About Me

僕は

Biography

僕の伝記

Photo of Garrett

I'm driven to consistently produce work that is organized, focused, and good for the user. Over the years, I've become an experienced design director, product designer, UI / UX designer, and front-end web developer. I provide my clients and employers with memorable and award-winning design, backed by user testing, design research, and empathetic decision making. Over the past few years, I've developed a passion for creating and maintaining design systems and am currently focusing on that full-time at Google. In leadership roles, I'm passionate about helping my employees grow and developing company processes. I'm striving to continually learn, be challenged, and make work an enjoyable experience.

Originally from Chicago, I now happily reside in Denver with my amazing wife, baby, dog, and a lot of electronic devices. In the 9 years I've lived in Colorado, I've become an established member of the Boulder / Denver design scene. I am currently working as an Interaction Designer at Google, where I work with the News on Search team. Formerly, I was a Lead Product Designer at Shutterstock, where I create and maintained their design system. In previous roles, I was the Director of UI/UX at Brandzooka, Director of Design at Voltage, the Art Director at Fireant, and more (see below).

In my free time, I am a devoted husband, father to a 6 month old, avid learner of Japanese, gamer, and am involved in local community groups.

For more about me, check out my Dribbble, Linkedin, Instagram, PSN, or email me.

Download My Resume

EXPERIENCE

僕の経歴

Google
06 / 22 – Present
Interaction Designer

At Google, I am working with the News on Search team. More info to come as I grow into my new role!

Shutterstock
09 / 19 – 06/22
Lead Product Designer

In my role at Shutterstock I've was involved in numerous product initiatives. I created and oversaw the company's design system, was the lead designer on customers' Search and Discovery experience, worked on internal tools to manage customers' payments and purchases, and created new tools and workflows to improve customer experience. In each project I was responsible for performing qualitative and quantitative research to validate my hypotheses; interviewing customers, gathering analytics, and running usability tests in each step of the process.

Over the course of my time at Shutterstock, I gradually took on increasing ownership of the Shutterstock Design System and eventually took on building and maintaining that as my primary responsibility. I actively mentored and trained other designers who also contributed to the system.

Brandzooka
01 / 19 – 09/19
Director of UI / UX Design

I led the visual direction, UI, and UX for Brandzooka's software and web applications. My primary role was to create a new look and feel for the Brandzooka product and improve the overall user experience. That included data driven decisions using UI / UX research, user testing, and following design trends. I worked closely with the development team, creating detailed specs and doing extensive QA to get my designs into production and into user's hands. I then monitored and tested user behavior to continue iterating. In my time at Brandzooka I launched numerous new products and applications that allowed customers to reach their audiences in unique and engaging ways.

Voltage
12 / 16 – 01 / 19
Design Director, Department Manager

I managed the design department of Voltage and worked with some of the world’s biggest brands like Adidas, Reebok, Chipotle, and Footjoy. My responsibilities included leading all design projects, critiquing designers’ work, training and developing designers, collaborating with the development department, forecasting / estimating projects, establishing company workflows and processes, working directly with clients, and advancing the Voltage brand.

Fireant Studio
7 / 14 – 12 / 16
Interactive Art Director, UI / UX Designer, Front-End Developer

I directed all front-end design work for clients’ websites and interactive applications. I handled the entire creative process from wireframes, to full designs, to front-end development. I also led the UI/UX direction, influence / engineered the HTML/SASS structure, and worked closely with back-end developers to put the sites into production.

Tool Studios
4 / 14 – 7 / 14
Senior Designer, Web Developer

Designed and developed websites, brand standards, print campaigns, collateral, motion graphics and more as the lead designer of a small creative team.

Now What
2 / 13 – 4 / 14
Graphic Designer, Design / Marketing Researcher

Designed magazines, workshops, infographics, presentations, and other print and digital work for internal and external use in Fortune 100 companies and large corporations.

smbolic
6 / 12 – 2 / 13
Graphic Designer

Designed the front and back ends of multiple desktop and mobile websites. Created numerous print pieces including brochures, books, and mailers. Designed print and web pieces for multiple events and conferences.

Education

僕の教育

University of Illinois
(UIUC)
8 / 08 – 5 / 12
BFA in Graphic Design, GPA: 3.83 / 4.00

James Scholar Honors Student, Dean’s List x8, numerous honors groups, design activities and awards received.

Activities, Exhibitions, & Awards

僕のアワード

2021 Shutterstock Hackathon Winner

Lead designer on the winning project submitted to the Diversity and Inclusion category. The new feature we created allowed Shutterstock contributors to see suggestions and recommendations for tags on their media that were inclusive and receive corrections to offensive tags and descriptions.

2020 Shutterstock Q3 Action and Impact Award

Received company recognition for my contributions to numerous product launches and juggling many priorities during a phase of being understaffed.

2020 Shutterstock Hackathon Winner

Lead designer on a winning project that allowed customers to identify themselves during their onboarding in order to see more curated recommendations.

2018 SoDA Adobe Creative Jam Winner

Team captain for the winning team of the Adobe Creative Jam, competing against the best agencies from around the world to design the best app.

2018 Muse Creative Awards

Awarded Rose Gold Honors for my work with clients Trimble and Sunrun.

2018 AVA Digital Awards

Awarded a Gold Medal and an Honorable Mention for my work with clients Diono and Trimble.

2017 W3 Awards

Awarded Silver Medals for my work with Adidas and Footjoy.

2017 Rocky Mountain Hackathon Winner

Awarded "Best Project Started At The Hackathon" for an app I designed and developed in one weekend.

Typography 33

Featured in The Type Director’s Club “Typography” annual, which showcases the best published typography of each year.

2016 BMA Awards

Received Awards of Excellence for my work with clients IBM, Denver Day of Rock, and eFowl.

How Magazine Design Award

Featured in HOW for my work with Ninth Letter.

Print Magazine's Design Annual

Featured in HOW for my work with Ninth Letter.

Cusp Conference

Helped design and run a conference about "the design of everything."

Certificate of Typographic Excellence

Awarded by the Type Directors Club for my work with Ninth Letter, Vol. 8 No. 2.

The James And Dorothy Shipley Award

Named the best Graphic Design graduate at UIUC.

Writing

僕の文書

Stop Trying To Avoid Returns, Learn To Embrace Them

(Ghostwriter)
Published by Forbes

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Don’t Settle: Doing Design Work That Aligns With Who You Are

Wrote an editorial piece for Trackduck which received over 75,000 unique readers. (Trackduck has since been acquired and their blog is no more.

Learnings From Designing, Developing, Testing, and Launching A Site In A Month

Published by Launchism

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Notable Clients

めぼしい依頼人

Disney
Kraft
Sunrun
Chevrolet
Footjoy
Lowes
adidas
MTV
Landscape Forms
Black Diamond
Bedell Guitars
Purina
Reebok
TDA Ameritrade
Verizon Fios
EMC
Cusp Conference
IBM
Chipotle
eFowl
LiveWell Colorado
Arrow Electronics
Chase Private Client
Starbucks

Skills

練功

Figma
Sketch
Adobe Creative Suite
Invision
After Effects
Webflow
Framer
Full Story
Google Analytics
Prototyping
Wireframing
User Interviews
User testing
Design research
Training Designers
Team Leadership
Juggling projects
HTML / CSS
SASS / SCSS
QA / Testing
Collaboration
Being happy
Staying calm

Hobbies

僕の趣味

Gaming
Learning Japanese
Marriage
Card games
iOS Jailbreaking
Fitness
TV / Movies
Cereal

Current Interests

僕は多趣味です

Learning

Japanese, Figma automations and plugin creation

Playing

Elden Ring, Super Smash Bros Ultimate, Genshin Impact

Watching

Severance, Winning Time, Our Flag Means Death, and rewatching sitcoms like Community

Reading

The Devil in the Dark Water, The Checklist Manifesto

Listening

Madeon, Slow Magic, The Empty Bowl

Eating

Plentifull, Cocoa Pebbles with Marshmallows, and my wife's amazing baking