First, pick one…

About me

Just a city gal living her best life in the mountains.

I'm an innately curious person with a bias for action, and I'm not afraid to use buzzwords when describing myself.

Janell standing under a rock arch
7Cities before the mountains
Chad with a cat in his lap
Sunrise through the trees

Designing at altitude.

A North Texas native, I moved coast to coast to coast since college — Los Angeles, Austin (though, notably landlocked), Houston, and New York — before hiking through Denver to find my home in the remote mountains of Colorado, cute cats, stunning views, and less oxygen included.

A double rainbow over the mountains
Emi and Ollie curled up on an outdoor cushion
2Cats named afterNASA missions
9,485Feet elevation is where I call home
Ollie in the window with a buck
Sun breaking through fog over the trees
Janell and her mom by a rock formation
Emi in a hammock
A rainbow over a green valley
A hummingbird on a branch
Janell and Chad in an ice landscape
Emi sitting on the stairs
Chad shoveling deep snow
Mountain ridges under a blue sky
Cow herd in a valley
Spring in the backyard, looking toward the mountains
Fall in the backyard, looking toward the mountains
A hummingbird feeding with its wings raised
Winter in the backyard, looking toward the mountains

Naturally versatile.

That nomadic stretch doubled as a professional playground for technology and design. I’ve worked at startups in their early funding rounds, at top New York agencies across healthcare, finance, and eCommerce, and in-house on product teams.

Janell on a mountainside with a sled
Ollie on a white couch
Chad with an emu
Two hummingbirds sharing a red feeder
A bird perched over a feeder
Emi sitting on a blanket
A deer in the snow
Hot air balloons glowing at night
A woodpecker feeder in winter
15Years married
Emi meowing on a balcony
Janell and Chad taking a selfie above a canyon
A rainbow
Emi in a hammock on the deck
Janell in a cave, holding a flashlight

Over the last 11 years, I’ve designed across experience, interaction, UX, and product design. That range means I know how to shape the big picture of a product, sweat the details where they count, and deliver great work for both the people using it and the teammates building it, at any scope.

A hummingbird drinking from a feeder on the deck
Emi and Ollie curled in a round bed
Chad and Robin with face cut out board of cowboy and woman
A male and female pair of grosbeaks
A mountain landscape
Ollie sprawled on a green blanket
Janell, her mom, and Chad outdoors in sun hats
A mountain landscape
A bird feeder in the snow
Chad with a rainbow over a sunlit hillside
Ollie standing on hind legs looking out the window
Janell and Chad with a donkey
Janell and her mom on an overlook
16Wild donkeys in the herd I volunteer with
~12Rainbows spotted here per year

Systems lover.

Though I love to build design systems, I also really love the systems I live in. I watch the weather bring in rainbows, track the hummingbirds that migrate through each year (a near obsession now), and volunteer at yearly events caring for the historic donkeys of the Two Mile High Club.

Rainbow on frosted trees
A hummingbird flying toward the trees
Emi and Ollie curled together in a cat tree
3Species of hummingbirds visit me
Chad with a cat on his shoulder
A hummingbird at a red feeder
218,122Steam points I’ll never spend
Janell and Chad out on the water
Janell playing a video game with Emi on her shoulder

After hours, it’s astrophotography during nebula season, systems-on-systems video games, absurdly large puzzles with my mom, and the vibe-coded smart home system my husband and I are building as we renovate. Even this site runs on a system of its own: pick a sky, and every color comes from that photo, and it all stays accessible. All this to say, I’m a forest AND trees kinda gal.

11,000+Hours playing video games
Janell with a telescope under the stars
2On the Bortle scale
1House named after an Arctic Monkeys album
Emi in a cat tunnel
Red aurora over the house at night
Janell on a valley overlook
Emi on the dining chair
A snow-covered mountain
A deer in the grass
Ollie on the deck with the mountains behind
100+Trails hiked
Janell standing under a rock arch