Sitting Down with Tim Davies

We continue our series of designer and developer interviews with a chat with the outspoken and hilariously animated Tim Davies. Tim’s a good friend and was nice enough to take the time to answer some of our questions.

Culture Milk: Hey Tim, thanks for taking a few minutes to hang out with us! Can you tell us where you’re from and what you do for a living currently?

Tim Davies: I was born 21 years ago in the German city of Münster, although I’m a hot headed Brit. I have worked in Graphic Design and Web Development for a decade, starting at a very young age, and have been working in iOS development since the device’s release in 2007. When not working my day job as a Web Designer and iPhone developer for V4 Technical, I’m hacking away on my own personal projects and those I work on with my partner, graphic designer Robbie Pearce. At V4, I’m a bit of a jack of all trades, working on both web apps and iOS apps for both small businesses up to national and international corporations. However as much as I enjoy my job, my real passion is building products for people and watching them smile as they the play with them. Luckily I’m now fulfilling that passion when outside of work with my partner as we’re running our own development house, Fabulous Apps.

CM: Sounds like you know how to keep busy. How many years have you been in the field of design and development? Did you have formal training, or are you self-taught?

TD: To use and old idiom, I first cut my teeth on web development while in my first year High School, thats year 7 in the UK, 6th grade for Americans. One of my tutors set up an after school class teaching kids HTML. This was over 10 years ago now, my tutor told us one day the Internet would really take off and we’d do well to throw ourselves into it at our age. So I did. I started making money freelancing by slicing PSD’s and coding then at the tender age of 12-13. I then moved onto building web apps 2 years later and Objective-C around the same time.

I took comp sci in Sixth Form, but failed the class for not documenting my final project, an iOS app I built for an MOD contractor. Failing this left a bitter taste in my mouth about going into the software world so I turned to another passion. Design. in 2009 I passed an interview and began to study for a BA(Hons) Degree in Graphic Design, I dropped out of this class to work where I am now, however I’ve been teaching myself and working in Photoshop since PS 6.

CM: What are some of your other interests outside of design?

TD: I have a minor obsession with furniture and appliances. I don’t know wether this stems from a design and development background or not, but my passion can be summed up by my love for 1950’s General Electric desk fans. Just google them, utterly beautiful.

I’m also a big fan of reading. I studied English Literature at school, so another passion of mine is writing. I’ve attempted to write a couple of books on subjects ranging from fiction to books on iOS development, but these are thwarted by how easily I’m distracted and my lack of spare time! However I do want to publish something within the next five years, even if my Ma’ is the only person to purchase a copy…

CM: Is there anything that you’re working on currently that you’d like to share?

TD: I’ve been known to start many a personal project and then drop it months later (I once began work on a much anticipated Twitter client that sadly became vapourware). Yet recently I decided to turn back to a project I abandoned called Bulletin. I renamed the project Novus (latin for both writing and news), and aided and driven by my wonderful boyfriend Robbie Pearce (a fantastic designer), we’ve begun working on it again. I’m solely focusing on the development and Robbie is doing all UI and we’ve made some great progress. Novus tries to focus more on the comfortable consumption of our RSS content in a beautiful yet functional environment. It’s an amalgamation of my obsession with written word, design, and makin’ apps.

CM: One question we’re asking everyone we interview is; what are your thoughts on communities like Dribbble and Forrst? Some people complain that there isn’t enough criticism. Some think there’s too much. Where do you stand?

TD: I was a big opponent to Dribbble and Forrst in the beginning and was quite vocal about this. I didn’t like the idea of a gated community that was, at the time, full of the “well known” designers that sat about telling each other how awesome they were. I joined Dribbble when it was opened to public viewing so that when I tweeted my shots everyone could see them rather than a righteous few.

I’m also a fan of the way Dribbble is now letting its own community choose who it inducts into its ranks, I think it helps keep Dribbble professional and people aspiring and working harder to get invited in.

CM: How about family life? What does the Davies crew look like?

TD: Family life is good, albeit I have a huge family (9 aunts, 8 uncles and 23 cousins) so it’s a crazy time of the year, I certainly don’t have a relaxing yule.

I also have a fantastic partner in the form of my boyfriend Robbie Pearce, who I’ve had the privilege of calling my own for 2 years come the end of this January. He’s a great designer who I met through twitter and the mutual following of our close friend Natalie Nash, well known as Pinky von Pout.

CM: Most designers I know got inspiration from someone. Not necessarily design style, but someone who really got you interested in the field. Was there anyone like that for you?

TD: Oh certainly, and I’m lucky enough to know most of them now. I started out as OS X was being released and people started to actually recognise UI and Icon design as real jobs. I’ve been lucky to grow up doing this job influenced by some of the people now at the top of their game. There were several moments when I’d get a new follower email from twitter and see it was someone like Mike Piontek, Jono Hunt or Elliott Kember, all of whom were major influences on me when I first got into graphic and web design, and I’d be so blown away that these people now chose to follow me. Another person I admire is Mike Lee, I can remeber the day he sent me his AIM handle and helped me through code and other matters I needed help with, I wish I could be half the ‘app maker’ he is.

And while trying not to be so corny I start to turn yellow. I really admired, and still admire Steve Jobs. I started out as the first iMacs were released and grew up watching this man and apple build a platform and community to which I now owe my lively hood. Without Steve Jobs and the Mac, I doubt I would be doing what I do now, and in turn be apart of such an amazing design and development world in which I’ve met many friends for life, and my partner. I’m not embarrassed to say I burst into tears when Robbie woke me up on holiday and told me he’d died.

CM Tim, thanks a million for taking a few minutes to answer some of our questions. It’s always great to talk to you.

TD It’s been an absolute pleasure. It’s great to see Culture Milk building a modern and diverse news site which I hope can flourish and stand out from the current valley obsessed news sites, and thank you for having me.

Make sure to check Tim’s website out, or follow him on Twitter.