Mike Mai on Clubhouse

Bio

😎 designer-coder
😏 make-believe rapper
🤓 author of typesettings.css
🇨🇳 straight outta china

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😻 Main Projects

https://mikemai.net
https://mikemai.net/typesettings

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💰 NFTs beginner guide for designers

https://mikemai.net/blog/2021/03/20/nft-for-dummies.html

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🎨 Designer

I have been working as a designer for 11+ years. I received my BFA in graphic design from Massachusetts College of Art and Design, where I developed my passion for typography. That passion drove me to what I wanted to pursue professionally: designing for the web. Because the web is 99% text (unverified 😅), typography is the most important foundation of any given website. Picking typefaces and typesetting are my first tasks when starting any web projects.

Many think that design is all about aesthetics, but a wise mentor once told me that “design is about solving problems, first and foremost”. My obsession of becoming a true designer drove me to what I am today: designing for the accessible web. While polished typographic styles create good forms, more is needed: functions. And more importantly, the experience of said functions. I mull over the user experience of every design I create, making sure they are usable, useful, and inclusive.

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🤖 Coder

Regardless what you are designing, it is important to pick the right tool. For the web, that tool is code.

What is better than working in the exact medium that you are designing for? Nothing. That is the reason I learned to code. I see HTML and CSS as a design tool, just like Adobe XD, Sketch, or Figma, but it is a tool that does not create a layer of abstraction. If one can read and write HTML and CSS, one can fully understand the limitations of the current web technologies. When equipped with such knowledge, a designer can easily rapid prototype designs that stay true to their intentions. Great designers pay attention to the smallest details, and the right tool enables them to massage the design as much as possible.

Not only do I design with code, I also design in the code. Semantics is a big deal on the web, it leads to better performance, better accessibility, and better SEO. While it is technically possible to build a website with just a bunch of <div>s—a generic element that carries no semantics, it is important to know that there are close to 100 HTML elements available for use. If a design has a specific information architecture visually, the same must be represented in code.

Always remember: form & function.