Biographies

Collected biographies of women and marginalized designers across the ages.

• Irene Au
  by Hermione Hu
  Irene Au has a math and science background and she built robots when she was in college. When attending the…
• Yoko Taro
  by Betty Deng
  “I always believe that humans cannot completely get rid of issues such as violence and discrimination. I believe that humans…
• Norma Merick Sklarek: The Rosa Parks of Architecture
  by Elaine Choi
  Norma Merick Sklarek, known as “The Rosa Parks of Architecture” was born in Harlem, New York City in 1926. She…
• Amélie Lamont and Leading Design
  by Jasmine Sun
  After decades of rapid development, the design industry has a set of a relatively mature system. However, this system is…
• Krista Donaldson
  by Mengyao Xiu
  Krista Donaldson was born in 1973. She is an engineer and currently is a CEO in D-Rev, which is a…
• Annie J. Easley
  by Elena Wang
  Annie J. Easley was born on April 23rd 1933 in Birmingham, Alabama. She was an American computer scientist, mathematician, and…
• Freddy Anzures – the person behind iPhone’s iconic “slide-to-unlock”
  by Amanda Liu
  Freddy Allen Anzures is a Filipino American designer who worked on the original design team of the iPhone, the single…
• Dori Tunstall
  by Ruth Bhavsar
  Dori Tunstall is a design anthropologist, or someone who studies how design translates values into tangible experiences. After receiving her…
• Lola Oyelayo-Pearson
  by Ruth Bhavsar
  Lola Oyelayo-Pearson is a black woman from the UK who has been working in digital systems for 17 years as…
• Julian Francis Abele
  by Zijie Zhou
  Julian Francis Abele is a famous African American architect. He is also the chief designer of Horace Trumbauer’s office. He…
• Zuzana Licko
  by Peter Peng
  Zuzana Licko was born in 1961 in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia. Licko’s father was a biomathematician and at the University of California,…
• Maureen Macharia – Design to Empower the Future of Africa
  by Ted Huang
  Maureen Macharia is an accomplished Product Designer, entrepreneur, and community builder who is proficient at the intersection of design thinking,…
• Dong Nguyen: father of Flappy Bird
  by Anh Truong
  Ha Dong Nguyen is a 35-year-old video game artist and game developer from Vietnam. He graduated as an engineer in…
• Sara Little Turnbull – Innovative Product Designer
  by Lylyna Heng
  Sara Finkelstein (née Finkelstein; September 21, 1917 – September 3, 2015) was born in Manhattan and raised in Brooklyn. She…
• Catt Small-Advocate of Underrepresented Group
  by Jasmine Sun
  In today’s society, many designers are working hard for the underrepresented group, and Catt small is one of the designers…
• Lynne Yun-Find the Code Behind Type Design
  by Jasmine Sun
  Lynne Yun is a type designer and educator based in New York City. She is famous for her work in…
• Lisette Titre-Montgomery
  by Rebecca Lin
  Lisette Titre-Montgomery is an art director in the Gaming Industry with over 17 years of experience designing games and leading…
• Arata Isozaki Biography
  by Tai Hao
  Arata Isozaki was born on 23 July 1931. He is a Japanese architect and an urban designer from Ōita. He received the RIBA Gold Medal in 1986…
• Charlotte Perriand: The Underappreciated Genius
  by Monica Xu
  Charlotte Perriand is an artist who wasn’t given her due credit. She was a designer from France born in 1903…
• Vivianne Castillo – Reframing UX Empathy
  by Noah Ahrens
  Not many have turned user research around and focused it not on customers, but on the designers themselves who craft…
• Typographer: Zuzana Licko
  by DeeDee Kwon
  Zuzana Licko is a type designer and one of the first designers to use the Mackintosh computer. Zuzana Licko was…
• Zaha Hadid Biography
  by Tai Hao
  Zaha Hadid was born on October 31, 1950, in Baghdad, Iraq, and died March 31, 2016, in Miami, Florida, U.S….
• Eileen Gray
  by Peter Peng
  Eileen Gray was born in Wexford in 1878. She studied at the Slade School of Art in London and the…
• Shigeru Miyamoto
  by Betty Deng
  People have paid me a lot of lip service, calling me a genius story teller or a talented animator, and…
• Hedy Lamarr: More Than Meets the Eye
  by Elaine Choi
  Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler, better known as Hedy Lamarr (1924-2000), was an Austrian-American actress, film producer, and inventor. She was…
• Mabel Addis
  by Brian Zhao
  Brian Zhao Erin Malone IXD History November 24, 2020 Mabel Addis Mabel Addis was a teacher, writer, and video game…
• Darcy DiNucci
  by Mengyao Xiu
  Darcy DiNucci is a web designer, author and expert in user experience. As a head of user experience at Ammunition,…
• Clement Mok
  by Vincent Chen
  Clement Mok is a designer, instigator, and consultant. He graduated from the Art Center College of Design Graphic Design program….
• Women in Programming: Corrinne Yu
  by Anh Truong
  Until beginning her career as a technical programmer, Corrinne Yu attended California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, to study electrical engineering….
• Brenda Romero – Game Designer
  by Lylyna Heng
  Brenda Romero designs games that turn some of history’s most tragic lessons into interactive, emotional experiences. TED Speaker Brenda Romero…
• Norma Merrick Sklarek
  by Zijie Zhou
  As the first African-American woman to hold the architect license in New York and the first woman to earn a…
• Biography of Timothy Bardlavens
  by Jonahtan Rabago
  Timothy Bardlavens was born in Greensboro, North Carolina but raised in Colombia NC. Bardlavens belittles his start as just being…
• Benjamin Evans – Designs for Everyone to Belong
  by Amanda Liu
  Benjamin Earl Evans now works as an Inclusive Design Lead at Airbnb. Before that, he has a winding career path…
• Zaha Hadid
  by Elena Wang
  Zaha Hadid was born in 1950 in Baghdad, Iraq. Hadid is a British-Iraqi architect, artist and designer. Hadid, after studying…
• Jerry Lawson: Game Changer
  by John Cho
  Jerry Lawson was an engineer and game designer who was out of a stereotype of engineers in 1970s America (IGN)….
• Giorgia Lupi – An Advocate of Data Humanism
  by Ted Huang
  Giorgia Lupi is an information designer and data-driven researcher. She is currently a Partner at Pentagram, the world’s largest independent…
• Cipe Pineles
  by Rebecca Lin
  (June 23, 1908 – January 3, 1991) Cipe Pineles was a pioneer in the world of graphic design, breaking several…
• The Birth of Survival Horror Games: Shinji Mikami
  by Philip Joo
  Shinji Mikami is a Japanese game designer, producer and director.  He was born in Iwakuni, Japan on August 11th, 1965…
• Cipe Penelis
  by Corey Rossi
  Cipe Pineles was an iconic female visual designer and Art director. Born in Vienna, Austria in 1908 she would go…
• Ovetta Sampson – Biography
  by Ruth Bhavsar
  Ovetta Sampson is an African American female product manager/design researcher/UX designer, and has a wide array of experience in the…
• Irene Au
  by Rebecca Lin
  Irene Au can be considered one of the pioneers in developing User Experience (UX) design into a distinct field of…
• Eileen Gray
  by Betty Li
  Bio 5 Eileen Gray has very few architectural works and she hasn’t the persistent pursuit of quantity. Her attitude towards…
• Bio 4 Charlotte Perriand: The Underappreciated Genius
  by Monica Xu
  Charlotte Perriand is an artist who wasn’t given her due credit. She was a designer from France who mostly worked…
• Aika Matemu Biography
  by Tai Hao
  Aika Matemu resides in Nairobi, an African city known for being the hub of technological innovation and design. In an…
• Tasha Lutfi – Womxn in Design
  by Amanda Liu
  Tasha Lutfi is an advocate for diversity in design, speaker, and designer with over 20 years of experience in the…
• Mariam Braimah-a bridge between Nigeria and Silicon Valley
  by Anh Truong
  Mariam Braimah is the Lead Product Designer at Netflix and founder of the Kimoyo Fellowship, a design program that connects…
• Meg Withgott
  by Evan Tang
  Meg Withgott, co-founder of Panafold, is known for her role in the company as Chief Technology Officer. Meg Withgott received…
• Lucy Suchman: More than a Green Button
  by Elaine Choi
  Lucy Suchman is a professor of anthropology at Lancaster University, who worked as the principal scientist and manager at the…
• Ellen Lupton
  by Hermione Hu
  Bored in 1963, Ellen Lupton presents herself as a curator of Contemporary Art. In 1981, Lupton became a fine art…
• Shigeru Ban
  by Zijie Zhou
  Shigeru Ban is a Japanese architect. He is known for his innovative work with paper, particularly recycled cardboard tubes used…
• Hideo Kojima – video gaming’s first auteur
  by Betty Deng
  90% of what is considered impossible is, in fact, possible. The other 10% will become possible with the passage of…
• Vivianne Castillo
  by Jonahtan Rabago
  Before Vivianne Castillo was one of the leading User Experience Research Speakers, she was a Counseling and Human Services professional…
• Denise Scott Brown
  by Mengyao Xiu
  Denise Scott Brown was born in Zambia and was raised in Johannesburg, South Africa. She is still alive and was…
• Lori Ann Cole – the creator of the Quest for Glory (QFG) series.
  by Lylyna Heng
  Lori Ann Cole is the game designer for Quest for the Glory series, where she worked along side her husband….
• April Greiman
  by Elena Wang
  April Greiman is a designer in America. She was born on March 22,1948, and grew up in New York City….
• Ovetta Sampson
  by Ted Huang
  Ovetta Sampson is a UX designer and design researcher driven by data science and ethical design. She sees herself as…
• Dantley Davis
  by Vincent Chen
  Dantley Davis is currently a chief design officer at Twitter. He had a lot of experience working on UX of…
• Shigeru Miyamoto And His “Donkey Kong”
  by Peter Peng
  Shigeru Miyamoto is a Japenese game designer and producer at Nintendo. He created the Donkey Kong, Mario, Pikmin and The…
• Zaha Hadid
  by Betty Li
  Zaha Hadid was born in a wealthy family in Iraq in 1950. Her father Mohammed Hadid (Mohammed Hadid, 1907-1999) was…
• David Nuff – Canadian Designer
  by Elspeth Tordoff
  David Nuff, who simply goes by Nuff, is a Toronto based designer and artist with experience in design branding, illustrations,…
• Biography 3
  by Monica Xu
  Life and Works of Beverly Loraine Greene Beverly Loraine Greene, an American architect, was born on October 4, 1915. According…
• Joy Mountford
  by Vincent Chen
  Her impact continues through the International Design Expo, which she created over 20 years ago to challenge the next generation…
• Dana Chisnell-Pioneer in Civic Design
  by Jasmine Sun
  When it comes to human politics and design, we have to mention Dana Chisnell. She is a pioneer and thought…
• Xia Peisu
  by Mengyao Xiu
  Xia Peisu was a computer scientist born in Chongqing, China. A year after attaining her bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering…
• Father of An Wuxia Fantasy RPG series – Yao Zhuangxian
  by Betty Deng
  Yao Zhuangxian is the father of one of the most famous Chinese game series, 仙剑奇侠传 Xianjian Qixia Zhuan / Legend…
• Annie Easley: Rocket Scientist
  by Hermione Hu
  When Easley was little, her mother had encouraged her to study hard, telling her that she could be anything she wanted…
• John Maeda: Intersection of Art and Technology
  by Elaine Choi
  John Maeda (born 1966), is an executive, designer, and technologist, whose work exemplifies the intersection between business, design, and technology….
• Arata Isozaki
  by Zijie Zhou
  Isozaki is a Japanese postmodernist architect, urban designer, and theorist. He is known as a thinker in the Japanese architecture…
• Xia Peisu
  by Elena Wang
  Xia Peisu was born in Jiangjin City, Sichuan Province in 1923. Electronic computer expert, one of the founders of Chinese…
• Ruth Kedar – a Designer of Google Logo
  by Lylyna Heng
  The playful and simple logo design of one the most profound company is Ruth Kedar. Ruth is an ideator, a…
• Sylvia Harris – A Citizen Designer
  by DeeDee Kwon
  Sylvia Harris was born in 1953 in Richmond, Virginia. She was part of the cohort of students who experienced desegregation,…
• Elizabeth Churchill
  by Betty Li
  In an interactive career, she made a huge contribution. Churchill is known for her work on Embodied Conversational Agents and…
• Joy Mountford
  by Brian Zhao
  Brian Zhao Erin Malone IXD History October 26, 2020 Joy Mountford Joy Mountford is one of the top designers who…
• Biography of Doreen Lorenzo
  by Jonahtan Rabago
  Doreen Lorenzo started her career off as a filmmaker. She would produce a spectrum of films, in the early ’90s:…
• Judith Donath and Deceptive Technologies
  by Anh Truong
  Judith Donath is a designer, computer science researcher, artist, and writer whose works ask fundamental questions about our interaction with…
• Irene Au Biography
  by Tai Hao
  Irene Au graduated from the University of South Carolina with a bachelor of science degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering….
• Oen Michael Hammonds – IBM Design Principal
  by Ted Huang
  Oen Michael Hammonds is an experienced designer, advocate, and lifelong educator. For over three years, Hammonds has been working with…
• Self Care for UX Researchers – Vivianne Castillo
  by Amanda Liu
  Vivianne Castillo is a UX Researcher with more than 8 years of psychology and research experience spanning multiple contexts, cultures,…
• Xia Peisu
  by Peter Peng
  Xia Peisu, b. 1923 in Chongqing, Sichuan Province, came from a literary family. She is a specialist in computer science…
• Hironobu Sakaguchi: From Zero to Game Hero
  by Philip Joo
  Hironobu Sakaguchi is a well-known Japanese game designer, producer, writer and former film director.  He was born in 1962 in…
• Tomoko Miho
  by John Cho
  Tomoko Miho is a Japanese-American graphic designer, born in 1931 and spent her early years at an Arizona internment camp…
• Kim Goodwin
  by Betty Li
  Kim Goodwin is the author of the bestselling book, Designing for the Digital Age. Kim helps clients build their own…
• Eileen Gray
  by Monica Xu
  Eileen Gray was an Anglo-Irish architect and furniture designer. She is considered to be one of the most influential figures…
• Norma Merrick – First Woman Architect Licensed in New York and California
  by Noah Ahrens
  Born in Harlem New York in April of 1926, Norma Merrick was a pioneering African American Architect whose legacy is…
• April Greiman: The Embracer
  by Corey Rossi
  Corey Rossi IXD History Fall 2020 April Greiman, born September 10th, 1948 in New York City, is an American contemporary…
• Brenda Laurel
  by Evan Tang
  Brenda Laurel, born on Novermber 20, 1950, is a interaction designer who has worked on computer interaction, computer science, and…
• Christina Wodtke Biography
  by Tai Hao
  Christina R. Wodtke is an author, professor and speaker, who has dedicated her time, both to the development of high…
• Valerie Casey
  by Jasmine Sun
  Valerie Casey, an Irish-born American product/interaction designer, is also a globally recognized design innovator. Valerie is Wal Mart’s highest level…
• Video Game Pioneer: Jerry Lawson
  by Betty Deng
  “The whole reason I did games was because people said, ‘You can’t do it. ‘ I’m one of the guys,…
• Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh
  by Hermione Hu
  Margaret Macdonald, as known as one of the “The Glasgow Four”, was one of the most gifted and successful women…