I am a generalist with ~two decades of experience building websites. My focus has been mostly on end users: web accessibility, performance and usability.
As former W3C Staff, I know things about (accessibility) standards making. I'm also a certified accessibility specialist (CPWA). My other interests are design systems (worked on them on and off since they were called pattern libraries) and developer relations (had some official and various unofficial developer relations roles).
For the last five years, more of my work has been about teaching and communications. From dozens of workshops about accessibility, CSS and design systems to accessibility audits, conference talks and developer and public relations. I like making stuff comprehensible. To specialists, generalists or both.
Background
In 2009, I started out studying Artificial Intelligence, but ended up getting a bachelor (in Utrecht, NL) and master’s (in Bristol, UK) degree in Philosophy. How it relates to front-end work? Abstractions!
Interviews
- Under Discussion: The Current State of Web Accessibility, about accessibility (Welcome to the Jungle, 7 January 2020)
- How accessibility leads to better digital products for all customers, about the advantages of accessibility (Contentful, 14 December 2020)
- How art direction in web design creates more engaging experiences, on how CSS helps art direction on the web (EditorX, 4 April 2021)
- WCAG Wat? - Gebruiker Centraal (guest in podcast, Dutch, 2 september 2021)
- Accessibility - CapiCast (guest in podcast, Dutch, 23 August 2022)
Awards
- My idea for Web We Want (I would like browsers to fix accessibility problems automatically) won both the jury and audience awards, presented at View Source in Amsterdam in 2019
Fronteers
From 2008 to the first quarter of 2017, I was a volunteer at Fronteers, organising conferences, meet-ups and workshops. From 2014 to 2016 I was also board member, in the last year even a treasurer.
