Holly Brewer | online portfolio

goal

To work on many campaigns with measurable goals endorsing brands, organizations and initiatives online and in print. Working with clients to either find ways to achieve their goals or to maintain their existing campaigns.

skill summary

Web Developer with a strong front-end foundation and prior professional experience building and maintaining production websites. Focused on accessible, mobile-first design using modern HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and React, with MERN fundamentals and refreshed training.

in depth about skills

Proficient in hand coding HTML, CSS 2 & 3, and JavaScript. Standards zealot ;-P well-read in Responsive Design, Zeldman, Meyers, and Nielsen, working within Section 508, WAI-ARIA and other accessibility & usability guidelines.

Comfortable using IDEs such as: Visual Studio Code, Notepad, Expression Web, Dreamweaver, Photoshop CS and up, SEO tools such as Microformats, site submission & robots files.

Experienced with Mailchimp, WordPress, Facebook, Instagram, and X implementations; and creating press releases in various forms to appeal to the different platforms: using trending hashtags and appealing to certain groups / handles.

Precision in coding to make it robust and forward-compatible with later iterations and browsers - with a separation between HTML structure, scripting and styling to ensure semantic structuring for accessibility and search functionality. Semantic HTML, alphabeticized styles, clearly annotated, commented and easy to jump-through code. Experienced in responsive design: ensuring that content appears clearly on multiple diverse devices - with design for mobile first. Consistent styles - and clear documentation of them. Use of code libraries and reuse of modular code blocks to improve ease of use, time management and consistency.

education

2025: Full-stack Web Dev Bootcamp at Noble Desktop in NYC.
LinkedIn recommendation:

Steven Hulse, Noble Desktop Instructor, "She’s constantly thinking, digging into problems, and asking the kind of thoughtful questions that lead to real clarity.

What stands out most about Holly is her curiosity. She genuinely wants to understand the “why” behind the fundamentals, not just memorize patterns or chase quick fixes. That depth shows up in her work: she learns fast, builds with intention, and catches details that others might overlook. And the best part is that her curiosity is contagious—it raises the bar for the whole team, because she shares what she learns and helps others grow along the way."
Working through tutorials at the epic w3schools.
Awesome articles at aListApart.com.
ASP.NET, CSS & JavaScript classes at Bellevue College.
DOM Scripting, by the talented Jeremy Keith - unobtrusive JavaScript at its finest.
Numerous high quality volumes at ABookApart
Designing with Web Standards, by the legendary Mr. Zeldman
Eric Meyer on CSS

Attended conferences to extend my skills:

I met young Mr. Zeldman at An Event Apart - and young Mr. Meyer. Yay!

the fantastic Mr. Zeldman et moi the fantastic Mr. Meyer et moi

personal

self-motivated
great interface with clients
experienced in enhancing brand images
nauseatingly enthusiastic about web technologies ;-P

Seeking to expand knowledge of web technologies such as: ux, JavaScript, ajax, php, asp.net, xslt and other such goodness.

previous positions

2019 media manager — Bainbridge Arts & Crafts

Maintained website content (Squarespace), edited marketing assets, produced email campaigns (Mailchimp), maintained the database, and managed social media content in collaboration with artists and staff. Focused on growing social media reach and highlighting certain art pieces and special days of the year.

6.16 - present writing and research - personal projects

Completed long-form research and writing projects, developing strong editing, structure, and management skills transferable to development work. Nurtured a community by making focused personal connections and by: Facebook postings, Mailchimp campaigns, and connections within the community online and by email. I systematically met and endorsed sister groups on Bainbridge Island through shared information and connections. I created logos and maintained the WordPress site; created, printed, and distributed flyers; summarized press releases and postings; updated content regularly; and merged written materials.

I expanded the role over time to creating a dynamic connection with our senators' Seattle staff, ensuring that we work together and understand each others' goals. This lead us to be able to have weekly meetings, and I circulated information from those meetings throughout the State.

9.12 - 6.16 program lead for school robotics program + home schooling

I designed curriculum, founded and led a LEGO Mindstorms EV3 robotics program, secured grant funding for equipment, and led teams to FIRST competitions. By the end of the progam, the grants I had written enabled us to have 20 robots; and I left the group with new leadership.

For home schooling, I created curricula in coordination with Lake Washington School District teachers and taught through school materials; acquired materials; and I ran field trips to learn about cultures and health.

LinkedIn recommendation:

Stephanie Rose, LICSW, fellow student, "Holly is smart, hardworking, driven and friendly. She sets goals and achieves them. Holly created the robotics program at Kamiakin Junior High and the robotics program at Emerson. She was instrumental in bringing the STEM program to the students. At Kamiakin, the robotics program started with three robots and when Holly left they had 20 robots. The program at Kamiakin is still going strong because Holly recruited new leadership."

ui developer at Amazon

The role was converting PDFs into ebooks as part of a team. Ebooks are relatively straightforward. The ones that we worked on had multiple graphics and text that wrapped around it - and needed to be positioned accordingly when text resizes. They were children's books and graphic novels mainly. Here are two:

LinkedIn recommendation:

Angela Giese, a colleague at Amazon: "Holly was a fantastic person to work with side-by-side on the wide volume of HTML and CSS work we had to get done at Amazon. Her experience, knowledge, and great attitude makes her a great asset to any team. She is very helpful and friendly, and knows how to get the job done."

web developer on store.microsoft.com

Store is Microsoft's main online retail presence.
Contract web developer, editing and optimizing front end experiences incorporating dhtml for the site, store.microsoft.com
-Working with jQuery and other goodness.

consultant ui developer on corbisimages.com

Corbis was a creative resource providing photography, footage and rights services. Their business model relied heavily on the website. They have since been acquired by Getty.
Contract ui developer, building front end experiences for a brand new website incorporating dhtml for the flagship site, corbisimages.com
- working wth asp.net, .resx files, mootools and other goodness.
LinkedIn recommendations:

Chris Esler, my boss at Corbis: "Holly was a joy to work with. Her knowledge of CSS and web standards (in all browsers) was invaluable and she was able to solve some perplexing layout issues whenever we threw it her way. She was always willing to help out when needed and on more than one occassion went the extra mile. She also dived into some JavaScript and .NET and once again proved her abilities to adapt and learn to suit the needs of the project. Her work ethic was to do it right and do it right the first time. If I had the chance to pick my team again, I would definitely want to include Holly if she was available."

Robert Barnett "Holly writes some excellent style and markup. She can move any page control or any object in any browser. In the agile development environment Holly was always willing to help a team member, quick with a smile, a quip, and her typical British humor. It was my great pleasure to work with Holly and I would quickly recommend her to anyone who wants to build a quality product."

Sharvari S. "She is a good UI Developer. Especially very knowledgeable about CSS. Friendly person to work with. Learned a lot more about CSS from her. Moreover her approachable nature is admirable, I can think of getting her help any time."

Mike Zhang "Holly was the owner of css framework for the whole site, she did all the fundamental work and also the tricky part across the browsers. She was THE CSS LADY !!! Holly was also a great team player, always very responsive, very helpful for us and deliver on time. Hope I could work with Holly again."

Sunny Zhang"very strong in CSS and easy going and super fast worker! I love to work with her, if I need any help no matter how busy she is, she will jump in problem and resolve right the way :)"

web developer at Ascentium (now Smith)

Ascentium was an interactive marketing and technology consultancy.
Front end dev, working as part of a team building & maintaining site frontends for many organisations, including:
- www.experiencewa.com
- www.kcls.org
- Microsoft BI
- Microsoft Environment
- Expedia (members promotion)
- www.oldcastleinfrastructure.com
- www.vikingrivercruises.com
LinkedIn recommendations:

Sam Hughes, my boss at Ascentium: "Holly is one of the most self-directed and reliable webdevs at Ascentium. She is always pushing to improve her skills in the craft and those of her team mates. She's even started up a beginning coding class for the less experienced members of her team. Project managers and clients love her work."

Danny Campbell" I was assigned to be Holly's 'buddy' in Ascentium's program to orient new hires. We maintained a good rapport throughout Holly's tenure. Holly was fearless and would jump into anything head first, and she was not afraid of asking questions and reaching out for help. She is also very open-minded and ambitious and an avid seeker with a thirst for increasing her knowledge and skills. I enjoyed Holly's contributions and personality on both a personal and professional level."

Margery Spears "Holly is a dedicated team player who sees the big picture. She took the initiative to start a JavaScript class at Ascentium to bring together the developer community at a time when this "non-billable" activity was discouraged, thereby increasing the JavaScript knowledge pool at the company. In addition, she's easy to work with, smart, and has a keen sense of humor."

Rick Stoelinga "Instead of just implementing a solution, Holly does a great job of understanding the best practices behind the underlying technologies. Her bigger picture thinking aid in creating better long term, more extensible solutions."

consultant ui designer and developer at DocuSign

Designing the ui for upgraded cross-browser web-based application
- Organizing personas and other research data to determine the market
- Building pages utilizing xhtml, JavaScript and css
- Working within a source control system (Tortoise SVN) alongside Java developers
- Integrating css into pages alongside Yahoo ui library code & scriptaculous
- Operating an environment with shell scripts along with Cygwin running a Java environment
- Creating and sourcing graphics and icons for the project as necessary
- Consulting on seo for the web site
LinkedIn recommendations:

Nina Bohn "Holly is a FANTASTIC designer. She is ultra creative but also has a flair for designing an intuitive user interface. One thing that is unique and really stands out about Holly is that she will query her colleagues for input on design, then take that input and and using her expertise, actually incorporate it into whatever she happens to be working on at the time. The end product is a multi-dimensional, yet holistic effect, which adds depth to her work, and results in a user friendly and well thought out interface, or a website that actually has a 'flow' to it that people actually understand.
Holly has a great sense of humor and is a truly unique individual. I would be honored to work with her again and she is truly an 'eyecon' in her space as a UI designer and web developer."

Steve Flenniken "Holly is a rare individual who is both a designer and a programmer. She handles the hardest CSS, HTML and JavaScript problems and you end up with a beautiful website. She lights up the office with her personality and is a fun person to have around."

Julia Tolmacheva "Holly is a terrific person to work with: very professional, very knowledgeable and passionate about things she does, a great team player. She has great ability to work through tough situations, is open to new ideas, always ready to offer support to other members of the team."

web design consultant for Expression Web

Utilizing Expression Web and looking at effective use of technologies such as: css, Microformats, Microsummaries (now deprecated), Silverlight (now part of Windows UI, in WPF), xaml (ditto), Semantic html and others; as well as ways to improve the editor’s ease of use and functionality.
-Integration between Expression Web and the other products in the suite (Expression Design and Expression Blend).
-Design of team site and advising team members on demo site designs
-Researching web technologies to keep the product ahead of the game
-Advising manual authors
-Webcasting and consulting on web technologies as required
-Presenting Expression Web to other teams
-Presenting other Expression products to the team, and explaining their relationships.
-Reporting on Standards-compliant css page layouts, bearing in mind offerings by Zeldman, Meyers, et al.
-Ensuring that Expression Web incorporates seo techniques

LinkedIn recommendations:

Janet Fisher Holly is fun, witty, and driven.

Kirsten Grumet Holly is a very fun person to work with. She seemed always eager to learn more and take on new challenges. I really believe she would be a very powerful team member in your company.

consultant web ui designer at Farmers

-Transitioning existing style sheet
-Implementing bleeding-edge menu system utilizing css
-Sourcing & manipulating images for the site
-Designing pages and working with programmers to implement them in asp.net
-Liaising with marketing: focusing on consistency, corporate styles and customer usability
-Troubleshooting legal and technical issues in the site
-Conversion of pages from asp to asp.net.
Skills:
Visual Studio.NET, Visual InterDev, SourceSafe, css, xhtml, JavaScript, asp.net, asp, xml, ActiveX controls, Flash, Java objects. Photoshop CS2