Skip to content

Software 70,000 people at 80+ brands use at work. And four products of my own, built end to end.

Most people do one of these. The interesting part is the combination: a design function rebuilt from one discipline to four, omnichannel features behind a 30% increase in store revenue for retailers, and an app taken from an idea to App Store review in 32 days on parental leave.
The work at scaleHow I lead
Store revenue
+30%
Store associates
70,000
Disciplines
1 → 4

An idea to something installed, without a company behind it.
My own.

Design, engineering and product are one conversation when there is nobody to hand off to. Three of these I built alone, and WhatWeCook with Firuze and David. One of them went from a sentence said out loud to a merged feature in six minutes, and from restart to App Store review in 32 days.

TalkMeThrough
Closed alpha

TalkMeThrough

An AI interviewer instead of a form. Send a link, and it asks the questions and follows up on the answers.

Web · Nov 2026 · closed alpha
Request access
WhatWeCook
In progress

WhatWeCook

Meal planning for households, on the web and as a native iOS app.

iOS · Oct 2026 · closed beta
See the product
ShareMyPage
Live

ShareMyPage

Share the pages you make with AI, behind real access control.

Web · Jun 2026 · live
See the product
Intura
Live

Intura

A journal for the people who lead, with a coach who has read every entry.

iPhone, iPad, Mac · Mar 2026 · live
See the product

The same work, at a scale one person cannot reach.
Through a team.

Seventy thousand store associates at 80+ brands in 40+ countries, and omnichannel features behind a 30% increase in store revenue for retailers. I led the design and the teams built them, which is a different verb and the reason the numbers are this size.

Associate App

The till leaves the counter, so a sale finishes wherever the conversation is. VEJA trains a whole team on it in about two hours.

Look closer

Omnichannel Manager

One view of an order that merchandising, operations and customer service can all argue in front of. 12,000 people at head office open it every month.

Look closer

newstore.com

The whole website rebuilt, workshop to launch in eight months, written by the design team.

Look closer

Those three are what I can show you here. What they add up to, the five areas of the store they cover, the numbers the retailers report and what the associates holding it say, is the whole nine years in one piece.

A patent, and two concepts ahead of the platform.
With Apple.

Twice NewStore took a concept to Apple before the platform could support it. I worked on both.
  1. 2018
    Two phones, one checkout

    We wanted to take a card on the phone itself and the hardware would not allow it, so we designed around it and filed for it: the customer’s phone and the associate’s phone authenticating between themselves. Granted as US 11,379,813 B2, to NewStore, five inventors, me among them. Apple announced Tap to Pay on iPhone in 2022.

  2. 2019
    A shop you can message

    Our clienteling already ran on SMS, so we proposed the same thing over Apple Business Chat: find a shop in Maps, message it, and talk to an associate standing in it. Apple never took Business Chat far. The work was real.

The patent was filed in January 2018. Apple announced Tap to Pay on iPhone in February 2022, and NewStore shipped it to retailers that September, among the first to do it. What that is worth is for you to decide; the dates are public and so is the patent.

Smaller things.
Built because something annoyed me.

I use all three. None of them are published, and only some of them ever could be.
All of it
iPad as Display, running where it is meant to
iPadOS · not published yet

iPad as Display

An old iPad in the corner of a desk, turned into a calendar that shows the day and joins the meeting with one tap.

Nuri TV, running where it is meant to
Apple TV · one weekend

Nuri TV

A television channel with one viewer, my son. Nineties shows on a fixed schedule, and it closes itself at the end of the window.

Listen Later, running where it is meant to
Web · personal

Listen Later

Paste any text or a link and it reads it to you. Built for the long answer you would rather hear on a walk.

Research has been turning into products since 2014.
Earlier.

Signum+ came straight out of my master’s thesis and became the first thing I made that people paid for. What’s Next? was the first run at the idea WhatWeCook finished five years later. Neither has a page here; both are why the rest of this one exists.

  • What’s Next?

    2021On my own

    A cooking diary that remembered what you had made and recommended the next one from your own meals. Ruby on Rails, and the first run at the idea WhatWeCook finished.

  • Signum+

    2014Zebresel

    A digital signage system that came straight out of my master’s thesis. The first time I turned my own research into something people paid for.

  • Beamerlasershow

    2013Zebresel

    An iOS app for the event industry.

What others say about me.
From every direction.

Nobody can write this part of a portfolio themselves. People who reported to me, hired me, sat across from me and watched from outside, quoted in full rather than cut to the flattering half.

“He isn’t a typical design or UX lead. He can comfortably think like a product person, and is really on the cutting edge of generative AI and codegen, as his team all are too.”
Benjamin HoskinsChief Technology Officer, NewStore
“I learned so much from his empathetic and transparent leadership style. He created a space where feedback and ideas were valued, and that made a big difference for the team’s growth.”
Sarah den BoerProduct Designer, reported to Henning
“He has a rare ability to zoom into the smallest design details while simultaneously steering bold, strategic bets. A real superstar player-coach.”
Mitun PandeyDirector of Product Operations
“He builds design culture, influences how teams think, and helps shape the way we work. He is a builder, a mentor, and someone who always shows up with a strong sense of purpose.”
Phil GranofChief Marketing Officer
“We collaborated on a Continuous Learning strategy that brought fresh user insights straight into the product, resulting in clear, measurable improvements to the user experience.”
David HawdaleSenior UX Researcher, reported to Henning
“The best design leader I have ever worked with. He has the Midas touch to make everything sharper, clearer and more impactful.”
Scott MatzaHead of Product
“His ability to drive UX strategy, lead with empathy, and build a cohesive design team made a huge impact on our product work.”
Jose MartinHead of Engineering
“He consistently pushed the limits of what his team was able to accomplish, always learning and sharing his knowledge to improve those around him.”
Levi BaadeProduct and Technology Builder
“He does not limit himself to his immediate scope. If he sees something that could be improved he steps in and takes initiative without fanfare, and he plays an active role in shaping the culture of the company.”
James LunanSolutions Engineer

One discipline to four.
Not a product.

I took over a design function with no designers left in it and rebuilt it: research, content and communication design alongside product, all on one levelling framework, with research every six weeks whatever the roadmap was doing. Customer satisfaction went up and handoffs to engineering got smoother. That half of the work ships through other people, which is the half a portfolio usually cannot show.

How I lead

Two theses, and one account of building from a phone.
Written.

Where the time went.
The whole record.

Own products
NewStore
GoodsCloud
Pepperbill
Zebresel
University of Applied Sciences Erfurt
WorkedStudiedTwo bars run under others on purpose. The degree overlapped the studio, and HWA Design overlaps NewStore.

  1. Own products

    Since 2025

    Three products, designed, built and shipped end to end, alongside the day job.

    1. Independent products, alongside NewStore2025 to present
      • Three products, designed, built and shipped end to end: WhatWeCook, meal planning for households on iOS and the web; ShareMyPage, a multi-tenant SaaS live since June 2026, where the isolation model is the architecture rather than a feature; and Intura, a reflection journal for people who lead, with a server that keeps nothing.
      • A personal design lab: staying hands on with emerging tools, so the leadership judgement stays attached to how the work is actually made.

  2. NewStore

    2017 to now

    Took the design function over with no designers left in it and rebuilt it from one discipline into four.

    1. Director of DesignApr 2024 to present
      • Own the design function, its tooling, the platform documentation and newstore.com.
      • Made design a strategic partner to product and engineering rather than a service to them.
      • Led design across the flagship products: the Associate App, Omnichannel Manager, the platform documentation and newstore.com, together used by 80,000+ people at work every month at brands including Clarks, Fossil, Burton and AllSaints.
      • Made handoffs to engineering smoother and raised customer satisfaction through better specs, onboarding and shared systems.
      • Built repeatable hiring loops and a design system, and set the documentation strategy the company now writes through.
    2. Head of Product DesignApr 2018 to Mar 2024
      • Took over a design function that had to be rebuilt, and rebuilt it step by step: product designers first, then research, then the documentation, and later communication design.
      • Introduced the foundational processes, the design rituals and the first components of the design system.
      • Mentored senior individual contributors and introduced levelling, goal setting and performance frameworks.
      • Set the standard by building the first one rather than describing it: I designed the first version of the Associate App, then handed each area to a designer on the team.
    3. Senior Product DesignerApr 2017 to Mar 2018
      • Led UX for mobile point of sale in its early growth phase, shipping the workflows now used by top global retailers.
      • Introduced usability testing and design validation, moving the team from assumption-driven design to insight-led delivery.

  3. GoodsCloud

    2015 to 2017

    Acquired by NewStore two years after I joined, which is how one job became the next without changing desk.

    1. Product DesignerApr 2015 to Mar 2017
      • Led product design for the back office of an omnichannel order management platform serving European retailers.
      • Turned complex inventory, order and fulfilment workflows into interfaces retail operations could actually run, and cut onboarding time for a new retail client by about 40%.
      • Played a key part in the UX alignment leading up to the acquisition by NewStore and the move onto one unified retail platform.

  4. Pepperbill

    2014 to 2015
    1. Product DesignerApr 2014 to Mar 2015
      • Designed the back office for a mobile iOS point of sale running in 500+ restaurants, bars and clubs, and cut the setup time for a new venue by about 30%.

  5. Zebresel

    2011 to 2014

    A studio in Erfurt, and the first time research of mine turned into something people paid for.

    1. Founder and Design LeadApr 2011 to Mar 2014
      • Founded a studio and led its design: 50+ clients across e-commerce and SaaS in three years, then pivoted from client work to products of our own.
      • Launched two. Signum+, a digital signage system that came straight out of my master’s thesis, the first time I turned my own research into something people paid for. And Beamerlasershow, an iOS app for the event industry.

  6. University of Applied Sciences Erfurt

    2008 to 2014
    1. BSc and MSc Computer Science2008 to 2014
      • Six years of computer science, which is the reason design, product and engineering are one conversation rather than three.