David
Serrano

What led you into design?

I think actually my dad! He's one of a kind. I've always been amazed by his creativity (his drawing skills are incredible) and how he loves fixing anything. Since I was a kid, part of that distilled onto me: playing with Lego, drawing, all of it. That pretty much set the precedent.

The rest was a beautiful accident: I always wanted to work in video games, yet never had enough coding experience, so I faced a quite decent amount of rejection out there. After a couple of months trying I landed a job at a gamification startup (if you can still recall the term, it used to be big 12 years ago) as a 'game designer'. On my first day I was told the UI designer had left, so all that was there for me was a bunch of Adobe Fireworks files that I had to reverse engineer to build what was on my brain.

From there (I still laugh looking at the first UI I ever did), it was years of copying, copying and copying until I learned the basics, with the added pressure of delivering things ASAP as at any other startup. Most of my craft came from learning through mistakes and imitation under real-world pressure, and truth be told, I wouldn't change a thing.

What does a typical day look like?

There's rarely a typical day in New York. I tend to take looooong walks every morning (since I was a kid my grandpa and I would walk for hours and that's still in my DNA), grab a coffee on the way, and I still pinch my cheeks when the subway drops me at Manhattan.

I'm lucky to still be able to work a couple of days from home, where I tend to work from any of the nearby cafes in Greenpoint or Williamsburg, sometimes catching up with colleagues that live around. I also tend to do pay a cheeky weekly visit to Yoseka stationary, to buy the 10th notebook I might not ever open! In the evenings I'm either hanging out with friends (when there's good weather you won't take me out of a terrace) or working on personal projects from one of the big open bars that I love in Williamsburg.

What's your workstation setup?

Where do you go to get inspired?

Inspiration for me comes from two things: the mundane and the 'unexpected'.

On the mundane: my long walks come with an add-on. I tend to stop at every place my brain is 'tickled' by. This can range from a quirky bar to a warehouse (I have a space in my heart for industrial parks, don't ask me why). I keep asking myself why that matters: the shapes, the sounds, the greenery, the buildings, what the people are doing, their stories, the conversations, the streets, anything. And sometimes... it just clicks. I attribute this to just letting your mind focus on the present and grounding yourself in real stimuli rather than locked on a screen.

On the unexpected: I'm a big maximalist. I've always been drawn to color, crowded layouts, loud compositions and illustrations. And I recently found my heaven on earth in Japan. After two trips, my house is filled with Japanese design books (I still can't read most of them), magazines, and any graphic material I could find from matchboxes to pamphlets. There's something unique in some of the layouts. I'm always amazed by the 'feel' of retrofuturism in katakana, the overloaded illustrations and compositions, the quirky balance of so many magazines and posters, and how much that comes through in my craft.

What product have you recently seen that made you think this is great design?

As I'm getting older, the more I want to reconnect with what gave me joy as a teen or kid. The last thing I got into my hands is a PSVita. Perhaps the most under-the-radar console Sony dropped, yet still the greatest piece of gaming engineering I've seen in a while (and possibly the first OLED screen we ever got access to!).

When I held it in my hands and powered it up, I was blown away by the quality of games we played literally 12 years ago. But most importantly the incredible licenses the design team took on building a UI based on... bubbles! I miss the old times when creativity tended to be a key differentiator of interfaces, and teams were racking their brains to be as 'pushing-the-boundaries' as possible.

What pieces of work are you most proud of?

The impact I've made on other designers is what I'll always be most proud of, through this whole journey and hopefully for the rest of my career. Over the past 8 years I've been deeply invested in teaching, reviewing work and mentoring other designers across Europe and now in the US too. Whether through design schools and universities, mentorship platforms like Projector, ADPList, or by reviewing the work of designers wherever I've been able to, the constant has been trying to genuinely help others in their careers.

Barreira Design School in Spain has a particularly big place in my heart. I've taught and reviewed students there for over five years, and seeing some of them go on to work at design firms I respect has been one of the most rewarding parts of the journey. It's how I pay forward what I once would have given anything to have access to. Back in Spain many years ago, I remember following all the design superstars posting on Twitter and wonder how they got there: what their day-to-day looked like, whether I'd ever do the same thing. Now I want to be that for designers who are starting out, or who need an extra push to make a change in their careers. I was there, and there's real satisfaction in helping someone feel a bit more confident in what they're capable of.

What music do you listen to while designing?

Any advice for ambitious designers?

I like to think I still haven't lost any hope on design. If anything I've regained more conviction on our value out there. These are challenging times, but it feels the same as when we got told to ditch Photoshop to jump into Sketch, or to learn how to talk to engineers to ensure our output could be matched perfectly into a screen.

Now it's like being back in it again. Ambition is exactly the main driver of success, and my advice to those seeking to grow remains the same as 8 years ago: curiosity, proactivity and heart.

Stay curious and treat every new thing you learn as a resource rather than a goal. Use the elements around you not just to produce output, but to improve how you arrive at it. That's the value of a true designer. Your process becomes more important than what you produce, and that's what ultimately gets you to the next stage.

And as for heart, that's always the key. Be nice to others. Support your colleagues, look to join forces and learn how to make the best of each other, and if you're able, stop for a moment and always ask twice: how are you? Magical words that make everyone's day. My hot take: I not only firmly believe that how you treat others is what will lead you to your next step, but also what ultimately helps you know you're making a positive impact in those around you, and that's what helps me go to bed with a smile (most times).

Anything you want to promote or plug?

If you're a designer in New York and want to come hang out with me on a Monday evening, I'll be back at BrainStation NYC on June 16 for my second demo session on AI-assisted product design. The May one was such a good time, and I promise the conversation continues at the bar after. BrainStation has been doing seriously good work in design education and I'm grateful to be part of it!