Headshot of Jason Santa Maria.

Jason Santa Maria is a designer with over 20 years of experience leading multidisciplinary teams across product, editorial, marketing, and branding.

I care about craft, collaboration, and lifelong learning. I believe that good design can make complex things fun-sized and accessible to everyone. I live and work in Philadelphia under a pile of books.


I’m Senior Director of Product Design & Research at Netlify. I’m also co-founder Creative Director of A Book Apart, a boutique book publisher for people who design, write, and code with a library of over 50 titles and growing—including my own, On Web Typography, and industry-defining titles like Responsive Web Design and Just Enough Research.

Previously, I was Senior Product Designer for COVID-19 Response at Resolve to Save Lives where I worked alongside US health jurisdictions, epidemiologists, and the Africa CDC in tracking the spread of the pandemic and their response. Before that, I was Senior Design Director at InVision where I led the Marketing Design team, and Design Director at Slate where I led a company-wide brand and site overhaul. I’ve served as Vice President of AIGA/NY, Executive Design Director at Vox Media, and faculty at the MFA Interaction Design program at SVA.

I’ve spoken at dozens of conferences to thousands of people around the world, and worked for clients such as AIGA, The Chicago Tribune, Housing Works, PBS, The United Nations, and WordPress.

I love and geek out on books, pencils, horror movies, fonts, smart quotes, photography, and games — both video and tabletop. You can usually find me watching space launch videos on repeat with my kids.


Type Design

I’ve been experimenting in type design for the last few years and am sharing in-progress typefaces. They are pretty limited to start, drop me a note if you need anything specific.

Thumbnail of the typeface Chonk, depicting the letters ABCD

Chonk

A heavy display sans that likes to take up space.


My Book

Cover for On Web Typography by Jason Santa Maria.

On Web Typography

Typography is your design’s voice and the most powerful tool you have to communicate with your readers. Learn how to wield type with care and wit: how to evaluate typefaces, consider technical constraints, create flexible typographic systems, and put together your own collection of favorite faces.


Select Words

Talks

Interviews

Articles


Past Versions

I used to blog a lot and tried to push on notions of what design on the web could be with some early experiments in online art direction. I like to preserve these past versions to keep links alive and to track my own progress as a designer.

  • v5 2011–2022
  • v4 2008–2011
  • v3 2004–2008
  • v2 2003–2004
  • v1 2000–2002