December 2, 2016 — Commercial WordPress themes have to be ready to handle thousands of use-cases, but your custom theme doesn’t. Reducing a theme to its essential components – index.php, style.css, and functions.php (plus screenshot.png) – gets your design into the browser as quickly as possible and allows for rapid prototyping based on client feedback. It’s also an easy way for beginners to start developing with WordPress, without getting lost in dozens of files.

Presentation Slides »

January 14, 2016 — A designer, a developer and a client walk into a bar… or more accurately, a meeting room. Hear from designer Avery Swartz, developer Linn Øyen Farley, and client Mark Aikman as they describe the process of getting the new Buddies in Bad Times Theatre website off the ground.

Forget the outdated “waterfall” method of designers and developers working on a site in hiding and then handing it over to the client at the end of the project. Discover the allure of the iterative web design process, where the designer, developer and client are all working openly, contributing to the site at the same time. It’s better, faster, and more cost-effective. It just requires one really important element (hint: it starts with T and ends with RUST).

After this presentation that’s part case study and part philosophy, you’ll want to try the iterative approach with your own clients.