Enhance your web design skills with the new EU edition of the Wix Playground Academy

You may know the Wix Playground as a physical space in New York, opposite the Whitney Museum, where we’ve hosted a number of talks events over the years in partnership with Wix. But it’s also the home of the Wix Playground Academy, a three-month web-design programme that sees an exclusive group of international designers come together each summer to sharpen their skills and be mentored by industry-leading creatives.

Now, that same learning experience is coming to Europe for a new one-month winter programme. Applications are now open for the programme, which kicks off on 4 January 2021. So, if you’re a designer based in the EU, then click on the link below to share your details and portfolio, for a chance to join the first-ever Wix Playground Academy EU.

The Academy is set up to impart the practical skills and confidence to stand out in what we all know is a highly competitive industry. The one-month programme includes mentorship sessions with industry leaders and the team at Wix; workshops led by top designers (past mentors in New York have included Debbie Millman and Nicole Ginelli); and lessons on how to create a knockout online portfolio. Plus, successful applicants become part of an ever-growing community of designers from across the globe, who are part of the Wix network.

As part of the new European Academy programme, we’re also delighted to announce that we at It’s Nice That will be hosting a portfolio review session. Three members of our team will be lining up alongside two guest creatives from our network to look through submitted portfolios and provide as much useful feedback as we possibly can. If that doesn’t sway you to get your application in, we don’t know what will!

The learning experience throughout the Academy is collaborative and interactive, with the whole programme seamlessly shifted online as a result of the pandemic. It’s based around the understanding that designers today need to have a diverse range of skills, so the programme will teach students everything from advanced web design to code for designers to inspiration research and animation. It will also introduce participants to Editor X, Wix’s newly launched website-building platform made especially with designers and agencies in mind.

If you want to find out more about how the Academy could help your career, head over to the Wix Playground site, where you can meet some of the most recent graduates from the programme, check out their new personal websites, and discover what they learned from the Academy and what they’re up to now. You can also hear from them about their experiences of design education, and their thoughts on personal growth and the design community.

Click on the link above or follow the link in the Further Info box below to submit your portfolio. The Wix team will then be in touch to let you know if your application has been successful. Good luck, and hopefully see you in January for the first-ever Wix Playground Academy EU!