Behind The Avatar #3: Liz Andrade of CMD+Shift Design

The idea here is that there are countless avatars and websites and icons and blogs. But every single one of them has a person or people behind them. Get to know the person a little bit and you will be all the more interested and invested in what they have to say and share.

I’ve been a subscriber to the CMD+Shift Design Blog for a few months now. I enjoy taking in the author’s writing style and I’ve found quite a few useful tips for freelancing and web design. I also recently started following @cmdshiftdesign on Twitter and have discovered much of the same value. So today I want to introduce you to Liz Andrade, the gifted, humorous, creative and design-community advocate behind CMD+Shift Design.

Liz Andrade of CMD+Shift Design

Liz lives in Seattle, WA, where she runs her one-woman web studio (CMD+Shift Design). She started art school as a Fine Artist but eventually succumbed to her closet computer nerdom and began a double-major in Graphic design. She has a post on her blog that covers this in more detail: Getting to Know Me, Part 1: How Did I Become A Designer?

After college, Liz worked for a Seattle company that designs and sells luxury presentation materials. She did sales and marketing for this company for a couple years before moving onto a staff design position at a small boutique firm where she worked in print and web design.

“It is with my experience in direct customer relations doing sales that I cut my teeth and learned valuable lessons that I would later be able to translate to project management in my senior design position and later as a business owner!”

Liz and Eric (her partner in crime of 8 years now) meeting Wil Wheaton at Emerald City Comic Con

I asked Liz to share some things she is passionate about. She said first and foremost are her family and friends, followed by the internet, web design, computers, web standards, code, pixels, problem-solving, listening to her clients, growing businesses through smart web solutions, learning, sharing knowledge, and community. She adds:

“I have strong opinions of music and movies and what I like and what I don’t like in both of them. You could call my a “snob”, and that wouldn’t be completely inaccurate.”

When I asked Liz why she is on Twitter and other social networks, she replied:

“I’m an internet nerd. I love any excuse to use the web, I like trying out new services and apps – it’s just fun! I like Twitter to stay in touch with the online design community, it makes things so easy. I have met a lot of great designers and developers simply through interaction on Twitter. The people who I enjoy the most on Twitter send out a good balance of helpful design-oriented information and more personal stuff that gives you glimpse into who they are outside of being a designer. I try to keep that balance with my own Twitter stream!”

Liz and Chewbacca

One of my favorite features on her CMD+Shift Design Blog is “Ask A Freelancer”, in which she fields questions about freelancing and shares her insights and experience. Her laid back, often humorous writing style is right up my alley, and I am sure you will enjoy getting to know her through her blog and various social network connections as much as I am. You can find all her social network links at http://lizandrade.com and of course you must check out CMD+Shift Design if you haven’t already. Take some time and get to know Liz Andrade, the person behind the avatar, and I’m certain you will enjoy exploring her websites and writings all the more!

If you are interested in being interviewed as a part of this series, please let me know in the comments, or send me an email. If you have any questions or comments for Liz, leave a comment below or visit her at CMD+Shift Design. Finally, if you are not already, would you consider subscribing to this blog so you don’t miss any future updates? You can either subscribe to the RSS feed in the reader of your choice or you can receive the blog updates along with my Delicious bookmarks in your email inbox by filling out the simple little form at the top right of the page.