From the life of an ambassador: from creating identities to basketball and back again with designer Lukáš Joch

Who are our ambassadors? What is their work process, what do they enjoy and what are they currently working on? In the next part of our column, we talked to designer Lukáš Joch.

What is your main occupation?

I am a designer. I focus on creating visual identities for companies and their products.

What does your typical working day look like?

I usually wake up at 4am, have tea, coffee, fruit and head to the studio. There I check out what's new in the graphic world, looking mainly at New York graphic design sites, listening to Vinohradská dvanáctka. Then I go over what I have planned for the day and check my evening emails. I'll check in on odds and ends and reminders from the previous day before breakfast. After that, I'll either drive out to the client I'll be spending the morning with. If I stay in the studio, I work on small things during the morning, and then design and push long-term projects after lunch into the evening. I usually spend the evening in the garden, playing basketball, going out to dinner in Prague with my wife, or sitting in front of the TV watching the NBA in the studio.

Why did you decide to become a solidpixels ambassador?

It was quite simple. I'm not a coder, I hate Wordpress, I'm a designer first and foremost, and dealing with the technical side of websites was unnecessarily burdensome and limiting. Then I discovered solidpixels and suddenly I could make sites fast and change them in real time. It was like discovering a magic wand.

What do you see as the key advantage of solidpixels? What's the one new feature you've been most excited about in the last year?

I have been using solidpixels for 6 years now. In that time the CMS has changed noticeably under my hands, there are a lot of new features, like uploading custom fonts, extended Layout block settings or section masking, all this helps me to push the site much further. Thanks to this, I also know that my sites practically don't get old, it always takes a few tweaks, a minor facelift and they can continue to serve their full purpose. I keep a pretty active eye on new features and if I learn about one that I know will add a lot of value for a particular client, I offer it to them straight away.

The key advantage is "right now". The speed of customization is of great value to my clients. At the same time, it helps me to be able to rely on the references of solidpixels clients. If Studio Najbrt chooses solid for their own sites, or if a complex solution for Skanska or Grandhotel Pupp can run on solidpixels, it is an argument that explains much more to the client than a lengthy technical description of individual functionalities.

What is the most common myth about the website/working with it among your clients?

That a website is something terribly complicated. They're afraid to edit and change it because of that, just in case they do it wrong. With solidpixels this problem goes away, clients are often shocked at how easily and quickly they can handle any editing, but overcoming that initial fear is not easy. The second obstacle tends to be an exaggerated tendency towards perfectionism. They feel that since a lot of people come to their website, they can't afford to make mistakes. They think that users are watching them around the clock and judging their every move. This then prevents them from pushing things further, trying new things and experimenting more, which ironically is exactly the way websites should be made.

You've got quite a few projects under your belt at the moment, how are you looking after them? What is the process of longer term management and client care?

My main care is that if I hear about a mistake or they contact me saying they want something changed, I can deal with it immediately. Because everything is "right now".

Can you share with us some of your recent favorite projects?

One of my latest projects is for a great patisserie called Votre Plaisir in the centre of Prague. It's a pretty simple website based mainly on photos of their beautiful pastries. It's always a great pleasure to make a website for such a high quality and polished product. Another one I will mention is the website for the amazing Vlastina Svátková. A simple clean site designed to reflect Vlastina's creative soul and approach to life. But I could talk about my favourites all day long.

Do you also want to try building and selling world-class websites? Try it with our ambassador program.