In more than 20 years leading Huston Design, John has never grown tired of the amazing range of challenges that come across our desk and serving up creative solutions. Some are design challenges. Others are just good old problem solving, like how to efficiently make a library of thumbnails for more than 600 pieces of art efficiently (P.S. It took 4 minutes.) John’s known for being “disarmingly chill”, applying design thinking and a cool head to even the toughest task. He’s come a long way since his teenage days in Spencer, Iowa, slinging newspapers and Happy Joe’s Pizza, and building Formula 1 crash barriers one college summer while home from Iowa State University. This year, in addition to designing logos, websites and annual reports, John’s looking forward to cooking, woodworking and biking in the Colorado Mountains.
Steve is a marketing nerd driven to help brands get the most out of their marketing investment. He is a strong believer that marketing strategy should be tied to business goals. Steve is also a marketing Rosetta Stone able to translate and communicate seamlessly between designers, developers, database-administrators, executives and sales and marketing leaders. While he has done just about everything there is to do in marketing, website and graphic design is not his thing, which is why he works with the great team at Huston Design. When he’s not thinking about marketing, Steve loves cooking, curling (the sport, not his hair), soccer, traveling, the Wisconsin Badgers, and the beauty of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
David is a designer who can do almost anything in the design universe—typography, illustration, animation, branding—you name it. His uncle, a professional illustrator, showed him that art could be a profession, inspiring David to fall in love with the whole creative world, not just one piece of it. His first job slinging frozen custard at Culver's taught him management skills that still serve him well today (and yes, design deadlines and client demands are way less intense than the dinner rush).
When it comes to design, David is a jack-of-all-trades, declaring, "If anyone claims to be a master designer, I'll call bullshit on that." He gets most excited about brand work where he can truly put his mark on something new, and he loves bringing static designs to life through animation. His goal is to make client meetings the most fun meeting of their day, thankfully, a principle he applies to internal meetings, too. When he's not designing, you'll find him disc golfing, working out, watching baking shows, or rewatching Big Trouble in Little China for the hundredth time. He's currently obsessed with the show Fallout and collects vinyl—his favorite album is DJ Shadow's Entroducing... On a perfect Madison day, David heads straight to Memorial Union for the views and people watching.
Daria is happiest when she’s being creative, from designing websites or a new logo, to cooking, knitting, and playing VR-games, especially Beat Saber. Daria is teaching us about Ukraine traditions. She and her husband came to Madison from Ukraine as the result of the war. She loves natural areas (especially Olbrich Garden) and says that seeing so much wildlife feels like a Disney cartoon. She also loves the downtown vibe and Capitol views, the kind people here and Ukrainian flags that show support. Daria’s other faves include the restaurant 1855 in Cottage Grove, the Italian band Maneskin and TV series like The Office, How I Met Your Mother and House MD, which she’s watched at least four times. Daria says she loves our “small talk culture” here, one more thing that lets her know she’s surrounded by friends.
