgment into deep partnership with product, data science, and brand teams, and her work has produced measurable gains in conversion, retention, and brand awareness. Mara is strategic, collaborative, and absolutely worth the investment.
Your work was of a high quality and we're happy to keep you in mind for future work. Cheers!
From colleagues
Mara is smart, diligent, likes to think creatively, is consumer-obsessed, not afraid to challenge the status-quo, and is a great collaborator with product, engineering and partner teams.
Mara is a designer extraordinaire! Imaginative, collaborative, reliable and inherently talented. She produces beautiful, well-thought-out work. Her contagious enthusiasm brings energy to the workplace. She's a polished presenter whom I'd put in front of a client any (and every) day of the week.
Mara is a dedicated designer who creates beautiful user experiences. She always goes above and beyond to make sure projects are functional and visually appealing while also working within guidelines.
Curious whether we can help?
Scoping a project together costs nothing. That is the honest way to find out.
Start a conversation