As a designer, I personally prefer taking any design straight to code (mainly because making iterations to Photoshop designs is a nightmare and frankly a waste

As a designer, I personally prefer taking any design straight to code (mainly because making iterations to Photoshop designs is a nightmare and frankly a waste of time). I think the thing that helped me most was that I started learning design by coding (i.e. I started writing XHTML/CSS alongside learning design principles). Being about four years in now, it's great to be able to get a project and say "yeah, I can code that." It really just takes time and patience. While my coding experience is mainly focused around front-end development, what I've learned from the front-end has helped me to feel comfortable with Wordpress and PHP. I think the best way to become a "Desingineer" is to constantly have some project that challenges you, whether paid or not (preferably not as there is less pressure to get things right).