I'm Jessie Katz.

I'm a product designer based in Brooklyn, New York.

I've been working in UX and product design since 2022, leading research, shaping flows, and building out high-fidelity UI for apps and platforms. Before that, I had a 14-year career as a propmaster in film and television, working on productions for HBO, Netflix, FX, and others.

Props work taught me that a cool idea means nothing if it can't actually exist and function in the physical world. Every prop has to work - really work - in the hands of a real actor, under real lighting, with a crew of people depending on it. I bring that same instinct to digital products: I think about edge cases, real-world constraints, and what happens when a product meets the actual complexity of someone's life.

I studied printmaking and cinematography, and have always had some creative practice running alongside my professional work. Collage, graphic design, textile arts, the occasional book cover. I also do web design and development, which informs how I think about UI that actually holds up in production.

What draws me most to product design is the people on the other side of the screen. I’m genuinely curious about how different people live, what they need, what gets in their way, and how a thoughtful product can make a task feel clearer, easier, or less overwhelming.