From what I've seen, at least half of design work is "make it look like x" where x may be "glass", "CRT effect" or "BigCo's design language".

This project looks like some light-hearted fun and demonstrates an ability to achieve a desired look. You seem to be looking for someone doing greenfield design work for a large advertising agency.

I see nothing in your profile that indicates any expertise in design, so it's really bold of you to level this kind of criticism at someone's project.

But the problem with you billing yourself as a graphic designer and reimplementing Windows XP is that you’re copying a design that already exists rather than showcasing your own design skills, so I can’t immediately tell how good a designer you are[0].

I can look at your projects under the IE icon, which gives more of an impression, but some of the visuals there do look decidedly AI generated, which isn’t super-encouraging.

The UX is also weird. For example, the back/forward history controls behave like carousel controls through your portfolio, whereas when I hit back/previous I expect to be taken back to the menu of projects.

If you applied to me for a job with this, would I interview you?

Yes, I would, simply because I can see you’ve put a lot of effort in and created something high quality. But I’d have some reservations because of the concerns I’ve raised above and, in particular, I’d want to dig in to how user-centred your approach is, because that isn’t really demonstrated here.

Sorry if this sounds discouraging. What you’ve done is cool, and I like it, and it would certainly get you a foot in the door of many interview processes, but that will be when the real work of showcasing your skills begins.

I hope that makes sense?

[0] Literally, I could do this, and I suck at design. It’s very similar to the process of implementing a design passed to me by a UX Designer, which I’ve done loads of times.