
I studied physics, which turned out to be less useful than expected and more useful than I thought. Then I fished commercially in Alaska and spent winters in Kauai. I didn't make much work out there — the nature was too good. I couldn't figure out how to compete, so mostly I just watched. Came back to New York in 2000 to try to put it all in focus.
I've always wanted work that feels inevitable — not decorated, not styled, not assembled from good decisions. Inevitable. The kind of thing where, when you see it, you stop wondering how it could have been otherwise. That feeling doesn't come from taste or trend. It comes from understanding a problem so completely that only one answer remains. That's what I've spent my career chasing, and it's a high bar.
In 2000 I co-founded CO11ECTIVE — a brand and design practice built around that idea.
We work on brand strategy, identity, and design systems. Before anything goes out into the world, we build it and test it — on shelves, in shipping, under bad light, in the hands of people who aren't paying attention. Alex + Mima is the production arm we use to do that: prototype, fabricate, stress-test. What survives goes forward.
I paint, fabricate and sometimes write about what I learn as I go.
When I'm not in the studio I'm fly fishing, or watching two better versions of myself play baseball and pole vault.
If you want to talk, collaborate, argue about something, or just exchange ideas — drop a line.