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I’ve had Matthew Butterick’s Practical Typography website/ebook bookmarked since I discovered it over ten years ago. It’s making the rounds again, and I think it’s a good reminder that we are all “professional writers” as he describes:

When we think of “professional writers” we probably think of novelists, screenwriters, or journalists. But the programmer, the scientist, the lawyer—and you, if your work depends on presenting written ideas—all deserve to be called professional writers.

But as professional writers, we do more than write. We edit, we format, we print, we generate PDFs, we make web pages. More than ever, we’re responsible for delivering the written word to our readers. So we’re not just writers—we’re publishers.

Typography is the visual component of the written word. Thus, being a publisher of the written word necessarily means being a typographer.

He’s right. As much of our work is in producing documents and content, we are publishers. Here are a few of my favorite pages:

This book reminds me of a couple of seminal books from the early 1990s: The Mac Is Not a Typewriter by Robin Williams and Stop Stealing Sheep by Erik Spiekermann and E. M. Ginger. The former is how I learned all the basics, back when I was designing my high school’s newspaper. The latter is more comprehensive, going deeper into how type works conceptually. These three are all essential resources for any designer.

Butterick’s Practical Typography

Butterick’s Practical Typography

Typography is the visual component of the written word. Thus, being a publisher of the written word necessarily means being a typographer.

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11 min read
A stylized digital illustration of a person reclining in an Eames lounge chair and ottoman, rendered in a neon-noir style with deep blues and bright coral red accents. The person is shown in profile, wearing glasses and holding what appears to be a device or notebook. The scene includes abstract geometric lines cutting across the composition and a potted plant in the background. The lighting creates dramatic shadows and highlights, giving the illustration a modern, cyberpunk aesthetic.

Design’s Purpose Remains Constant

Fabricio Teixeira and Caio Braga, in their annual The State of UX report:

Despite all the transformations we’re seeing, one thing we know for sure: Design (the craft, the discipline, the science) is not going anywhere. While Design only became a more official profession in the 19th century, the study of how craft can be applied to improve business dates back to the early 1800s. Since then, only one thing has remained constant: how Design is done is completely different decade after decade. The change we’re discussing here is not a revolution, just an evolution. It’s simply a change in how many roles will be needed and what they will entail. “Digital systems, not people, will do much of the craft of (screen-level) interaction design.”

Scary words for the UX design profession as it stares down the coming onslaught of AI. Our industry isn’t the first one to face this—copywriters, illustrators, and stock photographers have already been facing the disruption of their respective crafts. All of these creatives have had to pivot quickly. And so will we.

9 min read
A close-up photograph of a newspaper's personal advertisements section, with one listing circled in red ink. The circled ad is titled "DESIGN NOMAD" and cleverly frames a designer's job search as a personal ad, comparing agency work to casual dating and seeking an in-house position as a long-term relationship. The surrounding text shows other personal ads in small, dense print arranged in multiple columns.

Breadth vs. Depth: Lessons from Agencies and In-House Design

I recently read a post on Threads in which Stephen Beck wonders why the New York Times needs an external advertising agency when it already has an award-winning agency in-house. You can read the back-and-forth in the thread itself, but I think Nina Alter’s reply sums it up best:

Creatives need to be free to bring new perspectives. Drink other kool-aid. That’s much of the value in agencies.

This all got me thinking about the differences between working in-house and at an agency. As a designer who began my career bouncing from agency to agency before settling in-house, I’ve seen both sides of this debate firsthand. Many of my designer friends have had similar paths. So, I’ll speak from that perspective. It’s biased and probably a little outdated since I haven’t worked at an agency since 2020, and that was one that I owned.

5 min read
Vibrant artistic composition featuring diverse models in striking, colorful fashion. The central figure is dressed in an elaborate orange-red gown, surrounded by models in bold outfits of pink, red, yellow, and orange tones. The background transitions between shades of orange and pink, with the word ‘JAGUAR’ displayed prominently in the center.

A Jaguar Meow

The British automaker Jaguar unveiled its rebrand last week, its first step at relaunching the brand as an all-EV carmaker. Much ink has been spilled about the effort already, primarily negative, regarding the toy-like logotype in design circles and the bizarre film in the general town square.

Jaguar’s new brand film

10 min read
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How I Built and Launched an AI-Powered App

I’ve always been a maker at heart—someone who loves to bring ideas to life. When AI exploded, I saw a chance to create something new and meaningful for solo designers. But making Griffin AI was only half the battle…

Birth of an Idea

About a year ago, a few months after GPT-4 was released and took the world by storm, I worked on several AI features at Convex. One was a straightforward email drafting feature but with a twist. We incorporated details we knew about the sender—such as their role and offering—and the email recipient, as well as their role plus info about their company’s industry. To accomplish this, I combined some prompt engineering and data from our data providers, shaping the responses we got from GPT-4.

Playing with this new technology was incredibly fun and eye-opening. And that gave me an idea. Foundational large language models (LLMs) aren’t great yet for factual data retrieval and analysis. But they’re pretty decent at creativity. No, GPT, Claude, or Gemini couldn’t write an Oscar-winning screenplay or win the Pulitzer Prize for poetry, but it’s not bad for starter ideas that are good enough for specific use cases. Hold that thought.