I spent a month once in between jobs taking a ton of self-portraits with the thought that I would take a bunch and then never need to take a headshot ever again. Of course, the logic was flawed, because I realized that I’ll slowly but surely get more wrinkles and get fat and probably get tired of dying my hair white for at least a while before it starts coming in that way naturally. It was a great show all the same, I had fun doing it. In fact, I don’t regret any of my bizarre side adventures into learning new things because they’re normally fun and I always come out with fun facts that are helpful at dinner parties. Did you know that the Russian words for western-style clothing come from the words the French used at the time, as that was the language spoken at court? Did you know that in the 17th century when this switch from traditional to western clothing was made, a great deal of the aristocracy didn’t even speak Russian, only French, which caused this bizarre discrepancy? Well, now you do. Next time you're throwing a party you should consider having me over.
I’m a prototyper—this means I design and develop, taking scribbles in my sketchbook into reality. The line is getting more and more blurry for what I am and what I am not; I used to say that I did web and native prototypes, but lately I've been doing hardware, and video, and then there's this thing which is pretty fun to do too. I don't put a ton of stock into the specifics since I figure I can learn anything and that's that. Astrophysics, here I come.
I have fun when my work strikes a balance between interesting technical challenges and intelligent product design that's changing others' lives for the better. Or when I'm making something really, really silly. Can't be serious all the time, sorry.
This portfolio's been featured a few places, including Typewolf, Unmatched , and the front page of Designer News. If you wanna feature it too, rad! Thanks! Let me know when you do!
I’m currently employed with Mozilla on their devtools team, where I'm working with a bunch of smart engineers to build the tools people use to build the internet. All of that work is open source, so you can actually creep on my current work on Github, although no lies that site is more for me and tracking work than anything else.
I feel rather pressured to plug for my social media accounts here which is kind of awkward, but I’m helenvholmes on the internet. (In real life I add spaces and capitalize my first name.) If you want to follow me on social media, thanks! I think that list of results has me everywhere that’s important.