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You can't design until you can build!
In my previous job, somebody told me: you can't design till you can build. I was like WTF is he talking about? A designer is a designer, doesn't matter if he can build or not, right? Wrong!
Actually, he was absolutely right. How can you know what's the limitation of your design without knowing the limitation of the build? it actually vice versa, too. So, you need to know how to build to push your design, and know how to design to push your building skills, too. it's like yin and yang, contantsly in balance, pushing and pulling each other at the same time.
Where do you start? For me, it was the build as my foundation. I started collaborating with others designers, and just start observing and learning. I think designers are like the architects, the ones who come up with blueprint and the project lead. So, naturally builders are the contractors. Biggest challenge was to build exactly to the pixel. it may not sound like a big deal to untrained eyes, when you have 2 pixels more here and there, slightly different shade of font used... your build would actually destroy the design. I have to admit, first few builds were disastrous, I had to make so many revisions, but hey, everybody had to start somewhere, right?
At my previous job, before I was a designer, I was a builder. I worked with many designers with different requirements on the builds. After a while, I noticed the pattern. Those designers who demanded to have the builds exactly to the pixel, are the ones with the tightest designs. Very precise, very clean, very uniform. Those who are not, their designs are sloppier. Text not aligning, multiple different shades of color used for same elements.
After a while, I started picking up the tricks on how to layout the elements. I understood more about photoshop than ever. Gradually, I started using the tricks learned on my personal projects and just keep tweaking. Eventually, I picked up the designing skills.
Having a strong foundation before designing worked really well for me. Give it a try sometime, you'll start seeing what I saw.
True!