BEYOND THE DESK

Most of what I know about design, I learned freelancing solo — no team, and nothing to hide behind if something broke.

That's where the instinct to own a problem end-to-end actually got built: logos, pitch decks, landing pages, whatever a client needed that week. These days it's mostly product design and brand systems for SaaS and enterprise software, but the instinct hasn't changed — I'd still rather ship a slightly uglier system that holds together than a beautiful screen that falls apart the moment someone does something unexpected.

The work I actually enjoy happens shoulder-to-shoulder with engineers, not handed off once a file says “done.” Give me a tangle of real edge cases and I'll come back with a system, not just a better-looking screen.

Right now that means AI-first products and enterprise software— unglamorous, high-stakes, and mostly invisible until something in it breaks. Outside of work I notice the same thing in movies: I'll rewatch a scene just to figure out why a cut landed wrong. The good ones make the craft disappear completely, and that's really what I'm trying to build too.