Well, this sums up just about the worst kind of "critique" that lives in the seedier underbellies of the design community; adding little to the conversation aside from belittling the work of someone else. I hope this has just been a rough morning/day for you and not a regular occurrence.

Wow, such a rad question. This answer will just be for me. I think it's a pretty multi-faceted, and I'm going to try earnestly—and not just go for the romantic.

I struggled a lot in trying to figure out what it is I wanted to do while in school. I've wanted to be a great many things, but hadn't really considered any of the artistic leanings, though they were a huge part of my growing up.

By the time I figured out that design was a career I had have and sustain, I was almost out of college. For me, it was almost like discovering this whole new world of people who "made" things, all by themselves. I had really wanted to be a filmmaker, but there are so many limitation to working solo in that world. Chief among those, I didn't have a great camera, a budget to work with, actors, etc. So when I discovered this career, wherein I could create what I wanted on my own, it was like discovering a whole new medium for story. I was originally a Philosophy and World Religions major in school, after all.

Wow, that's a lot of setup. Anyhow, I'd say that now, what keeps me most excited is working in a field like technology with Code School that has a huge aim, which is to arm this generation and the next with the tools and proficiencies that are such an enormous part of our world. I love the idea that I could be making something that my daughter could one day be excited about learning from!

Super Team, on the other hand, is my way to play in a realm that's more about having fun and allowing myself to take joy in those little things that inspire me, or just bring a smile to my face. It's not going to change the world, but it's something that I feel like I have to allow myself to do, which is to express some inner delight and get the change to do with those I haven't yet had the opportunity to do it with.

And why keep learning and improving? Because I'm nowhere near done yet. At least I hope not! I'm so humbled to be working in such a great field with so many kind folks who will willing teach and invest in my own personal growth. If I don't take advantage of that, what a missed opportunity! It's good to remember what a privilege it is to get to do what we get to do from time to time.

Thank you for this question!

We're all about that Slack. It's definitely the go-to for communication at the group level. We've got rooms for this, rooms for that etc.

But I think perhaps the most valuable part of this is that we actually like each other quite a bit (or at least I do). So we're keeping up with each other anyway. A lot of these ideas for products are born out of general, non-focused discussion where a thread appears and we just start pulling on it to see if there's anything there.

Well, I'm not a good hand-drawn artist. So there's that. Also, I don't do it very regularly, so it hurts about five minutes into doing it. But I like working with computers!

Oh, also we ship to the UK now! <3

Oh, great question!

Loving the work of James Gilleard right now. Such stunning work with geometry and creating depth.

Also, huge fan of MUTI as their work is so diverse it's overwhelming.

Also, these folks at Super Team Deluxe. It's why we're working together :)

This market is crowded like whoa. Lapel pins ended up becoming the first little medium we worked in after trying out a bunch. We were actually originally going to be making little trading cards in the very first iteration of products, but after trying a lot of samples, we never really fell in love with the medium. It's absolutely the plan to keep growing and pushing into new territories.

Of course Rogie wants hats since we've all yet to see him without one.

We all know Rogie prefers his natural, buff state the most. Common knowledge.

Definitely not the easiest thing to do, but I think all of our lives are crazy for any number of reasons. Having children isn't easy when it comes to finding hours in the day, but neither is holding down a job, working on passion projects, finding time to socialize like a human, or finding your own time for solitude.

Not matter what you do in life, you're going to be prioritizing your time to do what you want to be doing. I think, for me, time management in parenthood has more manifested itself in being more time-boxed in how time is used. I'll typically work in sprints where I can hyper-focus for a burst of time and oftentimes those happen around 11pm when the kiddos are dozing.

For me, I've sort of let my love of interests kinda run wild on this thing. I'm a big fan of tattoos and collect them on my skin myself, so that played a huge factor in this first run for me since pins are worn on the body as well. There wasn't a particular artist that was the larger inspiration, but I'd say American Traditional as a style was a big influence. Super Team all sort of came from this idea of marrying things that could be perceived as hard and/or badass (a la tattoos) with things that felt more soft and fun (like working with computers for a living). That's been a theme for us on this first run.

A lot of the idea behind Super Team and how we approach goods is pulling from those things in life that were great sources of joy and delight. I think one of the bigger brands that we love (that's made its way into future plans) is Nintendo as I've felt they've played a huge role in my joy growing up. There's something so infectious about those characters and the universes they created—it's just masterful world-building. To be able to play in that sandbox is something I've wanted to do since I was a kid. And Nintendo hasn't come knocking on my door yet, so I guess I've just been finding my own ways to connect with things like that on my own terms.

Other than that, I love things that make me smile like The Onion / Clickhole, memes, 80s sci-fi movies, and comics.