About

Me in 10 seconds

Designer, maker, accidental entrepreneur.

• (1990s): grew up in Stockport. My mum wouldn't buy me Pokémon cards, so I made my own. By eight I was producing convincing fakes and accidentally learning what makes a good card. File that one away.
• (2000s): played a lot of RuneScape. Learned to love the grind.
• (2009): typeset and sold t-shirts in a print shop.
• (2011): projected 35mm film at a Vue cinema.
• (2013): design intern in Dubai; graphic designer at Sheffield Students' Union.
• (2014): briefly an animator. The effort-to-reward ratio was dismal. I figured I'd get rich and hire an animation team instead. Then generative AI arrived and now I don't fancy that either. Go figure.
• (2014-2018): junior designer, then UX designer, at Manchester agency Code Computerlove. Co-created the Higher Lower Game (2016). The YouTube zeitgeist picked it up, PewDiePie, KSI et al, and it was played over a billion times. I'd made it on company property, so I got virtually nothing. That planted a seed.
• (2018): Senior UX Designer at the BBC: Bitesize, Teach, Food.
• (2018-2020): freelance UX: the Co-operative Bank, Co-op Digital.
• (2019-now): started Pip Decks as a side project called Workshop Tactics. Remember the fake Pokémon cards? It became, unofficially, the fastest-growing profitable company in the UK. These days we're proudly going the other way on purpose: small, focused, built to last.
• (2026+): ?

Now

I live in Stockport with my wife and our two boys.

How my brain works

I have ADHD. Most of what I make, card decks, checklists, step-by-step tactics, started life as a system to get my own brain to cooperate. It turned out other people's brains liked them too. If I've gone quiet, I'm probably hyperfocused on something wildly unimportant, with tremendous commitment.

Things I'll happily talk about for an hour

• Brazilian jiu jitsu, as a permanent white belt.
• Gardening. I yearn for the mines, but settled for gardening.
• What makes a physical card feel good in your hand. Card stock has been a special interest since the Pokémon counterfeiting era.

Questions? Email me, the links are in the footer. I read everything.