Where did you work before Openbox and Stae?

I was a freelance programmer working with creatives to make fun and innovative tech projects, which I still enjoy doing on the side. Before that I was living in England, studying aerospace engineering and computer science and drinking lots of tea.

Why do you do the work you do?

I like that every project I work on is a different challenge. People think coding isn’t creative, but I disagree. Coding is problem solving, which is intrinsically creative, and it’s a process that comes very naturally to me. My biggest challenge in my work will always continue to be how I can contribute to solving the larger problems in society by doing what I’m good at. Technology plays such a large role in all of our lives that I find it hard to believe we can design for a better future without it.

What does inclusivity mean to you?

Inclusivity, to me, is a space (physical or not) in which everyone can show up exactly as they are and feel safe to do so. As my grandmother would say, freedom is being able to do whatever you want without bothering anybody. At its best, an inclusive space will offer this freedom.

When do you feel most like yourself?

When I’m visiting my family in rural Spain and I’m walking barefoot in the soil and cleaning squid fished that morning with my bare hands. I feel immensely privileged to not only know my ancestral land but to be able to return to it frequently.

I spend a lot of time thinking about...

How science, mathematics, astronomy, and technology used to be indispensably related to spirituality, philosophy, poetry, and art. You see this with the Greeks, all around Asia, the Americas and Africa. I could write a whole essay about this, so I’m just going to leave it at that before I derail, but I will say that the white man and Christian dogma played a big role in the severance of these fields.