To make a portfolio website, pick four to eight of your best pieces, write a short case study for each (the problem, what you did, the result), add an about page and one clear way to contact you, then build it and publish it on a domain with your name. The work you choose matters far more than the design. Below is what to show for ten professions, from UX designers to architects, a case study structure reviewers can skim in thirty seconds, and a prompt you can paste into VibeDream to build the site in an afternoon.
What a portfolio needs
- A clear one-liner: who you are, what you do, for whom. Product designer helping fintech teams ship simpler apps.
- Selected work, not all work. Four to eight strong pieces beat thirty mixed ones. Put the one most like the job you want first.
- Case studies with substance. A short story per project: the brief, your role, decisions you made, the result. Numbers only if you can back them up.
- Proof of you: a real photo, your location or time zone, and how you like to work.
- One obvious way to get in touch. A form, an email address, or both.
- Speed. Large images are the usual reason portfolios feel slow. Compress them before uploading.
Examples by profession
The structure above works for almost everyone, but what goes in each project changes a lot by field. Here is what reviewers in each field tend to look for.
- Product or UX designer: the process as well as the final screens. Show the messy middle, research and why you chose one option over another.
- Graphic designer: the work large and in context, such as a logo on a sign or a poster on a wall.
- Developer: live links and code links for each project, plus a short note on the hardest technical problem.
- Photographer: a tight edit per genre, full-bleed images, very little text. See also our model portfolio guide for the other side of the camera.
- Illustrator or painter: series, not singles, with medium and size. The art portfolio website guide goes deeper.
- Writer: three to five clips with a line on the outlet and the brief, plus one longer piece hosted on your site.
- Architect or interior designer: before and after, plans next to photos, and your role on each project.
- Marketer: campaigns with the goal, channel and outcome, and screenshots of the creative.
- Student or graduate: class and personal projects are fine. Say what you learned and what you would do differently.
- Freelancer of any kind: add services and a rough starting price so the right clients self-select.
Build one with AI
There is no portfolio template in the VibeDream gallery yet, so start from a prompt. If you like its look, the Aesthetic Landing Page template has serif headings on warm paper and can be turned into a portfolio by asking for a project grid on the home page. Tap New Project, choose Direct Prompt and paste the example prompt above with your own details. If you have a portfolio you admire, attach a screenshot and say: use a similar layout, but in my colours. A live preview appears within seconds.
- Swap in your real projects one at a time: replace project 1 with this title, this one-line result and the image I am attaching.
- Paste each case study's text into the chat and ask for it to go on that project's page under the right headings.
- Ask for the grid to show three columns on desktop and one on phones.
- Ask for the contact form to save every message to a private page behind a passcode, so nothing is lost.
- Check it in phone view, then tap Put it online.
Image galleries and case studies
For a handful of images, attaching them in the chat works. For a large gallery, or if you want to add work later without asking the AI each time, ask for an upload page that only you can reach. Uploads use storage built into VibeDream, with no separate cloud account needed; the file uploads guide explains how it works. Ask for images to be shown in a lightbox when tapped and for every image to have alt text describing it, which helps both accessibility and search.
Keep case studies scannable. A heading per stage, short paragraphs and one image per idea read better than a wall of text. If a project is under NDA, describe the problem and your process in general terms and say so; reviewers respect that more than a blurred screenshot.
Writing a case study that gets you hired
Reviewers skim. A good case study lets them understand the project in thirty seconds and gives them depth if they want it. Lead with a two-line summary at the top: what the project was, your role and the result. Then tell the story in four short parts.
- The problem: who had it, why it mattered and any constraints such as budget, deadline or technology.
- Your role: what you did yourself and what the team did. Being precise here builds trust.
- The process: two or three key decisions, each with the options you considered and why you chose one. Include sketches, drafts or rejected versions.
- The result: what shipped and what changed. Use numbers only if you can back them up, and say where they came from.
- What you would do differently: one honest paragraph. It shows judgement.
Keep each case study to one page that scrolls, with an image every few paragraphs. Ask the AI to add a small summary box at the top of each case study with client, year, role and tools, and a Next project link at the bottom so reviewers keep going.
Common portfolio mistakes
- Too many projects, so the best work is buried.
- Only final screens or finished pieces, with no sign of how you think.
- A clever layout that is hard to use on a phone.
- No date on anything, so reviewers cannot tell what is recent.
- A contact form that silently fails. Send yourself a test message after every change.
- Placeholder text or sample projects left in from the first version.
Keeping it current
Set a reminder to review the portfolio every three months. Swap in new work, remove the weakest project, update your one-liner if your focus has shifted and check the contact form still works. Each update in the preview goes live when you press Update it in Put it online, which costs 5 credits, so batch your changes into one session.
Domain and SEO basics
- Use your name as the domain if you can, such as www.mayachen.design. Connect it by adding a TXT and a CNAME record, as shown in the deployment guide. HTTPS switches on automatically.
- Give each page a title with your name and specialty, such as Maya Chen, Product Designer in Toronto.
- Name each case study page after the project and the kind of work, so people searching for that work can find it.
- Link to the site from every profile you have. Those links are how search engines and recruiters find it first.
Plans start at $49 a month on All Access Mini, and publishing costs 5 credits each time. If you mainly need a single page to point people at, how to make a landing page may be all you need.