Stephen Barkan is a designer excited about web design, branding, web development, and design tools.

Hi, I’m Stephen, and this is the beginning of my design story.

My first opportunity to design professionally was the year after I graduated college as an AmeriCorps at a nonprofit. Designing was my favorite task and I found myself eager to improve, so the following year I started freelancing with other organizations around the city, gaining experience in both design and business. I’m grateful for the people who trusted me to contribute to their organizations – learning as I went, I was lucky to have a caring group of people support my growth.

I quickly fell in love with web design and the systematic approach required to excel at it. There are so many problems to address in UI and UX design, and I find it challenging and rewarding to try to solve them. Learning to code has been an invaluable skill, helping me make informed decisions and encouraging me to be practical, efficient, and thoughtful in my work. There is so much more to learn, but I end each day a little more knowledgable than the last – in a way, the more I learn, the more I am motivated to continue learning.