In this paper, we introduce a new paradigm for performing user-centered product or service design on an experiential level. We call this approach Designer Experience, meaning design activity that takes place within an experiential system similar to the one that the eventual product or service will be used in. After a brief discussion of the inadequacies of user-centred design and experience in general, we explore the various aspects of Designer Experience and the ways to invoke it. A case study regarding the representation of users’ contextual systems to designers is presented. Our experiences with the UCD Holodeck system acted as an inspiration for the definition of Designer Experience and as a validation in order to illustrate one potential path towards Designer Experience.