Design journey: growth & learning

At first, a love for making art was the start. I became a designer through sheer will and quiet stubbornness to never fully “grow up.” My first design memories were from the early 2000s when I was obsessed with designing Xanga layouts in elementary school. I messed around with bootleg Photoshop and tweaked hodgepodge HTML/CSS. I risked sneaking into the computer room past my bedtime, then I’d muffle the dial-up modem with a pillow… all so I could launch a new layout design featuring my current favorite band. It was adorned with flowery swashes, distressed edges, and (probably) lyrics of “Mr. Brightside.” I'd wake up the next day to new eProps and gushing comments from my little internet community.

After getting a Design degree from UC Davis, I worked as a graphic designer for a few years. At a translation agency, I helped make election materials and health documents more accessible to limited English speaking demographics and screen-reader users. There, I often wondered about how much of a difference I was making. Were people using these tools as intended? What can we do better? My curiosity made me want to deepen my knowledge of people’s behaviors and apply human-centered design practices to my work.

For over three years, I made a slow and steady transition into UX Design. I attended conferences to learn about issues surrounding tech and applied my learnings at hackathons. Eventually, I took a year to freelance and pursue UX design by enrolling in an online program. At the same time, I got together with a group of creatives to establish a design collective in Sacramento to share knowledge, experiences, and resources to help other designers grow. That's where I really found my groove and realized how important community is to me. As of 2021 (still in a pandemic), I'm working at a public health nonprofit and still fostering community in the digital space, and grateful that life has brought me closer to where I want to be.