Husband / Father / Visionary / Creative Director / Mentor / Angler
Bryan Powell exemplifies the blend of visionary thinking, hands-on leadership, and unwavering integrity, continuously pushing the boundaries of digital product design to create lasting, impactful solutions. His mission is simple yet profound: to make everything better through curiosity, responsibility, and an insatiable drive to learn and innovate.
Biography
Bryan Powell is a visionary creative director and mentor with nearly three decades of multi-disciplinary experience in digital product design. As the founder of Powell Design in 2004, Bryan has consistently demonstrated his ability to turn complex design challenges into meaningful, innovative solutions. His broad experience spans various industries, from entertainment and healthcare to finance and luxury goods, designing elegant user interfaces for nearly every type of screen and platform.
Bryan’s career began in the mid-90s in Hollywood, where he designed the first websites and interactive television experiences for high-profile clients like the Oscars, ABC, and Fandango. These early projects were highly creative endeavors, although their temporary nature often left Bryan seeking more lasting impact. His work at Vertu, Nokia’s luxury spin-off, was a turning point, where he integrated hardware and software design to create cohesive, high-end user experiences. This pivotal role laid the foundation for Powell Design, where a consistent focus on blending hardware and software continues to be a driving principle.
As a well-rounded design leader, Bryan has designed experiences on a wide array of platforms, including mobile and tablet applications, interactive television, web applications, and wearables. His expertise extends across various industries such as consumer electronics, entertainment, industrial applications, IoT, medical devices, healthcare, luxury products, defense, finance, science, and engineering. This diverse background equips him with a unique perspective, allowing him to deliver innovative solutions tailored to each industry’s specific needs.
Forward Thinking
Bryan is a visionary who regularly assists clients in looking toward the future, crafting designs that anticipate where they will be in years to come. His ability to create compelling vision projects aligns teams towards a unified direction, fostering project and services roadmaps that pave the way for future advancements.
Insatiable Curiosity
Curiosity is the cornerstone of Bryan’s personal approach to design. He believes that great design stems from a relentless pursuit of knowledge and understanding, which he achieves through intentional learning and exploration of new ideas, techniques, and technologies. His insatiable curiosity drives innovation as he continually seeks new methods to enhance his designs. This curiosity is further invigorated by time spent outdoors, particularly on the water, where he gains clarity, perspective, and unbridled creativity. From discovery and research to concept development and design, Bryan’s curiosity ensures that his work is always at the forefront of technological and creative advancements.
Effective Communication
Bryan is also known for his exceptional communication skills. He demonstrates leadership by sharing design solutions and guiding clients through the decision-making process. He facilitates workshops that drive insight, alignment, and innovation, ensuring all stakeholders are aligned, engaged and informed. His ability to articulate complex ideas clearly and compellingly helps clients visualize potential solutions and make informed decisions.
Mentorship and Integrity
Bryan’s extensive experience has provided him with a wealth of knowledge that he is passionate about sharing with the next generation of designers. As a mentor, he imparts wisdom gained from both successes and failures, guiding young designers toward their own paths of innovation and excellence. His leadership is built on a foundation of integrity—doing what he says and fostering trust in every professional relationship. This commitment to integrity has resulted in long-lasting partnerships and a reputation for reliability and honesty.
Career Highlights
Throughout his illustrious career, Bryan Powell has held pivotal roles at several renowned companies, each contributing significantly to his expertise in digital product design. At Vertu, he served as the Interactive Design Manager, where he crafted the vertu.com website and user interfaces for luxury mobile phones, seamlessly blending hardware and software to enhance user experiences. As a Creative Director at Pittard Sullivan, Bryan led the design of numerous award-winning websites and convergent media projects for high-profile clients such as ABC, Oscars.com, and Fandango. His tenure at Cow saw him direct innovative website projects, including Kahlua.com, while at AND Interactive, he spearheaded interface designs for broadband applications for companies like @Home and the Getty. These diverse experiences have solidified Bryan’s reputation as a versatile and visionary leader in the digital design landscape.
Education
Bryan graduated with honors with a BFA from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA. During his time as a student, he was selected as an ambassador of the school to present his work at a multimedia design conference in Kitakyushu, Japan.
Recognition
Bryan Powell’s work has been recognized in numerous publications and awards. His designs have been featured in Communication Arts Magazine, Print Magazine, How Magazine, and Critique Magazine. Notably, the Atheer Air project earned the Enterprise Solution award at the Augmented World Expo 2016, and the JPL/NASA Media Search was a finalist for NASA Software of the Year. The Vertu.com website received Yahoo!’s “Pick of the Week” and Shockwave’s “Shocked Site of the Day” awards. The Fox Family website won an International Monitor Award for Best Website and was featured in How Magazine Design Annual. His work on the US Senior Open Website, Kahlua.com, and cow.com has been highlighted in several design books, including “The Web Design WOW Book,” “New Design – Los Angeles,” and “Creativity, Innovative Ways to Build Great Design.”
Bryan’s work consistently garners significant attention and accolades in the industry, underscoring his impact and innovation in digital design, and he holds seven patents for unique user interface design solutions, showcasing his innovative contributions to the field of digital product design.
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