White Whale

Alex has been indispensable to White Whale since its inception, becoming a permanent full-time employee in 2004 and taking the lead in the development of LiveWhale, our content management system. He is a graduate of NYU’s film and psychology programs, an active writer and photographer, and a student of metaphysics.

Ismail is an experienced and meticulous organizer of information. In addition to managing White Whale’s virtual office, he also serves as the primary liaison with prospective LiveWhale Calendar customers. Ismail lives in Oakland with his wife and young daughter, whose entry into daycare made it possible for him to join our team.

A pathological multitasker, Jason is involved in every aspect of the website development process – from collaborating with our senior designer on design work to overseeing the care and feeding of the LiveWhale CMS. Jason first began exploring interactive design in 1997 as a complement to his graduate study in linguistics at the University of Chicago (where he holds a master’s degree).

Naomi enjoys collaborating closely with designers to create elegant, versatile websites. At White Whale, she leads the buildout of our site designs and works to move LiveWhale’s feature set forward. Naomi is British – she moved to Berkeley to study Astrophysics and stayed in California. Outside of coding, she enjoys running, climbing and mountain camping trips.

Isaac writes front-end code for the LiveWhale CMS, assists with other CMS implementations, and backs up our UI development team. He has developed and managed web applications since 1999, working on corporate teams as well as individually. Isaac lives in San Rafael with his wife and sons; his non-code interests include surfing, capoeira, and burritos.

As the lead designer for White Whale, Sacha works with clients to shape beautiful and usable experiences for the web. Born and raised in Oregon, Sacha left the state to study at Stanford University, where he received a BA in Art and Art History. A father of three small children, he now lives on a farm outside of Portland with his family, chickens, cat, books and oil painting studio.

On top of managing White Whale’s business affairs, Tonya works with clients on top-level branding and communications strategy – helping them get past organizational roadblocks and find ways to present web content to make sense to their multiple audiences. Raised in small-town Wisconsin, she headed east to attend Wellesley and then Brown, and then west to Portland, OR where she juggles work, kids, chickens, and a side-gig making napkins for her sister’s restaurant.

Karl is all about bringing people together to make beautiful things. Besides being a designer and programmer in his own right, Karl also has extensive experience in higher ed as a student, faculty, and staff member. Outside of White Whale, Karl is a musical theatre composer, where he continues to feed his love of collaboration, art, and storytelling.

A compulsive list maker and professional organizer, it’s Katie’s job to shepherd projects from start to finish. She makes sure everything is on track and everyone is happy. In her free time, you can find Katie with a camera around her neck, enjoying the outdoors or renovating her 100-year-old house. She lives in the small town of Alma, Michigan with her husband and dog.