The 100 Most Influential People In Design
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Jeffrey Zeldman
Jeffrey Zeldman is Creative Director at Automattic (creators of WordPress) and co-Founder of An Event Apart, a convention for front-end and UX designers. He wrote “Designing with Web Standards” (now a textbook at 85 universities), which set many of today’s best practices for web design, usability, and accessibility. He also publishes the web and interaction design journal A List Apart.
Khoi Vinh
Khoi Vinh is Principal Designer at Adobe. Prior to this, he was Design Director at The New York Times and Co-founder and CEO of the iPad social network and design app Mixes (acquired by Etsy). Fast Company called him one of the “fifty most influential designers in America.” He wrote two books and hosts Wireframe podcast.
Fábio Sasso
Fábio Sasso is Senior Staff Designer for Android Automotive OS and Google Automotive Services, and he has been a designer at Google for nearly ten years. He is the founder of Abduzeedo (abdz), a top design blog featuring tutorials and design inspiration, with millions of visitors per month. He also wrote “Abduzeedo Inspiration Guide for Designers (Voices That Matter).”
Addy Osmani
Addy Osmani is Senior Staff Engineering Manager working on Google Chrome, leading projects intended to improve web performance and speed, including PageSpeed Insights, LightHouse, Chrome User Experience Report, and DevTools. He writes about design on Medium and posts videos on his YouTube channel.
Chris Coyier
Chris Coyier is Co-founder of CodePen, a development environment blended with a social network and community for web designers. He also founded CSS-Tricks, a web development website. He is Co-host of the development podcast ShopTalk (300+ episodes), the author of “Practical SVG” and “Digging into WordPress,” and he speaks at events including Smashing Conf, Webstock, and An Event Apart.
Luke Wroblewski
Luke Wroblewski is Product Director at Google, and his software is used by billions. Prior to this, he was Co-founder and CEO of the graphical opinion poll service Polar (acquired by Google) and Co-founder and Chief Product Officer of the list-sharing service Bagcheck (acquired by Twitter). He also worked in lead design roles at Yahoo!, eBay, and NCSA.
Sarah Drasner
Sarah Drasner is VP of Developer Experience at the development platform as a service company Netflify and Staff Technical Writer at CSS-Tricks. Prior to this, she was Principal Lead for Azure Cloud Developer Advocates at Microsoft and Manager of UX and Engineering at Trulia/Zillow. She wrote “SVG Animations” and is Co-founder of Web Animation Workshops.
Veerle Pieters
Veerle Pieters is Founder and Manager of the freelance graphic design agency Duoh! (now b.v.b.a.). Since 2003, she has written a blog about web and graphic design with projects, tips, and tutorials on tools including Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign, and XD. She also shares curated and original graphics for her readers’ design inspiration.
Dave Shea
Dave Shea is Creator of the influential CSS Zen Garden, hosting CSS style sheets for design inspiration. He is Director of Product Design at Bench Accounting. Prior to this, he was at Mobify and leading Bright Creative, serving clients including Google, CNet, and New York University. He speaks at conferences and is Co-author of “The Zen of CSS Design.”
Brad Frost
Brad Frost is a web designer, writer, and speaker. He wrote “Atomic Design” about effective design system methodologies and co-hosts the Style Guides Podcast. He also helped create tools including Styleguides.io, Style Guide Guide, Pattern Lab, Death to Bullshit, and This is Responsive. Prior to becoming self-employed, he worked at R/GA, Pod1, and Sharp Creative.
Lea Verou
Lea Verou is a research assistant pursuing a PhD in Human-Computer Interaction at MIT. She is also a web designer/developer who has spoken at 100+ events worldwide. The author of “CSS Secrets,” she is one of only a handful of Invited Experts on the W3C CSS Working Group. She has also started open-source projects including Mavo, Prism, and Awesomplete.
Jessica Hische
Jessica Hische is a lettering artist and the bestselling author of the children’s books “Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave” and “Tomorrow I’ll be Kind.” Her clients include Adobe, Apple, The Atlantic, Barack Obama, Etsy, Facebook, Harper Collins, Hallmark, HP, Nike, Pinterest, The New York Times, UNICEF, Wes Anderson, Wired Magazine, and numerous other top brands. She has spoken at 100+ events.
Eric Meyer
Eric Meyer is recognized by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences as an expert on web standards, HTML, and CSS. He is the author of numerous books, including “Design for Real Life (A Book Apart)” and “Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide,” and creator of the CSS Browser Compatibility Charts (“The Mastergrid”). He also co-founded An Event Apart.
Chris Messina
Chris Messina is best-known as the inventor of the #hashtag, and he has been instrumental in technological, design, and cultural changes to online life. He has worked at Google and Uber, founded Molly.com (supported by Y Combinator), and helped Mozilla Firefox reach its first 100 billion downloads. He also co-organized the first BarCamp and opened San Francisco’s first coworking space.
Patrick Neeman
Patrick Neeman is User Experience Director at Knowable, Product Advisor at Stealth Startup, and Product Advisor at Jobscan. Prior to this, he was a UX instructor at General Assembly. He has led design teams in both high-growth organizations and startups, and he specializes in conceiving of new products and redesigning existing ones iteratively to drive engagement.
Richard Darell
Richard Darell is Founder and CEO of content-based sites including BitRebels, Trenderous, XMG, and the graphic design blog Minervity. His websites rely on his background in graphic design (to design new website systems and features) and in statistics (to develop web optimization systems).
Dan Cederholm
Dan Cederholm is a designer and Co-founder of Dribbble, a global design and creative community and recruiting organization serving companies including Apple, Airbnb, IDEO, and Slack. They recently acquired Creative Market and have grown to 12 million users. Founder of the design company and online store SimpleBits, he also hosts the podcast The SimpleBits Show.
Sara Soueidan
Sara Soueidan is an award-winning UI and front-end developer and design engineer, serving clients including Netflix, Khan Academy, and Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport by building “resilient UI foundations.” She works with SuperFriendly building design systems and wrote the Codrops CSS Reference. She was Net Awards’ 2015 Developer of the Year and speaks at numerous international events.
Ethan Marcotte
Ethan Marcotte is a web designer, speaker, writer, and the inventor of Responsive Web Design. He was a lead designer on the launch of the first large-scale responsive website for The Boston Globe, and his clients have included Google, People Magazine, New York Magazine, The Today Show, and Sundance Film Festival. He is Co-founder of Editorially and Autogram.
Calvin Lee
Calvin Lee is Founder and Designer at Mayhem Studios, a design firm providing strategic guidance on design identity, websites, annual reports, and logos. He helps small and large clients, has received awards, and been featured in books including Creativity Awards, “Big Book of Business Cards,” “Big Book of Layouts,” “American Corporate Identity,” and “Creatively Self-Employed.”
Debbie Millman
Debbie Millman is Editorial/Creative Director at Print and host of Design Matters podcast. She was President of Design and Chief Marketing Officer at Sterling Brands, serving the world’s largest brands, including Burger King and Star Wars. With work featured in Chicago Design Museum, Boston Biennale, New York Magazine, and Fast Company, she co-founded the world’s first graduate program in branding.
Chris Spooner
Chris Spooner is a designer and Founder of the blog Big Spoon Graphics, where he shares tutorials, design tips, inspiration, and articles about design and creativity (both free and through a paid membership). He also posts content on his YouTube channel and tweets about updates to his site and content.
Tobias van Schneider
Tobias van Schneider is a designer whose clients include Google, NASA, BMW, and Toyota. He is Advisor and Creative Director at memomi, Co-founder of the Semplice design community and portfolio system, and Creator of the Authentic Weather app. Prior to this, he was Art Director/Lead Product Designer at Spotify as they grew from 15 million to 70+ million users.
Jacob Cass
Jacob Cass is Founder of JUST Creative and runs their popular blog and podcast. His clients include Disney, Nike, Nintendo, Jerry Seinfeld, Puerto Rico, and San Francisco. A TEDx speaker, his work has appeared in Forbes, Entrepreneur, and books including “The Best of Logo Lounge Master Series.” He is a Certified Brand Master and Yahoo’s Best Brand Coach in 2020.
Ray Wenderlich
Ray Wenderlich is Founder of Razeware, makers of the mobile development community raywenderlich.com, which unites 200 developers and editors to provide professional programming tutorials on topics such as Android, iOS, Unity, and Flutter. They have produced 2000+ articles, 3000+ videos, 50+ books, and held four conferences. Prior to this, he was at Mythic Entertainment and the NSA.
Jen Simmons
Jen Simmons is a Web Technologies Evangelist at Apple for Safari and Webkit and a Member of the CSS Working Group at W3C. Prior to this, she was a Designer and Developer Advocate at Mozilla. She has spoken at 100+ events, including An Event Apart, Velocity, and SXSW, and hosted and produced the technology podcast The Web Ahead.
Daniel Burka
Daniel Burka is Director of Product and Design at the NGO Resolve to Save Lives on Simple, an electronic medical record used by hospitals to manage hypertension. Prior to this, he was Design Partner at Google Ventures, working with companies including Flatiron Health and Blue Bottle Coffee. He co-founded simpleorange, a design firm with clients including Mozilla and Duolingo.
Una Kravets
Una Kravets is Senior Developer Relations Engineer for Google Chrome. Prior to this, she worked in front-end, product, and UX/UI design at Bustle, Digital Ocean, and IBM. She hosts design podcasts (Toolsday, CSS Podcast), and produces Designing in the Browser. She speaks at global events and her work has been featured in outlets including Smashing Magazine and A List Apart.
Rachel Andrew
Rachel Andrew is Editor-in-Chief of Smashing Magazine, Technical Writer at Mozilla, and Technical Editor and Writer at A List Apart. She is also on the CSS Working Group. Prior to this, she was part of The Web Standards Project and co-founded the CMSs Perch and Perch Runway. She has written or contributed to 22 books and speaks at numerous events.
Pablo Stanley
Pablo Stanley is Co-founder and CEO at Blush, a web-based illustration tool allowing users to remix and customize art from designers around the world into custom designs. He also writes and illustrates the comic The Design Team. Prior to this, he was Design Lead at InVision and Founder of Sketch Together workshops on Design, UI Animation, and Prototyping.
David Airey
David Airey is a graphic designer who has spent 15+ years specializing in visual identity, branding, and logos. His books “Identity Designed: The Definitive Guide to Visual Branding ” and “Logo Design Love: A Guide to Creating Iconic Brand Identities ” are required reading at universities worldwide. His clients have included Uptown Dogs, Ecometrica, Montville Coffee, Pacifico Energy, Kairos, and Squelch.
Andy Budd
Andy Budd is Founder of Clearleft, the UK’s first UX agency, with clients including Virgin Holidays, Penguin Random House, Spotify, and Tesco. He helped popularize UX design and founded the UK’s first UX (UX London) and digital design (dConstruct) conferences. He was Co-founder and Judge of the Web Standards Awards and wrote “CSS Mastery: Advanced Web Standards Solutions.”
Aarron Walter
Aarron Walter is Senior Product and Design Lead at Resolve to Save Lives for the US COVID-19 response. Prior to this, he was VP of Content at InVision, and he started MailChimp’s UX practice. His book “Designing for Emotion” established design principles now applied at IBM, the White House, American Express, and others. He is Co-host of Design Better Podcast.
Ryan Singer
Ryan Singer is Head of Product Strategy at Basecamp, where he has spent 17 years in roles including UI, strategy, and development while inventing important internal processes. He wrote “Shape Up: Stop Running in Circles and Ship Work That Matters,” advice on growth for small, bootstrapped software companies. He also writes a newsletter.
Cameron Moll
Cameron Moll is VP Design at Pendo. Prior to this, he was Head of Design at Facebook. He was Founder, CEO, Product Manager, and UX Designer at Authentic Jobs (acquired by BuySellAds), a job search website, and has been featured in outlets including The Atlantic, NPR, and Forrester Research. He wrote “Mobile Web Design” and co-authored “CSS Mastery.”
Graham Smith
Graham Smith is a logo and brand identity designer and is Founder of The Logo Smith, a branding, design, advertising, social media, and web development firm started in 1986. Clients include SuperblyCo, Feedly, Pure Storage, T-Shirt Express, and View’d. He tweets about design and writes a blog.
Jonathan Snook
Jonathan Snook is a designer who works for clients, speaks at events, and runs workshops on web and app development. His 17+ year career has been in UX and front-end design, development, products, and prototyping at companies including Shopify, Yahoo!, and Squarespace. He Co-authored “Accelerated DOM Scripting with Ajax, APIs, and Libraries,” and “The Art and Science of CSS.”
Karen McGrane
Karen McGrane is Partner at Autogram, a digital consultancy focused on content strategy, mobile or multi-platform design, and UX design. Prior to this, she was Managing Partner at Bond Art + Science and started the first UX practice at Razorfish, serving clients including the New York Times, Citibank, Disney, and Condé Nast. She wrote “Going Responsive” and “Content Strategy for Mobile.”
Sarah Parmenter
Sarah Parmenter is Adobe Insider for Adobe XD and Founder of her design practice serving clients including Apple, Adobe, Blackberry, The National Breast Cancer Foundation of America, and News Corporation. She is also Creative Director and Founder for the beauty industry and design company Blushbar and Creative Director at Clement Browne. She is a regular speaker at An Event Apart.
Paul Boag
Paul Boag is Founding Partner at Boagworks, where he helps clients including BBC, Nestle, and the European Commission improve customer experience, brand awareness, and conversion. He is also Non-Executive Director at Smashing Magazine and Headscape. He launched the first and longest-running web design podcast, Boag UX World, wrote six books, and speaks at numerous international events.
Elliot Jay Stocks
Elliot Jay Stocks is a designer working in web/print design and branding. He was Creative Director of Adobe Typekit (Adobe Fonts), and he has worked with clients with particular interest in typography, such as Microsoft, MailChimp, Virgin Group, Founders Fund, EMI, Smashing Magazine, and Automattic. He has also been in leading creative roles at the magazines Lagom and 8 faces.
Dan Rubin
Dan Rubin is a designer and photographer. He is Founder and Creative Director of webgraph, a design and usability studio serving companies including Google, Microsoft, Chicos, MailChimp, MOO, Walmart, Geffen/Universal Music, Web Standards Project (WaSP), and Yahoo! He works with private clients, speaks at international events, and posts content on Twitter, Flickr, 500px, and Instagram.
Jeffrey Veen
Jeffrey Veen is Design Partner and Head of Platform at True Ventures, advising companies including Medium and WordPress. Prior to this, he designed Google Analytics and led Google’s UX. He was Co-founder and CEO at Typekit (acquired by Adobe), VP of Design at Adobe, and Founding Partner at Adaptive Path (acquired by Capital One). He also helped found Wired Magazine.
Andy Clarke
Andy Clarke is Creative Designer at Stuff & Nonsense, one of the web’s top design studios, and Director of Product Design at Nozomi Networks. He worked with companies including Disney Store UK, Home Office (UK), Greenpeace, SAP, and WWF. The author of four books, he regularly speaks at international design and UX conferences. He founded Britain’s first digital photography studio.
Brian Hoff
Brian Hoff is Partner and Creative Director at the product design and digital branding agency RocketAir (formerly Brian Hoff Designs), focusing on UX/UI design, information architecture, and art direction. They help clients including Asos, Walmart, Makerly, and the American Council on Education develop digital products, improve their brand awareness, and grow their company. Prior to this, he was at Apple.
Jon Hicks
Jon Hicks is a partner (with Leigh Hicks) at Hicksdesign, a UK-based graphic design studio. They work with clients including Firefox, Shopify, MailChimp, Canva, Resolve to Save Lives, Dyson, Monotype, Canonical, Duck Duck Go, and Skype to provide services including web and product design, iconography, print, and brand identity.
Leisa Reichelt
Leisa Reichelt is Head of Research and Insight at Atlassian. Prior to this, she was Head of Service Design at the Digital Transformation Agency of the Australian Government and Head of User Research for the UK Government’s Digital Service (GDS). An expert in user-centered design, she has spoken at events including UX London, DConstruct, Web 2.0 Expo, and Next.
Joshua Porter
Joshua Porter is Partner and Product Designer at Rocket Insights (acquired by Dept), the fastest-growing product agency in the US, with clients including Bose, HBO Go, Hulu, Comcast, BrightCove, PillPack, Intuit, 20th Century Fox, and Virgin Pulse. Prior to this, he was Director of UX at HubSpot and Founder of Performable (acquired by HubSpot).
Val Head
Val Head is Senior Design Advocate at Adobe, specialized in UI animation and UX. She wrote “Designing Interface Animation,” “Animation in Design Systems,” and “Pocket Guide to CSS Animation,” and curates the UI Animation Newsletter. She has spoken at events including An Event Apart, SmashingConf, Design Up, Design Matters, and Awwwards.
Laura Klein
Laura Klein is Principal at Users Know, a consultancy providing product management, UX design, and user research to help companies build better products. She is author of “UX for Lean Startups” and “Build Better Products: A Modern Approach to Building Successful User-Centered Products,” as well as host of the podcast What is Wrong with UX.
Mark Boulton
Mark Boulton is a web designer who leads digital communications at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory. He founded Mark Boulton Designs (acquired by Monotype) and has worked with clients including CERN, Condé Nast, Al Jazeera, Drupal, and ESPN. He also co-founded the community publisher Five Simple Steps and wrote “Designing for the Web” and “Web Standards Creativity.”
Mike Davidson
Mike Davidson is Vice President of Partnerships and Community at InVision. Prior to this, he was Vice President of Design at Twitter, where he built a design and research team of 100 for UX and branding. He founded Newsvine (acquired by NBC News) and worked at NBC News, ESPN, and Disney. He also invented the typeface tool sIFR.
Bruce Lawson
Bruce Lawson is a consultant on web standards, accessibility, HTML, and CSS, with clients including Wix and PrinceXM. He has spoken at 120+ events in 22 countries, co-wrote “Introducing HTML5,” helped draft British web accessibility standards, and was Opera's representative on the W3C Mobile Web Applications Best Practices. Prior to this, he was Deputy Chief Technology Officer at Opera Software.
Mike Rundle
Mike Rundle is Design Lead on the Smart Business Decisions team at Intuit, where he has spent nearly 10 years. Prior to this, he was Owner of Design Then Code, producing eBooks like “Building iOS Apps from Scratch” used by companies including IBM, Apple, GE, Yahoo!, Salesforce, and Starbucks. He was also Design Co-Founder of 9rules (acquired by Splashpress).
Tim Holman
Tim Holman is Lead Frontend Engineer at Bustle Digital Group, a leading media company with brands including Bustle, Elite Daily, Mic, NYLON, Romper, and The Outline. Prior to this, he was a frontend engineer at CodePen, Tumbler, Wieden+Kennedy, and Qwiki. He shares his design and coding projects on his blog, The Curious Creations of Tim Holman.
Meagan Fisher Couldwell
Meagan Fisher Couldwell is a freelance web designer and developer helping clients including Adobe, Change.org, Verse, Scroll, and United Pixelworkers “create digital experiences that are engaging, memorable, and successful.” She contributed to the design book “Laying the Foundations.” Prior to this, she was Creative Director at HomeTeam, SproutVideo, and ChartBeat.
Scott Jenson
Scott Jenson works in product strategy at Google, leading future Android UX concepts, and he has also worked on Mobile UX there. Prior to this, he was founder at Jenson Design and Creative Director at frogdesign. He also spent eight years in UI design at Apple, with projects including the Apple Human Interface Guidelines, System 7, and Newton.
Antonio Carusone
Antonio Carusone is VP, XD Design Principal at Bank of America, creating their data-driven financial products. He also owns the lifestyle and design shop Superlunar. Prior to this, he was Senior Director or Director of Product Design at Bizly, Frame.io, and MakeSpace; Senior Product Designer at Microsoft; and Senior User Interface Lead at Thomson Reuters.
Jim Coudal
Jim Coudal is Founder of the design, digital marketing, and interaction studio Coudal Partners, makers of the Field Notes brand of notebooks. Their clients include the Houston Astros, Go Roma, 44 Farms, TripDisc, and Chicago Double Decker Co. He has appeared in A List Apart, Crain’s Chicago Business, 37signals Fireside Chats, and Wired Magazine, among other outlets.
Alex Muench
Alex Muench is Senior Digital Product Designer at Doist, working on their app Todoist and the communication app Twist. He is also a freelance designer creating digital experiences on Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and the web for clients including Adidas, Audi AG, Mercedes Benz, Nestlé Schöller, Nikon, Philip Morris GmbH (L&M), and Telefónica Europe (O2).
Liz Danzico
Liz Danzico is Vice President of Design for NPR and Co-founder and Chair of the Interaction Design MFA at the School of Visual Arts. Prior to this, she was a digital consultant on design, UX, and strategy for organizations from major companies to NGOs, such as The New York Times, Teach for All, the TED Prize, and This American Life.
Laura Kalbag
Laura Kalbag is Co-founder of the Small Technology Foundation (previously Ind.ie), a not-for-profit organization for digital social justice through tools like tracking blockers, accessible design, and de-centralized peer-controlled digital spaces. They “advocate for Small Tech as the antidote to Big Tech and surveillance capitalism.” She wrote “Accessibility for Everyone” and speaks at events such as SmashingConf, Nordic.design, and UX Australia.
David Teodorescu
David Teodorescu is Senior Product Designer at Fitbit, and he has 12+ years of experience in product, visual, and UX/UI design for products with millions of users and organizations including Samsung, Vodaphone, and Amplicare. His work has appeared in Inc. Magazine, TechCrunch, UX Collective, Adobe Blog, TNW, Awwwards, and other outlets. He writes on Medium and speaks at events.
Jon Phillips
Jon Phillips is Product UX/UI Engineer at BuySellAds, creating solutions serving thousands of daily users and overseeing the look, flow, and experience of their apps and products. He is also Founder of Contrastly, a photography tool marketplace. Prior to this, he was a freelance web and UX designer, and Founder or Co-founder of MediaLoot, SpyreStudios, and FreelanceFolder.
Kostas Hatzis
Kostas Hatzis is a product designer and information architect. He is Owner of Monospace Labs, a small “software house” creating software for startups, CRM/CMS applications, and well-designed websites. Prior to this, he was Chief Technology Officer at Movinhand, a recruitment solution for teachers around the world, handling web architecture and website UX/UI.
Chris Pearson
Chris Pearson is a designer, software engineer, copywriter, and speaker. He created Focus, the fastest WordPress theme, and Thesis, a modular replacement for WordPress themes making faster, more agile websites. He also created Golden Ratio Typography, a responsive text sizing system to optimize text ratios and CSS values on any layout.
Mike Kus
Mike Kus is a designer focusing on web and graphic design, branding, photography, and illustration. He is Founder of Mike Kus Ltd and Creative Director on the board of Parcel for Me. His clients include Shopify, Getty Images, Smashing Magazine, GoodDollar, Epic Travel, and Bigeye. He speaks at conferences including Awwwards, Pixel Pioneers, Web Expo, and The Photography Show.
Alyssa X
Alyssa X is a designer, full-stack developer, and Founder at companies including the social, web-based sound editor Sonuum, the animated mockup platform Animockup, and Screenity. She is also Lead Product Designer at Tensil. Maker Magazine named her Best Woman Maker of 2018, and she has been featured in outlets including YCombinator HN, Awwwards, Smashing Magazine, and Product Hunt.
Derek Featherstone
Derek Featherstone is Chief Experience Officer at Level Access, where he coaches clients and their teams on accessibility and ease of use. Prior to this, he was Founder at Simply Accessible (acquired by Level Access) and an accessibility consultant (focusing on eGovernment accessibility) for a decade. He led the Web Standards project and speaks about accessibility and inclusivity at events.
Austin Byrd
Austin Byrd is Product Designer at Mighty Networks. Prior to this, he was Senior Product Designer at Wyze Labs, UX Designer at Microsoft, and UX Engineer at Transactly. He has also been at NASA, Pixel Press Technology, and Centene. He tweets about design, technological developments, and the social implications of new technology.
Andy Sowards
Andy Sowards is a freelance web designer, developer, blogger, and online entrepreneur. He is a full-service developer and consultant with clients including celebrity chef Fabio Viviani, Michael Yo, The British Voice Talent, Virl, and Suicide Girls. He also curates InfiniGEEK and Game Tomatoes, and he has been named one of the top developers on Twitter.
Jane Pyle
Jane Pyle is User Experience Lead at the biotechnology company Genetech, where she has spent her 24-year design career. She uses research and storytelling to understand the user’s point of view and integrates this with business needs to solve problems, working with interaction designers, developers, end users, and stakeholders. She tweets about design, news, and animal rights.
Heydon Pickering
Heydon Pickering is Editor at Smashing Magazine, a technical writer, and a web designer. He is interested in inclusive design and design systems, and has written four books on web accessibility and frontend design, such as “Inclusive Components.” He also co-created the CSS learning system Every Layout and was shortlisted for the Designer of the Year award by NET Magazine.
Denise Jacobs
Denise Jacobs is Founder and CEO at The Creative Dose, a creativity consultancy using neuroscience and improvisation to teach creative thinking and how to generate and communicate new ideas. A Creativity Evangelist, she wrote “The CSS Detective Guide” and co-authored “Smashing Book #3: Redesign the Web” and “InterAct with Web Standards: A Holistic Approach to Web Design.”
Alice Lee
Alice Lee is an illustrator and muralist who creates dreamy designs “with heart, purpose, and originality.” Her clients have included Elizabeth Warren’s 2020 presidential campaign, the Asian Art Museum, XOXO Festival, Slack, Facebook (Spaces), Automattic (WordPress), and Wealthfront. She hosts Adobe’s Doodle Therapy. Prior to this, she was Product Designer and the 2nd-ever illustrator at Dropbox.
Richard Rutter
Richard Rutter is Co-founder and Managing Director of the digital design consultancy Clearleft. Their clients have included London’s Natural History Museum, Queen Mary University of London, Virgin Holidays, Penguin Random House, and Trusted Reviews. Prior to this, he was Co-founder and CEO at Fontdeck, Producer at Multimap, and carried out UX design and information architecture for Barclaycard and Credit Suisse.
Tiffany Wardle
Tiffany Wardle is Typegirl, a self-employed typographer and designer. She is also an instructor at Typecamp. She has been published in outlets including Alphabettes, Interrobang, TypeCulture, STEP Inside Design, and Indie Fonts III. Formerly on the board of the Society of Typographic Aficionados, she was a judge at the Typography Annual for Communication Arts.
Jeffrey Kalmikoff
Jeffrey Kalmikoff is Product Designer at Facebook, working on Privacy UX, and previously on Messenger. He is also Mentor at 500 Startups and TechStars and Design Advisor to the Skatepark Project. Prior to this, he was Staff Product Designer at Uber and held creative roles at Barrel + Ink, Jelly Industries, Blurb, Betable, Simple Geo, and Digg.
Anna Dorfman
Anna Dorfman is a book cover designer, blogger, illustrator, and art director. Prior to this, she was Senior Designer at Simon & Schuster for 17 years. She writes Door 16, a blog about her personal interests and home renovation projects, and was a brand ambassador for IKEA. Her work has appeared in Dwell, Glamour, Elle Décor, and The Washington Post.
Robert Hodgin
Robert Hodgin is Co-founder and Interactive Director at the design and technology studio Rare Volume. Prior to this, he was Founding Partner of the Barbarian Group and worked with Bloom Studio on the Planetary iPad app. He co-created Cinder C++ framework and was featured at Victoria&Albert Museum, Wired NextFest, Wing Luke Asian Museum, San Francisco Exploratorium, and elsewhere.
Yesenia Perez-Cruz
Yesenia Perez-Cruz is Senior UX Manager for Polaris at Shopify. Prior to this, she was Senior Design Director at Vox Media and worked at agencies for clients including Harvard University, Viacom, Papa John’s, and fonts.com. The author of “Expressive Design Systems,” she has spoken at technology and design events such as An Event Apart and SXSW.
Paul Sahre
Paul Sahre has been an independent designer since 1997. A member of Alliance Graphique Internationale, he speaks at international design events. His clients include The New York Times, Google Creative Lab, Chuck Klosterman, They Might Be Giants, Malcolm Gladwell, This American Life, Simon and Schuster, Criterion Collection, and Time Magazine. He also wrote “Two-Dimensional Man: A Graphic Memoir.”
Derek Powazek
Derek Powazek’s design and development career has spanned companies including Blogger, HotWired, Technorati, and HP. The author of the influential “Design for Community: The Art of Connecting Real People in Virtual Places,” he founded or co-founded the photography magazine JPG, the quarterly publication Fray, the online game Cute-Fight, and others. He now grows CBD in Oregon at Milk Barn Farm.
Jen Dewalt
Jennifer Dewalt is a designer, developer, and serial entrepreneur who learned to code by making 180 websites in 180 days and blogging about it. She is Founder of the project management tool Zube (supported by Y Combinator Fellowship), Yumhacker, Grapefeed, Pivit, and Soda Truck, and she was a Growth Developer at Wit.ai (acquired by Facebook).
Jessica Ivins
Jessica Ivins is UX Designer and Educator at Centre Centre-UIE, a UX design school. She is also Founder of Chattanooga UX Design Meetup, speaks at events such as SXSW, UX Cambridge, and Midwest UX, and writes extensively on Medium about UX. Prior to this, she was Senior Experience Designer at Happy Cog and Lead UX Designer at AWeber.
Nick Babich
Nick Babich is Editor-in-Chief of UX Planet, a one-stop shop for UX content, career advice, research, and beginner guides, with work from experts around the world. His work appears in outlets including Smashing Magazine, Net Magazine, Shopify, CreativeCloud, Usersnap, Tech in Asia, and UX Booth. He also writes on Medium.
Ryan Sims
Ryan Sims is VP of Design at the gamified language-learning app Duolingo. Prior to this, he was Head of Product Design at Stripe, Principal Designer at Adobe, Head of Design at Rdio, and Lead Designer at Virb. He is interested in creative direction, UX/UI, and design leadership. He tweets about design, Duolingo, and job openings.
Joe Natoli
Joe Natoli is Founder at Give Good UX, an online learning platform whose courses have helped 200,000+ designers and developers learn UX/UI. He spent his career training UX and product teams for major corporate clients including Google Ventures, Oracle, and SC Johnson. The author of “Think First,” he speaks at events including WebExpo, DevWeek, Interaction South America (ISA), and QCON.
Chad Engle
Chad Engle is Product Design Director at GoDaddy, building their design team. Prior to this, he was Director of Product Design at the real estate platform Boom Town. He created their Lead Matching Engine and NOW App (a CRM alternative that allowed for faster communication between agents), and he redesigned their website for 417% increase on their goals.
Linda Eliasen
Linda Eliasen is VP Design at Help Scout, customer support solutions serving 10,000+ customers, including AngelList, Basecamp, GrubHub, Buffer, and Timbuk2. Prior to this, she was Art Director at Ueno, Designer and Illustrator at Dropbox, and a designer at Squarespace and MailChimp. She hosts the podcast Earth to Linda.
Folkert Gorter
Folkert Gorter is an interaction designer who aims to “[add] value through design in digital media without being compromised or influenced by status, style, or financial considerations.” He works out of the Los Angeles studio Superfamous and has been a part of the ongoing projects Cargo, Space Collective, and But Does it Float.
Golden Krishna
Golden Krishna is Head of Design Strategy, Platforms and Ecosystems at Google. He wrote the bestseller “The Best Interface is No Interface: A Simple Path to Brilliant Technology.” Prior to this, he was at Zappos, Samsung, and Cooper. He speaks internationally and delivered a SXSW keynote. His work appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, the Verge, BBC, and others.
Larissa Meek
Larissa Meek is Creative Director at the PriceWaterhouseCoopers Experience Center. Her career spans 15+ years working for Fortune 500 organizations and global brands, and she specializes in UX, responsive web design, and digital strategy. Her work has appeared in outlets including Smashing Magazine and .net, and she has spoken at events like SXSW and Future of Web Design.
Bryan Velos
Bryan Veloso is CEO of Altair Interactive, seeking to create a more “mindful” alternative to Twitch and Facebook Gaming. Prior to this, he worked in UX/UI and design roles at Facebook, Twitch, Automattic, GitHub, and Sidebar Creative. He was also a Full-Time Partnered Broadcaster at Twitch, former CEO of Revyver, and Blogger at Avalonstar, his personal and technology blog.
Greg Storey
Greg Storey is a designer with 30+ years of experience and Principal at Airbag Industries, a design and development studio serving clients including MSNBC, Sundance Film Festival, Red 5 Studios, The Today Show, and Arizona State University. He is also Senior Director of Design at InVision and former Head of Brand and Culture at IBM.
Cameron Olivier
Cameron Olivier is UX Designer and Frontend Developer at Nona Creative. He has been working in web design since the 1990s and using CSS since 2005, and he has held UX, frontend design, and development roles at numerous companies. He prefers to build in PHP, HTML5, CSS3, and React.
Sophie Shepherd
Sophie Shepherd is a manager in product and web design at Github, where she has spent five years. She also teaches responsive design at Girl Develop IT. Prior to this, she was Senior Designer at the open-source software company Ushahidi, which used crowdsourced data to map crisis events. She was also a designer at Happy Cog and freelance.
Ximena Vengoechea
Ximena Vengoechea is Senior User Research Specialist at Pinterest, helping them design user-centric products and create “moments of delight.” Prior to this, she worked in user research and UX at Twitter and LinkedIn. Her book “Listen Like you Mean It” will be published in 2021 and she writes about careers and personal development for Muse, Fast Company, and other outlets.
Becky Simpson
Becky Simpson is an art director, freelance illustrator, and creator of the online shop Chipper Things selling optimistic objects, stationary, and flowcharts. She wrote “I’d Rather Be Short” and “The Roommate Book.” Her work has appeared in outlets including Inc., Digital Art, and LifeHacker, she has spoken at events such as SXSW, Mobile World Congress, and Adobe MAX.
Phi Hoang
Phi Hoang is Senior Design Lead at Funsize, an industry-leading visual and product design firm also offering strategy and optimization services and investing in ventures including Hitch, Squad, Plum Lighting, and Incrediband. He is also Partner and Design Director at Awake° Studios. Prior to this, he was Senior Product Designer at HomeAway. He shares numerous case studies on Dribble.