From Prototype to Portfolio: Lessons from Building My Personal Site

My portfolio started as a junior build: semantic HTML, SASS, vanilla JavaScript, AOS for subtle motion, and Swiper for carousels. Over time, I refactored for readability and performance. I trimmed animation durations, reduced image payloads, and tightened CSS architecture (BEM‑ish with tokens). Netlify Forms simplified the contact section without introducing a backend. If I were to migrate it to a modern framework, I’d favor Next.js App Router + MDX for the blog, and lean on a design system with shared tokens. The main lesson: keep the surface delightful but the internals boring and reliable.