Spicy Web Designer Interview with Marie January Cavan

Marie January Cavan is a web designer from the Philippines. From day one, Jan “fell in love with” web design since she took a Web Essentials course while studying animation at school. She has been featured in Web Design Magazine (Issue 152) and .NET Magazine (Issue 181). She currently runs DawgHouse Design Studio.

1. How did you first get started in web design? When did you design your first web site?

Web design kind of just fell on my lap. The first thing I wanted to learn was cartoon animation. I found this local computer school which offered a program that included what they called “Web Essentials” with animation (it turned out to be Web Design that included text animation using marquee – yea the sales agent lied to me). I didn’t have any idea what I was getting into then but on my first day of class, I fell in love with it.

2. What I find interesting is that you hold a Computer Science degree and you are clearly very creative looking at your website? How do these two things work together in the work that you produce?

I acquired a degree in Computer Engineering. It never had anything to do with Web Design except that it had this one class that asked us to do a website for our Finals but that’s about it. The core skills that I needed I learned from the crash courses in Web Design that I took, constant self-study and my very first job as an Entry-Level Web Designer.

3. You use a great deal of color and contrast in the web design work that you’ve produced.  Why is that?  And can you describe your style of design?

I used to always be able come up with designs that are a bit too clean and pale. My boss always used to me that I could maybe use a little more contrast. When I began to, I couldn’t get it off me anymore. But I believe I am flexible in whatever kind of approach to design. If I am required to do whether a clean or corporate kind or a grungy one, I can handle it. However, I specialize in bold, dark and grungy type of designs.

4. What do you think that makes web design successful?

Great and unique design, clean markup and user-friendly interface.

5. Do you usually try to incorporate Flash into the web design work that you do and do you worry about possible SEO concerns that your clients have? How do you deal with these concerns?

Only if a project calls for it. If the company I currently work for requires me to design a website for a movie, then Flash would be the best way to do it.

6. How do you price out the web design work that you do?

I let potential clients fill up a Web Design info sheet to let me have an idea of what their requirements are. I base my price on whatever they write on the info sheet.

7. Do you think that being “self-taught” and passionate about web design gives you better focus to think outside the box and push what is possible in web design?

I don’t think it has anything to do with being “self-taught”. Whether you are self-taught or you were sent to school to specialize on this certain craft, it doesn’t matter how or where you learn the tools, all you need is creativity, passion and lots of practice.

8. I was reading your blog and was wondering how did you come to be featured in Web Design Magazine?

I actually wrote to them asking if they featured offshore or non-UK talents. They wrote back asking me to send them my stuff and if they like it, they’d feature me. Luckily, they loved my work and I’m very happy that they did. By the way, they featured me for the second time on Issue #152, which I am really excited about! .NET Magazine also featured me on their 181^st Issue. I don’t know how they found out about me, but it’s really cool, too!