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Liquid Glass has reignited ideas that never quite disappeared
Some friendships act like gateways. These are people with whom you not only share interests or hobbies but also visions, insights, and leaps into the future. , senior front-end developer and designer, is one such friend. With him, discussions can turn into visionary sessions imagining the future. It doesn’t matter whether we’re discussing anime series, societal critiques, artificial intelligence, or future ways of living: there’s always an open door to imagine new possibilities.
That morning, like many others, I started my day browsing through design and technology news. One piece, in particular, caught my eye: Apple’s announcement of its new design system, Liquid Glass. At first glance, it seemed like an aesthetic evolution of what Material Design proposed years ago. Still, with an intriguing twist: instead of drawing inspiration from paper and layers, this concept explored glass as the central material. Liquid glass. Interfaces that not only simulate fluidity but also undergo visual and structural transformations as if they were matter in motion.
Curious to know his opinion, I sent the news to Adriel. His response was immediate and, as so many times before, it both surprised me and invited me to imagine new possibilities:
“That idea came to me a while ago… not the same, but definitely about using a liquid.”
That little spark — a fusion of new technology and an old idea — lit up something bigger. A conversation that ultimately took me beyond Apple’s liquid glass, expanding into a broader vision: what if our interfaces were not only fluid but could also evaporate, solidify, and transform again, resembling the different states of water?
The New Announcement in UI Design: Liquid Glass
It’s not unusual for Apple to unveil visual concepts with a high degree of sophistication. But that day, the announcement of Liquid Glass felt different. It wasn’t just about polished aesthetics or smooth animations. There was something more profound: an intention to redefine visual language around a new material — the glass — at the heart of the user experience.
Unlike Material Design’s flat and geometric approach introduced in 2014, Liquid Glass embraces fluidity, refraction, reflections, and translucency. These components don’t just look like glass; they behave like liquid glass, changing their form.
At its core, it’s not just a visual proposal. It’s a statement that revisits the idea that elements are almost tangible while remaining digital, much like they were in the early days of the first iPhones.
That was the starting point of the conversation with Adriel. A design inspired by glass, which ultimately opened the door to a broader universe: one focused on the changes in material states, specifically the origin of life in water.
Materials that behave like states of matter
Reflecting on Adriel’s response, it didn’t catch me off guard because of the content but because of the pattern. It’s happened before: I share something I see as a significant innovation, and he often comes back with, “I thought of something like that a while ago,” followed by an explanation that inevitably broadens the original idea or leads us to consider new possibilities or offshoots. It’s not arrogance on his part; in fact, he’s one of the most humble people I know. On many occasions, I’ve had conversations where he has anticipated trends and had a unique way of viewing the present, always with his sights set a few years into the future.
This time was no different, and he mentioned:
“Yes, I remember imagining something like that. I thought about water instead of paper when Material Design came about, but not just as a liquid. I was also thinking of water that could change states, able to be in its liquid, solid, and gaseous forms.”
And then, a trigger for possibilities exploded in my mind.
What Apple showed was a great visual exploration. Adriel’s idea, on the other hand, was a more conceptual and nuanced proposal. An interface that doesn’t just behave like a fluid but can transform like water itself. A frozen element symbolizes permanence; it can evaporate to disappear or flow to adapt.
Adriel even gave it a name: Aqua Design. A UI approach based on the states of water. It’s an interface that doesn’t just look liquid-like but incorporates elements that can solidify, evaporate, or flow again, depending on the context and the user’s intentions. A UI that behaves like matter, encompassing its changes of state.
We’re not just talking about visual effects. This idea is about a UI with symbolic physical behavior, where each state represents an intention: solid for what’s permanent, fluid for adaptability, and vapor for the fleeting.
An interface that mutates, reacts, and lives in transition.
I find it as simple as it is powerful. And while we were discussing it, I felt that we were tapping into something broader than design: a new way of thinking about how we interact with technology. This is a metaphor rooted in nature, the states of matter, and the concept of change over time. It’s a concept that connects us to the world around us and prompts us to reflect on our relationship with technology.
Second State: Gaseous
The idea that an interface can evaporate opens up numerous possibilities.
Imagine if certain UI elements don’t disappear with a traditional animation but fade away like vapor. Not in the purely visual sense of a fade out but as an almost physical reaction: a state transition that conveys impermanence, volatility, or even urgency.
Imagine on our phones or laptops. What if a notification, once seen or ignored, didn’t just hide but evaporated right before your eyes, leaving a trail of moisture or subtle condensation somewhere else on the screen? It’s no longer just a simple action; it’s transforming matter; it’s storytelling.
An interface that evaporates can speak to you about the passage of time, about what transforms if left unattended, and about what is ephemeral by nature.
It can also be about context. A function that only appears under certain conditions and then quietly dissipates when it’s no longer relevant, like steam on a window, like breath on a cold morning. It’s a perfect metaphor for interfaces that live on the threshold between presence and absence.
In this world, interacting with a UI is no longer just about pressing, swiping, or clicking; it’s about engaging with a UI. It’s about living with elements that appear, transform, and vanish, leaving trails, sensations, or clues.
It’s a new dimension of design. One that not only informs but also suggests. That doesn’t just display but disappears intentionally.
Third state: Solid
Just as steam suggests, the fleeting ice represents the opposite: permanence, structure, and focus.
Imagine components that, when they become solid, signify something that mustn’t change, that requires attention, or that needs to be handled with care.
A frozen button could symbolize a crucial action, such as confirming a transaction, sending an irreversible message, or pausing a critical process. The solidity would not just be visual; it could be felt through a slight vibration, a tactile resistance, a crisp sound, or even a symbolic temperature if hardware someday allows it.
And here’s an intriguing thought: that solidity could melt over time or with interaction.
Imagine a rigid menu that, if unused, slowly melts back into its original liquid state. A visual reminder that nothing lasts forever, that even firm decisions can become flexible, and that everything transforms.
This approach can also be applied to collaborative interfaces. An idea or comment can be «frozen» until another user unlocks it. Or an application’s state can “freeze” to save a temporary version, like preserving it on ice.
What Aqua Design proposes is a living metaphor: designing through physical states. Transitioning from pixels to an analogy with natural processes. In that transition, it rekindled certain aspects of poetry that many modern interfaces had lost in their obsession with efficiency, which was necessary at the time. Flat Design wasn’t a whim, but today, we can go further thanks to advancements in processing speed.
UI as a physical phenomenon
Until now, we might have thought of interfaces as something we see and touch. Screens that respond, buttons that activate, and components that slide or disappear. But if we take this a step further, awakening our primal senses, which are embedded in us, where we learned millions of years ago what it’s like for something to freeze or evaporate, it evokes the deep knowledge we carry in our DNA.
Adriel’s proposal — and Aqua Design’s — is not just a creative metaphor. It’s a paradigm shift. Considering components that freeze, evaporate, or flow isn’t just about applying an attractive animation; it’s about understanding UI as something that lives and reacts according to its context, environment, or purpose — something that transforms.
Let’s imagine possibilities that are a bit more complex: an interface that responds not just to touch but also to the ambient temperature and simultaneously gives temperature sensations on the surface it’s touched. One that changes its behavior depending on humidity, light, or a user’s proximity. A UI that adapts not only to a screen’s resolution but to the emotional state of the user.
This approach encourages us to design closer to nature than to machines. To view the interface as an ecosystem, with cycles, states, and transitions that make sense beyond being merely pixel-perfect.
And while it still sounds like science fiction, many of these principles are already on their way. With more advanced sensors, contextual intelligence, and increasingly powerful hardware and internet speeds… the line between software and the physical environment is starting to blur, not only through the use of virtual reality.
Perhaps it’s not about replacing what’s already there but about opening up a new realm: one where the UI transforms based on its context and meaning, tapping into our most primitive knowledge acquired by our species over thousands of years.
When the UI transforms, so do we
The best ideas don’t always spark during huge presentations. Sometimes, they pop up in a chat with friends, a voice message, or that moment when the news reminds you of something you’ve felt before. Luckily for me, that’s what conversations with Adriel are like. A crossing between the existing and what could be.
What I love about all this is that when we talk about design — and especially UI — we’re not just designing screens. We’re envisioning ways to inhabit the future. Interactions that, although virtual, have the power to influence how we feel, how we move, and how we perceive the technology around us.
Thinking about a design system with liquid components that freeze or evaporate might sound like a poetic exercise. But often, that’s how new trends start: with visions of futures that seem distant but then, little by little, come to life.
This article isn’t a prediction. It’s an invitation. To imagine without limits. To design with states of matter. To allow ourselves to play with what seems impossible today because tomorrow, it could be the next big trend in design systems.
After all, I believe innovation doesn’t come from staying ahead of technology but from imagining things in a different way.
Sources
- https://www.theverge.com/news/682636/apple-liquid-design-glass-theme-wwdc-2025
- https://m3.material.io/
- https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/flat-design?srsltid=AfmBOorJwHr4HsuO7zxw2UudpMxgS28dUXR2WTd4V6QwM47wbfelvNnZ
Ideas that flow like water
This article was born from a conversation among friends and a shared intuition that design can continue to draw inspiration from nature to evolve.
Thanks to for always being that creative spark that ignites new ways of envisioning the future. And to you, on the other side, thank you for letting me share these ideas.
If this concept resonated with you or sparked new questions or ideas, we would love to continue the conversation. Feel free to write us, debate, add your perspective, or simply share what you’ve been imagining.
Original article in Spanish.
This article has been translated with GetGloby.
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➔ https://www.linkedin.com/in/gutierrezjoel/
➔ https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrielzarate/
