Duane King is an Interactive Creative Director and Designer, in Portland. Duane's one of the most knowledgeable and resourceful designers I’ve met. Today we sit down to talk about the longevity and sustainability of design, starting two businesses and working with companies like Nike and Herman Miller. Duane grew up in Texas, started a luxury branding company and then moved to Portland to pursue design. Since then, he's made huge contributions to design, including designing one of my favorite we...
Jul 19, 2016•2 hr 30 min•Ep. 45
Kerem Suer is a Product Designer at Operator, in San Francisco. Before that Kerem worked with FitBit and Omada Health. We talk about being motivated at work through seeing improvements in your own offline life through the products. Kerem grew up in Istanbul and came to Sulphur, Oklahoma as a highschool exchange student. Since then, he's made a huge impact on the Design world and contributed to a lot of my favourite reading on Medium. He shares his journey with us and talks about the importance o...
Jun 28, 2016•1 hr 23 min•Ep. 44
Jed Schmidt is a JavaScript Developer at Uniqlo in NY. Before that Jed lived in Tokyo and worked as a Japanese Translator. We talk about the huge shift in jobs, and how it feels to be working in a field that was once his hobby! Jed also was a founder of BrooklynJS. He tells us what sparked the inspiration for the meetup, what it means for the NY community and why he's decided to step down. We have a bunch of debates about minimalist coding, staying up to date on trends in Programming and people ...
Jun 21, 2016•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 43
Yaron Schoen is a Human Interface Designer and Product Designer in NY. Currently Yaron is working at Compass Inc., building a more sophisticated and tech-first real-estate company. Before that Yaron had a plentitude of work experiences - from a tiny design company in Jerusalem, founding Made For Humans, freelancing and starting Julpan (which was then acquired by Twitter!). Yaron sits down (in my apartment this time) to talk about his experience as a designer, founder, freelancer and employee. He...
Jun 14, 2016•1 hr 23 min•Ep. 42
Yoko Sakao Ohama is a Designer who lives in Brooklyn, NY and works at Squarespace. Aside from being an awesome designer, Yoko is also a dancer. In her spare time, she writes Why Aren't We Dancing - a curated newsletter about interesting dance videos she finds online. We sit down and talk about the path from school to working in the "real world" - the different perceptions and experiences of college, quitting a job at a start-up and when it's okay to burn bridges. We talk about our community of d...
Jun 07, 2016•1 hr 24 min•Ep. 41
Today we sat down with Liang , the Creative Director at Soma Water in New York. We talk about full-time vs freelance work, ego in design and the importance of showing your results rather than showing your work. Liang is hilarious and has sort of done EVERYTHING! No really, she has experience working in a ton of different spaces - ads, social media, photography, design, product design and coding. She shares how she ended up where she is now, and how she defines her title as Creative Director. We ...
May 24, 2016•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 40
Andy Mangold is a designer and co-founder of Friends of the Web in Baltimore, MD. On today's episode, we talk about defining what kind of designer your are, what it's like to work with your friends, and how he started his first company at the age of 16! Andy tells us about his path to his current career. He went from making rubberband guns, to falling in love with art, to finding the nexus of "making" and "art" in design. We talk about what it means to build a business in the city you live in, a...
May 17, 2016•1 hr 41 min•Ep. 39
Scott Riley is a Product Designer and an Emergency Front-End Developer who worked at Pact Coffee and joined the podcast from England at 6am. We talk about gaming, curiosity, and privilege. Scott joined the podcast all the way in from England (at 6am). He tells us about city vs. country living and how he got his start in the tech industry through a love of gaming. Scott is endlessly curious and loves to create things that impact peoples lives. We talk about inequality, inaccessibility and our pri...
May 03, 2016•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 38
Pavan is a full-time software consultant at GrayBike, in San Francisco. He explains exactly what that title means, and how he uses technology, design and code to solve other people’s business problems. He explains the transition from the corporate world to starting his own thing. We talk about developing skills (regardless of your age), the importance of curiosity and amazing coaches we’ve had in the tech industry. Pavan also shows us his amazing photography, and shares what his rapper name woul...
Apr 26, 2016•1 hr 14 min•Ep. 37
On this week’s episode we sit down with Jenn Schiffer to talk about her journey into the tech industry and its future. Our interview was a perfect mix between serious and hilarious — sort of what Jenn’s all about. On paper, she’s an open web engineer, but online she’s so much more. Jenn can find humor in almost every situation, and she talks to us about how she uses her humor to deal with the shitty internet. You can read her Twitter or any of her satirical writing on Medium to get a sense of wh...
Apr 19, 2016•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 36
On this week’s episode we sit down with Corey Grusden to talk about online vs offline communities, learning processes and a bunch of old computer games from the 80's. Corey works for So Fetch , but he started programming when computers tied up phone lines and he was 8 years old. His introduction to tech started with a golfing game on his family's 80286 computer. He was installing sound cards, memory and drives before he was in middle school. Corey found his first tech-community locally - with a ...
Apr 12, 2016•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 35
In this week’s episode we sit down with Una Kravets to talk about emigrating from the Ukraine, falling in love with tech, and being the youngest person in the room. Una works for IBM's Design Lab , as a front-end developer on the cloud platform team in Austin, TX. We talk about how she became interested in tech, and the influence that her father and family's culture had on her future. Una fell in love with tech at a pretty young age. She joined her first online community at the age of 9 through ...
Apr 05, 2016•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 34
With Season 3 in the books I wanted to recap the episodes and some things that stood out to me. Themes, if you will. This season we spoke about commitment, saying yes before you can say no, life outside of the industry, digital overdosing, being humans again and a bunch of other things. Thanks again for listening. shownotes Aaron Dowd - The Podcast Dude The Gap The McDonalds Theory Junior Designers VS Senior Designers...
Jul 28, 2015•26 min•Ep. 33
For the final guest of the season we brought Dan Mall on the show to talk about his life, professionally and personally. Dan has done a lot in his life and he was incredibly open in sharing it with us. In a nut shell, we talked about his “failed” attempt as a 3D animator, producing work that isn’t good enough, working with greats like Jeffrey Zeldman, the illusions of job security and handling the stress of freelancing while supporting a family. Outside of his professional life we talked about w...
Jul 21, 2015•1 hr 42 min•Ep. 32
Randy’s life is a mix of thought-out steps and going where life takes him. In his professional career he’s managed to try various hats at a small shop in Orlando, get his masters from SVA, start Citizen Scholar, Inc, create The Supermarket and lead design at Etsy. He’s had a wild ride but it’s all apart of Randy’s plan in one way or another. As you'll see in this episode, Randy is led by two personal (and professional) principles: human-interaction is key to our success and our internal compass ...
Jul 15, 2015•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 31
This is by far one of our favorite episodes. I’ve known Andrew for a while and he’s definitely the developer I hope I become one day. His determination, his patience, his bad ass tattoos all make up the man that Andrew Norcross is. But lets make one thing clear - it wasn’t the easiest road to get to where he is now. Andrew once worked in Finance, leading some really big portfolios for some really important clients and decided to leave that life and start a new one in development. During that tim...
Jul 07, 2015•2 hr 5 min•Ep. 30
In this episode we chat with Keenan Cummings about risks. Those we take on purpose and those that just happen. In Keenan’s case, those risks defined his career as a designer. When asked what Keenan wanted to do as a teenager he responded very simple, “study design.” Too bad he didn’t know what design was. Luckily for Keenan he did know one thing - he was drawn toward strong branding and visual identities from his punk/skater lifestyle growing up. After graduated Keenan took a big risk. He left a...
Jun 30, 2015•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 29
Yesenia Perez Cruz is known by most as a designer but after this week we like to say she’s a designer and student. She’s had the privilege to work at great companies like Happy Cog and Intuitive Company designing websites, apps and interfaces for clients like Zappos, MTV and Chef Garces. In this week’s episode we spoke about learning on the job, working with talented colleagues and getting better every day. Yesenia has worked with some of the Internet’s most influential developers and designers ...
Jun 16, 2015•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 28
On a very philosophical level, this episode explores a lot of interesting facts about life when you listen “between the lines.” To start, a loving mother with a strong background in education raised Claudina. So when she decided to leave college after her freshman year, it was no surprise there was some concern for her wellbeing when she moved to Portland. But after a job or two in Portland and New York her mother, like most, realized she’d do well on her own being that she prepared Claudina for...
Jun 03, 2015•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 27
Ben is a self-taught developer, and designer, who specializes in JavaScript. He got his start the same way a lot of us did - by “googling it.” Even years into the game he still googles stuff, too. Ben grew as a developer by necessities as his projects and work required. Over time Ben built his skills and got his first job, and when he landed that job he still felt like an “imposter” - as most of us do. Similar to other guests, Ben says yes before he can even think about saying no, trusting he’ll...
May 27, 2015•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 26
Karolina Szczur is a designer, developer and photographer living in Kraków, Poland. Karolina started working at a very young age as a fortuneteller for an online future teller company - randomly, we know - and has found work opportunities online ever since. In this episode, we talk about how Karolina often says yes before she can say no to pretty much anything – conference talks, jobs, projects – and how it has opened up new opportunities. We discuss how she got started giving talks at conferenc...
May 20, 2015•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 25
Jen Mussari is a freelance lettering artist and illustrator. She’s never worked for anyone else and plans on keeping it that way. Her skills and fine-arts background helped her produce great work for clients like Squarespace, Airbnb, Kickstarter and to just name a few. In this conversation we spoke about everything in Jen’s life that has influenced Jen’s interests and career. Everything from her pope-painting grandmother to that one time she created the artwork for Amos Lee’s Mission Bell album....
May 12, 2015•1 hr 23 min•Ep. 24
Chatting with Karl proves our lives can take us anywhere, and each destination has a purpose. In Karl’s life he’s worked in two professions, music and development. He’s worked in Australia, Europe and currently resides in New York City. As a kid he SysOp'd bulletin board systems before the internet was a thing, and years later hung out in IRC chat rooms, like most of us. Instead of chatting about the newest trend he was discussing naming conventions for the MP3 file format. When Karl wasn’t on t...
May 06, 2015•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 23
Lara Hogan is a Senior Engineering Manager of Performance at Etsy. A lot of Lara can be summed up in one word - commitment. Her level of decisiveness is definitely admirable and something I hope to achieve in my career in general. Overall, the conversation was a fun one, we talked about her family life, her background and education, what the kind face really means, and how she’s built a career in the web industry. We even spoke a bit about donuts and cookies. Lara Hogan Follow Lara on Twitter et...
Apr 28, 2015•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 22
Patrick & Nick, hosts of The Start, reflect on Season 2. We talk about our favorite episodes, reoccurring themes throughout the season and moments of that really stuck with us. We also chat about our fun, out-of-the-ordinary interview with Jessica Hische and things we look forward to doing differently in Season 3. We love recording this podcast and love our listeners. Let us know if you have any thoughts, feedback or things to make The Start better. Thank you for listening. Shownotes Ira Gla...
Oct 21, 2014•33 min•Ep. 21
Having grown tired of the usual interview format, she politely asked us to break away from the norm and we happily obliged. We talked about Hazelton, Pennsylvania, her vacation in Europe, books she’s read, things she does while she works and mind-numbing reality TV. Shownotes Kerning Conference The Circle by Dave Eggers Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore A Heart Breaking Work on a Staggering Genius A Working Theory of Love Life is So Good Fish App Flux Jessica Hische...
Oct 14, 2014•55 min•Ep. 20
As a kid, Christine would travel two hours away to visit her dad during the weekends and summer. She lived in Norway and often found herself in front of the computer, where she spent hours online with friends, building fan-sites for Pokemon characters. Christine continued to build sites throughout her childhood and eventually made the jump all the way from Oslo, Norway to San Francisco, California where she attended California College of the Arts with an intent to focus on her design. Amidst the...
Oct 07, 2014•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 19
As a kid, Meng designed and sold clothes for the Sims computer game, which led her to pursue a career in fashion through Parsons. In class they drilled the idea of iteration into her head, helping her understand that the first idea isn’t always the best, and its definitely not the only one you’ll ever have. Meng is currently a freelance UI/UX designer in New York working with companies and startups of various sizes. Rosebud Sims Cheat Parsons Communication Design Irwin Chen Jason Fried Questions...
Sep 30, 2014•1 hr•Ep. 18
The story starts with Rameet selling candy and burned CDs at school in order to earn some extra income...for his stock portfolio. From there he moved on to designing flyers for his mom’s real estate company, then eventually her colleagues, before moving onto building websites for them too. All before 18. When Rameet was graduating high school, his dad told him to pay for his own college tuition as an exercise in character. Naturally, Rameet made a deal. He said he’d pay the first two years and i...
Sep 23, 2014•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 17
Wells Riley is a product designer at Envoy and a creator of the exceptional Hack Design and Startups, This Is How Design Works. Wells prides himself respecting the craft of design; understanding that good design takes time, effort, sweat and sometimes tears. Wells’ story includes bad grades in college, almost leaving San Francisco and a strong sentiment that anyone can be a great designer if they are willing to put in the time and work. Shownotes Collective Ray Baby Geniuses Bionic Hippo Kicksen...
Sep 16, 2014•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 16
