Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I am a web designer and developer based in London. I run my own web design and development company Kulör, and I’m the digital guy at the creative agency YCN. I’m 28.
You have a psychology degree. What brought you to be a designer and a developer?
Very good question, and the short answer is I’m not sure.
It all started during my studies when some friends and I decided to set up a website in the midst of the very first dot com craze, around 1999. The idea was that we would buy digital cameras (a rare commodity a decade ago) and go to student nightclubs in and around Manchester, England. We’d then hand out little flyers that invited students to go onto the website the next morning, and download or buy prints of their photos.
We didn’t know anybody who could design or develop websites, so I volunteered to take care of that. I dutifully taught myself HTML and ASP using Dreamweaver in my spare time. It was a lot of fun, and having a personal project like that is definitely the best way to learn web development. What is scary is that it was one of the first websites in the UK to allow you to create a profile, send messages to one another, and allow you to tag yourself in photos. And then along came Facebook a few years later… (Sigh.)
I met Nick Defty in 2000, who explained the idea behind YCN - a network of young, emerging creative talent. He was looking for the website to be developed which I agreed to do, helping in my spare time.
After university, I took the unusual move of going into Advertising as a suit. Whilst fun and very hard work, it ultimately wasn’t for me, so I took the even more unusual step to going into management consulting. That was even harder work but I learned an awful lot which is directly applicable to what I do now: client handling, functional design, testing, data modelling, and general technology management. After a few years I made the move to an investment bank doing the same thing.
Shortly after making that move though, I suddenly realised that all I really enjoyed doing was web design and development, which I was still doing for YCN in my spare time. So just as the banks started to panic over the sub-prime situation, I bit the bullet and decided to quit, and contract with YCN on a full time basis. It was a relief to finally be doing something I genuinely enjoyed, whilst still drawing on the random array of skills I have built up over the years from working in a variety of industries and sectors.
When did you start Siteinspire, and why?
I found myself bookmarking sites that I loved, for inspiration and just as visual eye candy. It’s very enjoyable seeing work designed and developed by people much more talented than myself.
After saving around 300 bookmarks in Safari, I kept on forgetting what the sites looked like, and there was no easy way to categorise them in the browser. I decided to create siteInspire as a tool for myself to organise my favourite sites, but also as a response to the myriad of other website galleries whose quality was dreadful. I took a lot of inspiration from MiminalSites as being the only carefully curated gallery out there. It was launched in March, and has grown at an extraordinary rate and seems to be popular among the community.
There is a major functional update due soon allowing users to browse the studios and individuals behind the websites that are posted.
Other than Siteinspire, where do you find inspirations?
I don’t look at many other web galleries (other than Miminalsites, Siiimple, and MinimalExhibit to get my fill of minimalism!), so I rely on other design blogs to find great content. Some of my favourites include Form Fifty Five, Creative Review, Iain Claridge’s blog (http://www.iainclaridge.co.uk/blog/), It’s Nice That, AisleOne… the list goes on (I subscribe to just over 300 blogs).
Last year, you also started your own design studio, kulör. What do you want to achieve through this company?
A happy side-effect of running siteInspire is that I have met hundreds of superbly talented designers and developers over the past year, so I have set up Kulör in the hope that I can work collaboratively with these people on a diverse range of projects for a variety of clients, and also take on more technical application development projects.
The company is very new, but it is very exciting times. I’m working on a variety of projects collaborating with Nation (http://wearenation.com/), YCN (http://ycnonline.com/), Mike Sullivan (http://www.workwithmister.com/), Jason Reynolds (http://www.jason-reynolds.com/), Åh Studio (http://www.ah-studio.com/), and Emil Olsson (http://emilolsson.com/). We’re also working on some exciting non-client projects; the details of which will be released soon.
Do you have a quote you like?
I couldn’t think of any quotes, so I asked the siteInspire twitter audience for some inspiration. A few that I liked and which are so applicable to anybody who works for themselves include these gems…
“If you’re not generating income while you’re sleeping, then you don’t have a business. You have a hobby.” - Jeff Staple
http://twitter.com/lifterbaron/status/7638463165
“simplicity is not the goal. It is the by-product of a good idea and modest expectations.” - Paul Rand
http://twitter.com/fruitcorner/status/7638506494
“The entrepreneur is a person who, in order to avoid working eight hours a day, works sixteen hours a day.”
http://twitter.com/muff/status/7638542265
“We will either find a way, or make one.” -Hannibal
http://twitter.com/zenworm/status/7639441194
“Do one thing every day that scares you.” - Eleanor Roosevelt.
http://twitter.com/anderswik/status/7639737050
And finally, Christ Gillespie of the brilliant Future Büro (http://blog.futureburo.com/) suggested,
“free your mind and your ass will follow”
http://twitter.com/Chris_Gillespie/status/7643613460
Is there anything you want to say to Minimal Sites?
I love the new design (it will be featured on siteInspire soon!) and I’m very excited to see it back. It’s a superb resource, and I’m excited to see you have branched out into minimal food…
Comments
Awesome interview, it was great to see how Daniel started in the business.
With the re-align of Minimal Sites, I think these general interviews are a great start. I would love to see some in-depth interviews in the future about design process, working with clients, etc.
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Daniel. Thank you for participating in the interview.