Background More
Born in Pennsylvania in January of 1993, I struggled with rote learning. When something caught my interest, however, I dove in with everything I had. The issue was that nothing in the classroom at Germantown Academy seemed to interest me. All of that changed when I discovered Apple computers. Everything.
By eighteen, I was teaching myself how to code, book after book, tutorial after tutorial — not to build a career, but to simply build a door to a digital world that felt limitless. First Python, then Java, C, Objective-C, then Javascript, CSS, HTML, and countless other frameworks, I quickly fell in love with web and mobile development. “Design in the browser” was my very first introduction to creation in the digital realm, and I couldn’t get enough of it.
During my undergraduate degree from 2011 - 2015, I studied web and mobile development through Information Technology and Software Engineering programs at the Rochester Institute of Technology. I spent my days and nights sitting in front of the blue light of my black MacBook laptop building personal websites, side projects, school projects; the ideas just kept coming. It was in that quiet isolation that I really found my focus. I wasn't just learning a skill; it was my first form of true creative expression.
My relentless drive eventually took me to Seattle to intern at Amazon for two summers (on the Kindle and Logistics teams), then to work there full-time. I started my professional career at Amazon building prototypes based on other designers’ ideas, but as time passed, I couldn’t deny what I had always wanted: to be the mind behind the design, not just the implementation. Within the first year, I transitioned into a full-time user experience designer, creating features for millions of Amazon drivers delivering packages all over the world. I later worked on voice technology software on the Alexa Smart Home team, and secret hardware projects focused on human connection on Amazon Glow. And as my time at the company lengthened, I found myself enjoying the process of writing and pitching higher-level strategic thinking. Around the midpoint of my tenure, I had this burning sense that I was in need of a change.
I turned inward toward the arts, then. Reading. Philosophy. It was music I first embraced — learning to play electric guitar, singing, writing lyrics at Dusty Strings — then visual art came — learning to create three dimensional, animated worlds in Blender and the Adobe Suite — then creative writing — taking Jack Grapes’ Method Writing classes every week, where I first drafted stories of an old man and a boy by the beach. My hobbies started to stack, and so too did my sense for the balance between utility and beauty in creativity. I was evolving, no longer just designing digital houses for other people’s visions; I had finally begun to manifest my own artifacts that were reflective of my growing philosophies.
In 2023, I took an opportunity to move to San Diego and lead a design team at Riot Games. Not only did I have an incredible manager and an amazingly talented team, but I was working with people who genuinely loved Esports, and all of the fun things that could be made for fans. During this time period, I honed my ability to develop organizational strategy for new-to-world products, align team structures with core business goals, leverage AI (Cursor, Claude, Gemini) to evolve my strategic and tactical design craft, and write countless frameworks for live viewing experiences, fandom, and channel / modality strategies. I spent much of that time mentoring younger designers, growing my strategic skillset, and connecting with senior leaders — from the outside, it looked like I had finally “arrived.” I had a beautiful home in San Diego, a great job, and a partner I cared for, but something was missing. Something big.
I was living a double life, using my personal creative work to escape my career, rather than actually enjoying it, and the weight alone became too much to carry. So on one single day, I decided it was time to change everything: leave my job, sell my home, and end my relationship. I had come to the realization that "enough" wasn't something I had to earn — it was a place I had already reached.
In January of 2026, I moved to the Atlantic in a small beach town one block from the ocean. I intended to live a simpler, more honest life for a period of time. The days are slow and built on peace: yoga in the morning, a dedicated focus on diet and exercise, swimming and exploring in the ocean, reading fiction and philosophy on the beach, making things, daily conversations of self-excavation with AI (part of my daily rhythm for years), and teaching meditation, yoga and life skills to trauma-burdened youth at night.
In time, I may return to design and technology. But for now, I can hear the ocean calling.