Born and raised in sunny southern Cali. I designed and developed my first website in High School, instantly falling in love with the design and code. From there I attended Cal Poly Pomona and graduated with a BA in visual arts. I was fortunate enough to land a full-time gig fresh out of college designing and developing microsites for major music labels as well as handling a multi-million dollar partnership with T-Mobile for ARTISTdirect.
Then moving on to the largest publisher of original music and celebrity content on the interwebs as a senior designer. Working closely with the creative director on front-end web design, UX Strategy, mobile app UI, promotional assets and event branding for 15+ Buzzmedia properties.
After 6 years straight of the 9 to 5 grind. I started looking towards a more flexible schedule for travel and joined the freelance agency world. It was an amazing learning experience getting to work with a diverse collection of super talented designers and managers for clients such as Wilson, NantMobile, Nike & Neutrogena to name of a few.
With the knowledge gained from working with great teams at top agencies. I decided to go at it on my own as a design and branding consultant for small businesses and startups. My services included brand identity, UX strategy, eCommerce, UI design, and development. Running a business and managing multiple clients and business objectives was a great experience and gave me new insight into the business side of design.
After a fun run managing my own business I was ready to join a team again. I linked up with a former client and accepted the lead product designer role. Daily brainstorming, wireframing, prototyping, testing, and revising was the norm for delivering new features to clients and members.
As a product designer, you gotta be versatile and able to clearly communicate your design decisions. Working closely with the development side of the process helps us as designers do our job better. I believe that you have to go beyond just making things look pretty and really understand how the sausage is being made.