I'm a designer who codes, a founder, and a product leader who loves turning messy problems into real products. I've been the first designer at multiple startups, co-founded two of my own, and led global design teams at Microsoft. My sweet spot is early-stage: shaping vision, validating ideas, building systems, and shipping fast.
I'm a generalist in two ways. First, across design disciplines—I do business strategy, go-to-market, brand and marketing design, product design, and systems work. Second, across scale: I've been the founding designer at startups and led design teams at public companies, and everything in between. That range isn't dilution. It's versatility. It means I see the whole picture and know where design needs to show up next.
I have two degrees but seldom speak of them. One taught me to think big and small, the other to be a skeptic (think harder). I studied earth sciences and systems theory... which required me to take the 80,000 foot view and see the system zoomed out, but also to zoom in and look at things through a microscope. That training shows up in how I design products: I care about the whole system (how does this feature affect everything else?) and the micro-interactions (does this button label actually make sense?). Most product problems are systems problems in disguise.
My grandfather was a jeweler, watchmaker, and craftsman. I spent my childhood watching him make intricate things with his hands. He taught me that great work takes care, skill, and pride. That stuck.
I can do the full range... from garage-stage product to design leadership at scale. But I want to be honest about something I've learned: product design and brand/marketing design have fundamentally different operating rhythms. Product is iteration-focused and systems-driven. Brand and marketing are campaign-driven and polish-focused. When collapsed into one role long-term, it creates friction... design becomes a blocker instead of a force multiplier.
As a leader, I'm a player-coach. I thrive in the dual role of setting direction and getting in the trenches. Early-stage teams need both. Whether I'm prototyping in Figma or code, mapping product strategy, or advising founders, I'm thinking about what helps teams move faster and smarter.
I live in Vermont and New York with my wife, daughter, husky (Jiro), and two cats (Francis and Beatrix). I play gypsy jazz guitar in a Django Reinhardt cover band, sail in the summer, ski off-piste in the winter, build furniture, cook, and bake sourdough.
