As a designer, one eventually thinks not about what they liked in other people's work but why it worked. You can derive a design out a compendium of some things

As a designer, one eventually thinks not about what they liked in other people's work but why it worked. You can derive a design out a compendium of some things that you've seen that you like, but ultimately, to be successful you need to know why what you're copying made sense for its purpose. Perhaps you need to even encounter the same problem; it takes a bit of maturity to copy effectively.