Selected Work

blocSonic

A Creative Commons label, 500+ releases, and 18 years of design and engineering in one pair of hands — founded, built, and still running.

Role
Founder, designer, developer, curator
Years
2007–present
Stack
Astro, React, YAML content library

About this project

I founded blocSonic in 2007 to elevate independent artists and the netlabel movement. It started as a Ruby on Rails blog hosting a monthly compilation. It grew into a Creative Commons label with over 500 original releases, a custom on-site music player, its own visual identity, and release art I've designed for nearly every title.

It's also my lab. Every skill I bring to client and product work gets tested here first. When I came off the Liberty Mutual engineering team in 2022, I rebuilt the site end-to-end on everything I'd learned: a design system drafted before any code was written, an Astro/React component library, full accessibility, SEO-first architecture, and a CI/CD pipeline with a YAML content library baked into the build — so database queries no longer slow page load.

Eighteen years of design, engineering, and curation under one roof. It is the clearest proof I have that design and engineering can belong in one person's hands.

Visit blocsonic.com (opens in a new tab)

  • The blocSonic release page for ETHX “Boom To Bloom”, showing the cover art beside the release notes with the site's custom audio player docked along the bottom.
    A release page, with the custom on-site player docked at the bottom.
  • Release art for ETHX “Boom To Bloom”: heavy white display type across an orange ground, split by a cyan starburst, beside the tray card and cyan disc.
    ETHX — Boom To Bloom (BSOG0005, 2010)
  • Release art for Ant The Symbol “Tempus Fugit”: the artist photographed against oversized clock faces and Roman numerals, with a white circular ant-head mark centred over him.
    Ant The Symbol — Tempus Fugit (BSOG0050, 2018)
  • Release art for Graphic Antics “What Does It Mean?”: a wrecked car in a flattened landscape under a red sky, the title broken across three lines inside a white square frame.
    Graphic Antics — What Does It Mean? (BSOG0064, 2017)
  • Release art for Cheese “Barnaby Comes Alive!!!”: a drawn yellow ape seated over a collaged cityscape and alchemical diagram, title set in yellow and white capitals.
    Cheese — Barnaby Comes Alive!!! (BSOG0079, 2018)