About Me

I am a full-stack designer specializing in building brands and inclusive digital products.

Throughout my career I've pursued a depth and breadth of knowledge and skills as a design practitioner to better support my teams and, most importantly, the people for whom we design. I began my career in the advertising / branding space, but I quickly realized that I was most interested in and passionate about the intersection of design and technology and wanted to focus in this space.

I was fortunate enough to begin that focused journey at Colab as a Designer + Developer, where I designed, built and tested responsive (mostly Wordpress-based) websites for a variety of companies and organizations. I was able to experience first-hand the translation of the PSDs and Sketch templates I designed into living, breathing, responsive websites. I tried my hand at PHP and JavaScript, got the hang of version control with Git via CLI, and refined my HTML and CSS skills (BEM! SCSS!). I also discovered that I have a knack for QA and served as the QA lead, performing cross-browser testing for most of our sites and developed the appropriate systems and processes to support effective QA.

After spending years laser-focused on mastering everything that powers the experience on the screen, it was through the data in Google Analytics that I became deeply interested in understanding the experiences of the real people on the other side of the screen. I realized that the work I was doing was pointless if the people for whom I was designing could not use the experience, and it was in the pursuit of growth in the human-centered design practice that I joined CapTech's Customer Experience department in mid-2016.

Shortly after joining CapTech, I had a conversation with a former Associate UX Director and Accessibility Lead, Chris Lacroix, that profoundly impacted my life and the trajectory of my career as a designer. I had just lost my Grandma to breast cancer and our casual conversation meandered through some of the details of her life with Multiple Sclerosis, and I shared how it impacted her physical ability over time. Chris encouraged me to explore the accessibility space, so I signed up to fly out to Utah with my accessibility partner-in-crime, Virginia Booth, and participate in WebAIM's two-day intensive training that changed the trajectory of my career.

While I am very proud of the work I supported there in my day-to-day role as a Creative Director, what is most meaningful to me from my time there is the impact I had as Accessibility Lead — growing the accessibility practice of the individuals, teams and company as a whole, and working with my teammates, clients and in the design community writ large to share my knowledge and skills to help everyone build more inclusive digital experiences.

My work as an accessibility practitioner and advocate is the perfect intersection of the skills I've cultivated throughout my career and I believe it is exactly the work I was meant to do. I feel an incredible sense of gratitude whenever I learn something new in this space or leverage my skills and am able to share my knowledge to help others make accessible decisions and support more inclusive work.

After a decade of work in agencies and consulting, I decided to transition to in-house product design and joined the Tradesy (now Vestiaire Collective) team in 2021 as a Senior Product Designer. I deeply enjoy being a part of the product team — I love working in this space — and I am excited about the work and growth ahead.

Enough of the serious stuff — let's talk non-work things.

When I’m not working hard for the money and the world isn't on fire with a global pandemic, I’m exploring new places and restaurants. In these coronatimes, I'm staying put, hanging out with my husband, reading, watching TV and movies, listening to music and podcasts, working our house and running #thekitchenatcypresshill.

I’m lucky enough to have married the kind and generous spirit that is Andrew, an iOS Engineer at Cash App. We live a geeked-out life together, mostly talking about the latest tech thing that has happened. I crank a lot of tunes on Spotify these days and create a few cool playlists and listen to some good music every now and then. If you’re so inclined, you can follow me on the Twitter or check out the Contact page for other ways to get in touch.

Extra Credit

I love Call of Duty and Mario Kart; my drinks of choice are a neat bourbon or juicy DIPA; and I'll eat anything twice, but would eat Mexican food all-day long if I could.

Whew! That was a lot of words — thanks for stopping by and making it this far. You deserve a treat.