The Funsize Show

In this episode, Nina Sanchez, Tony Sanchez, Bobby Dixon, and Nhi Nguyen delve into the Big Little Poster Show, exploring its value for Austin's design community, sharing personal connections with food, and uncovering the inspiration behind Bobby and Nhi's desire to get involved. They discuss how the show brings together a diverse group of designers and creators, fostering a unique space for colla...

In this episode, Tony and Anthony explore the nuanced distinctions between good and beautiful design. They consider the subjectivity of beauty, influenced by cultural and individual preferences, and the importance of usability and business objectives and what constitutes “good” design. Citing a mobile game that succeeds commercially and the unconventional design of the Cybertruck, they underline t...

In this episode, we chat with Brian Simpson, a creative professional who took the leap from Florida to Austin, Texas, back in 2008. Brian started in flash design and later co-founded an experiential design agency, showcasing incredible innovation and adaptability along the way. We’ll hear about his work on high-profile projects, including a groundbreaking app for Rupert Murdoch, and dive into the...

Ten years ago, Funsize launched the Hustle Podcast. Since then, we have had nearly one hundred conversations with exciting people in the design industry. Today, we're excited to announce and discuss the next generation of the Funsize podcasting, The Funsize Show! This podcast, now rebranded as The Funsize Show, is a variety show with many exciting segments hosted by many brilliant people at Funsiz...

Juliana Vislova is the VP of Design at Mercury, an all-in-one banking platform for startups. A former linguistics major, Juliana is career switcher who spent time as an art director for a digital marketing agency before her design career. After moving to the U.S., she stumbled upon product design and immediately loved its intersection of pscyhology, art, storytelling and problem-solving. Her desig...

During our party for SXSW 2022, we interviewed designers and tech workers to understand how their careers were affected by the pandemic and what it means for their futures. We'd like to extend a huge thanks to Johnny Abowd, Carlos Menchaca, Dina Williams, Ali Metall, AC Cowart, Steven Parvaresh, Rick Messer, Isabelle Encela, Steven Ray and Katy Beightol for sharing their perspectives on this uniqu...

Brian Peterson is a a multidisciplinary creator supporting, connecting, and empowering organizations through strategic design. Brian’s background is in fine arts with a brief stint in animation/illustration. His path to design has taken him through freelance visual design, to a founding team startup, to the design studio at Funsize. Currently, he leads design teams at Affirm, where he works to bri...

Kevin Hawkins is the director of product design at BookClub —an online platform that brings authors and readers together. He is also an award-winning, multi-disciplinary design leader and educator with over 12 years of experience building communities and launching products. Kevin is a self-taught front-end developer and started his career doing freelance web design for local businesses and science...

Michael Holzer is the director of UX at Google Payments and has been at Google for over eight years. He is a passionate, entrepreneurial design leader currently focused on building and operating large-scale creative teams working on new mediums and technologies. Michael grew up in Silicon Valley and started his career studying mechanical engineering and industrial design by prototyping bicycle hel...

Alli Metall is a husband, father, and designer living in Reykjavík, Iceland. He was born in Húsavík, Iceland--a small town on the northern coast (also famed as the setting of Netflix's Eurovision Song Contest ). He began his career playing guitar in death metal and jazz bands and soon combined his interests in music and computer games to a career in design. After a brief agency stint as an intern...

Aaron “Ron” Irizarry , is the Sr. Director, Servicing Platforms Design at Capital One. He loves all things user experience, problem-solving, and design process. Having worked for Fox/IGN, HP, Nasdaq, and now Capital One, Aaron loves sinking his teeth into complex problems. In addition to his day job, Aaron speaks at events and provides training for companies on design team structure, communication...

In this first episode with Tony Sanchez as an official co-host, we were honored to be joined by a design legend.  Toke Nygaard is the Chief Creative Officer at Zendesk. With more than 20 years of experience designing digital experiences, Toke Nygaard oversees Zendesk’s brand and product UX/UI. In this role, he is constantly developing and building the Zendesk brand with his global team of passiona...

For the last episode recorded in 2020, we flip the spotlight onto our founders, Anthony and Natalie Armendariz, to walk us through the challenging, chaotic and — at times — exciting journey that was 2020. In a year that provided surprises and obstacles for just about every human being on the planet, we wanted to tell our agency's part of the story. We hope you enjoy. We cover: Our mindset going in...

Ted Boda is currently a Product Design Manager on the Well-Being team at Instagram. He is also a former Director of Design at Udacity, former Senior Designer at Nest Labs, former Lead Mobile Designer at Netflix and a former Lead UI Designer for Keynote at Apple (where, interestingly enough, he worked on some of the slides used for Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth). With all that experience to draw...

Margaret Lee is the Director of UX Community & Culture at Google. A self-described "reluctant leader," she heads up programs that unite departments across the company and create Google career opportunities for those who might not typically have access. Margaret created this role for herself a few years ago when she noticed there was an opportunity to put more intention behind efforts of inclusion...

Braden Kowitz is a former design partner at Google Ventures, where he had the opportunity to work with startups like ClassPass, Gusto, Slack, Medium, Flatiron Health, TuneIn, BlueBottle Coffee, 23andMe, One Medical Group, HubSpot, RetailMeNot, Nest and more.  He is the co-author of NY Times Best Seller, Sprint , and the co-founder of Range , a tool that keeps teams connected and productive. We're...

Douglas Ferguson is an entrepreneur and human-centered technologist with over 20 years of experience. He is the founder and president of Voltage Control, an Austin-based facilitation agency that specializes in helping teams work better together through participatory decision making and design inspired facilitation techniques. He has helped transform teams from U.S. SOCOM, the Air Force, Adobe, Dro...

In a first for The Hustle, we're tackling important subject matter outside the realm of design. In a conversation led by our Guest Host, Tony Sanchez, a Design Lead at Funsize, Chas Moore joined us to discuss the public outcry and wave of activism in the wake of George Floyd's murder. Chas is the Executive Director of Austin Justice Coalition, an activist-led organization that educates and builds...

Note: We apologize for the audio quality. There was an issue with the microphone. Justin is a multi-faceted, multi-pierced, multi-tattooed designer, author, and speaker. He wrote the book "Cultivating a Creative Culture", is the Vice President of Human-Centered Design and Development at bswift, the founder of The Dead Pixel Society, and a contributor to A List Apart. Justin had some really intuiti...

Funsize friend, Chad Engle, is the Product Design Director at GoDaddy, a company that is rapidly expanding its product offerings and leaning into design with a focus on in-house talent.  He stopped by to share his experience growing design orgs, explain what he looks for in applicants, and provide some insight into how he approaches leadership. We cover: Growing a design practice at GoDaddy Transi...

Note: We recorded this one before COVID began, so some references (like to our SXSW party) did not come to fruition. Theo Strauss is an 18-year-old product designer out of NYC who's already making waves in the community through his involvement with companies like Apple, Postmates, and Figma. As someone on the bleeding edge of a new generation of designers, we loved having him on the show to share...

Note: We apologize for the audio quality. There was an issue with the microphone. Ash Huang is a designer, illustrator, author, speaker, artist and parent who currently works at Adobe. After finding design at a young age, Ash's career has spanned a wide variety of well-known companies and different pursuits that have left her with some fascinating views on accomplishment, progress, staying curious...

Helen Tran is a designer, CEO, hobbyist writer, traveler and macaroon connoisseur (amongst other things). In this wide-ranging episode, we discuss everything from software design, business ownership and bodybuilding, to wealth and weird Texan habits. We cover: Growing with Shopify Paying dues before taking big career risks Figuring out what to pursue and deciding to start Jupiter Why there's no su...

Guigo Sanchez is the Creative Director at THIRD EAR — previously known as LatinWorks — an agency that specializes in creating advertising for the U.S. Hispanic audience. Born and raised in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, he is the husband of Mari Chamoun (Managing Director at Funsize), and father to Julia Elena Sánchez Chamoun. After completing his psychology degree in Puerto Rico, Guigo moved to Austin to...

Thomas Ewart is an Associate Product Designer at Funsize, where he works with startups and enterprise design teams to craft thoughtful digital experiences. With a non-traditional career path that spans accounting, tattoos and electronic music, Thomas brings a unique perspective to his work and enjoys helping others find their place in the design world.  Non-traditional paths to design The decision...