Autumn is my favorite season. The air feels quieter, more deliberate. The light is golden but fleeting, the kind that makes you slow down and pay attention. In my home office, the windows are open just enough for a cool draft to mingle with the sound coming from my speakers.
Lately, my studio playlist leans toward contemporary jazz, artists like Misha Panfilov, Okonski, The Circling Sun, Surprise Chef, and Karate Boogaloo. Their grooves roll through the space like falling leaves, unhurried and full of rhythm. The music sets a tone that feels alive and loose and I love it.
There’s something about jazz that feels like pure creativity in motion. It’s improvisation with purpose, structure and spontaneity dancing in perfect tension. And that’s exactly how I approach design.
Jazz reminds me that creativity isn’t about rules, it’s about listening. To rhythm, to tone, to what’s not being played. Design feels the same way. You tune in to the brand, to the little shifts in color and type, and build something that moves. It’s not about making things pretty, it’s about making them sing.
Miles Davis once said, “It’s not the notes you play, it’s the notes you don’t play.” I think about that every time I sit down to create. In design, restraint is as powerful as expression. Negative space, thoughtful pacing, quiet moments. They are what give the work its soul.
I tend to design with a sense of symmetry, which might seem at odds with jazz. But jazz has its own kind of symmetry, not always visual but emotional. There is balance in how tension resolves, how chaos finds a center. A groove by Surprise Chef might feel endlessly cyclical, but it’s always evolving, always finding its way home. I see design the same way. The symmetry gives the piece structure, but it’s the improvisation within that symmetry, the subtle shifts in line weight, texture, or spacing, that makes it feel alive.
Jazz also teaches adaptability. The best musicians don’t just solo; they respond. They build on what’s happening in real time. In a creative studio, it’s the same. The best ideas come from collaboration, from letting someone else’s thought shift your rhythm, from being open to the riff.
And maybe most importantly, jazz celebrates imperfection. It’s raw, alive, human. That’s the energy I try to bring into my work. Less polish for polish’s sake, more soul in the details. Because that’s where the truth lives.
Design, at its best, is jazz: an interplay of intuition, structure, and emotion. A creative conversation you can feel.
Autumn reminds me to slow down and listen, both to the music and to the work itself. The season, like jazz, has its own rhythm, subtle, balanced, and full of movement beneath the stillness. And in that rhythm, creativity finds its voice.
If you want to hear what’s been playing in my studio, I put together a playlist of the artists that inspired this piece: Misha Panfilov, Okonski, The Circling Sun, Surprise Chef, and Karate Boogaloo. It’s full of groove and warmth, perfect for early mornings or late-night creative flow. You can find it here:
