Hi, I'm Owen

I'm a product design manager with a passion for building design teams that work on deep, technical complexity.

Here's some of my work:

Our next-generation developer tool with an entirely unique UX

Creating the future of headless commerce tools at Shopify

Supercharging theme development with GitHub

A next-gen design system for hundreds of device types

Bringing third-party apps directly into the Shopify admin

Designing the chat experience and personality for IKEA Place

Our next-generation developer tool with an entirely unique UX

Creating the future of headless commerce tools at Shopify

Supercharging theme development with GitHub

A next-gen design system for hundreds of device types

Bringing third-party apps directly into the Shopify admin

Designing the chat experience and personality for IKEA Place

Get to know me

I'm a design leader with a passion for building great teams and products. Here's a bit more about me, the human.

Home

I've lived all over the world! Today, I live in Victoria, British Columbia. Before moving to Canada, I lived in Amsterdam for five years, and I grew up in Wellington, NZ. After so many big moves, I've settled down in Canada for the long run.

I work at Stripe, leading a team of designers building tools developers love, the world's best developer documentation, and developer AI.

I love building my own products. My last company, Charged, was a weekly newsletter delivered to 15,000 people, and grew into a newsletter platform with 1,000 paying subscribers.

Femke, Owen, and Kaya in the Rocky Mountains

Beyond

Outside of work, I spend my time with my partner Femke, our daughter, Saskia, and our Duck Tolling Retriever, Kaya. We love hiking, finding the best coffee places, and discovering absolute best playgrounds on Vancouver Island.

Companies I've worked with

I've worked with some of the largest, most innovative companies in tech—and beyond.

Where I stand out

I help technology companies build design teams that make complexity seem simple.

Design Leadership

I excel at building and scaling high-performing design teams delivering exceptional experiences, especially in remote-first environments. I've lead and built design teams of 15+ designers and design managers, building products used by millions of people.

Building design teams

I know great design when I see it. I'm great at building and scaling design teams from the ground up.

AI Design

I lead teams working on boundary-pushing AI design, exploring entirely new ways to build products.

Developer Experience

As a developer myself, I specialize in designing next-generation developer experiences that they love using. I've led teams building the world's best developer documentation, and innovative new tools like Workbench.

Global Experience

I've lived and worked all over the world. I started my career in Wellington, New Zealand, spent 5 years in Amsterdam, and have now lived in Canada for almost 10 years. This global experience gives me a unique perspective on design and bulding great user experiences.

Content Design

I've worked as a content designer, working with companies from IKEA to Spotify to help cut through complexity with words.

Say hello.

I'm currently working full-time for Stripe from Victoria, British Columbia. Working on something interesting? I'm always open to chat.

Contact Owen