About me

Hey 👋 I’m Steve Farquharson, a passionate and empathetic UX/UI, Product and Visual designer based near London with over 15 years experience and a solid reputation working within ecommerce, retail and automotive industries across many websites and mobile apps.

Knowing that customer experiences are a sum of all parts, I love delving into end-to-end journeys to gain a complete understanding of the role of each touchpoint and through customer research, identify pain-points and areas of meaningful improvement.

My aim is always to achieve user-friendly, easy, consistent and joined-up experiences that benefit the user in order to generate improved revenue for businesses.

I find it most rewarding and productive working within Agile teams where designers, engineers and product work closely and collaboratively throughout.

Personal details

Email

steve.farquharson@outlook.com

Date of birth

24 January 1985

Nationality

British

Mobile

07960 184890

Address

2 Tarragon Way
Godalming
Surrey
GU7 1UY

Experience

Working as an integral design resource across multiple squads within BCA’s B2B web and app products. Responsible for the entire product design process, from discovering and defining user problems, understanding customer needs, Ideating and testing possible solutions and prototypes to designing the final pixel perfect UI. Always striving to benefit users whilst also successfully blending with business goals.

I was fortunate to have the opportunity to lead the complete redesign of their flagship and business critical product - BCA Live online auctions.

I also created the new BCA Design System and I’m responsible for designing and maintaining UI Components, templates and documentation for use across multiple products in multiple regions across Europe.

Senior Product Designer - Permanent

Oct 2019 - Present | BCA / British Car Auctions Ltd

Senior UX/UI Designer - Contract

Jun 2018 - Apr 2019 | Currys

An intensive but very rewarding time spent working as an integral member of a small group of experts, assembled to answer some critical customer experience questions for Currys.

Through Google Venture Design Sprints we rapidly prototyped and tested ideas directly with customers every two weeks without needing to develop a working product.

  • Mapped out existing end-to-end customer experiences to identify pain points

  • Played a key role in ideating possible solutions

  • Designed all assets and prototypes for customer testing

  • Showcased our proposed end-to end customer experience improvements through a series of UX prototypes and storyboards

Dec 2017 - Jun 2018 | My Knowhow / Dixons Carphone

Senior UX/UI Designer - Contract

Worked within an Agile Product Team, leading UI/UX Design for the Dixons Carphone cross-brand membership club - My Knowhow.

  • Implemented a mobile-first strategy throughout wireframing and the creation of the final UI visuals and CRM email templates

  • Worked closely with Brand & Marketing to feed into and translate the wider brand guidelines and to create our digital principles, style guide and Sketch UI library

  • Worked closely with our front and backend developers to ensure that every little detail and interaction was as close to our designs and animations as possible

  • Led the presentation of UX/UI at each sprint review and during business/key stakeholder demos

Dec 2016 - Dec 2017 | Team Knowhow / Dixons Carphone

Senior UX/UI Designer - Contract

Led UI/UX Design throughout the rebrand of the Geek Squad (Carphone Warehouse) and Knowhow (Currys PC World) services, now all under the same umbrella - Team Knowhow.

  • Worked closely with Brand & Marketing to translate and establish the Team Knowhow online look & feel

  • Created the Team Knowhow online style guide and UI library for the team to use

  • Led the creation of all wireframes and also the final responsive UI components and templates and layouts

  • Worked closely with their development partner Accenture throughout the project, onshore and offshore to ensure we would receive the highest build quality possible

  • Led the presentation of the UX/UI to the business and key stakeholders

  • Created hundreds of production assets and created the foundations of their asset library in Adobe AEM

Apr 2016 - Aug 2016 | Apex Mobiletech

Senior UX/UI Designer - Freelance

I was approached to completely redesign Apex Mobiletech’s Windows-based Estate Agent Property Management app - Connexus.

  • Created and established their brand identity

  • Created the Connexus UI library and all UI visuals for their numerous journeys

  • Completely reworked the taxonomy and navigation, simplifying the entire user experience

Sep 2012 - Mar 2016 | Carphone Warehouse

Web Design Manager - Permanent

In 2012 I was promoted to manage the entire Web Design team. Responsible for delivering all visual assets and UI design for their websites as well as other digital channels such as social media and digital marketing. I managed a team of three other permanent members of staff as well as contract resource. During the last couple of years I also co-led the complete redesign of the Carphone Warehouse website.

  • Implemented smarter ways of working - such as introducing Trello for managing design briefs/requests, completely changing the way the department worked

  • Successfully led design for all key product launches (iPhone, iPad and Samsung Galaxy)

  • Made numerous iterative improvements and significant redesigns across all journeys - e.g. Purchase journeys, Seasonal Sales, Real-time upgrade eligibility checker and Trade-in

  • Co-led UI Design during the complete redesign of the Carphone Warehouse responsive website. Playing a significant role in shaping their new brand online - from designing and presenting the winning design concept to the fleshing out and creation of their final UI Library, key user journeys, page components/templates and final production assets

May 2009 - Sep 2012 | Carphone Warehouse

I managed UI design within the Development team at Carphone Warehouse. I worked closely with our in-house and offshore development resources to improve every aspect of the user experience across their desktop and mobile websites.

Key projects included

  • Product and tariff search with advanced facet filtering

  • Engaging product detail pages with more customer-focussed content

  • Carphone Warehouse’s Mobile Memories Facebook app

  • Simplified checkout experience

UI Design Manager - Permanent

Skills & Apps

  • Lo-Fi & Hi-Fi ideation

  • Pixel Perfect UI

  • DS Component design

  • Prototyping

  • Interaction design & motion

  • Handover spec documentation

  • Branding & style guides

  • User journey mapping & storyboards

  • Vector & pixel artwork

  • Presentation assets

I’m always on the lookout for new apps and ways of working.

Education

University of Kent

Academic Qualification

BSc with First Class Honours in Multimedia Technology & Design.

Rickmansworth School

Exam Results

A Levels

Computing
Photography
Art

A
A
B

AS Levels

Geography

B

GCSEs

Ten GCSEs, including English Literature & Language, Science (Double Award), Mathematics and Business Studies.

Design

Interests

To me design isn’t just a job, or even just an interest - I’ve begun to truly realise it’s part of who I am and how I view the world.

My wife jokingly says I have OCD but to me it’s that attention to detail and the carefully considered balance of both form and function that makes me a designer. When broken down, design is basically problem solving and I love solving puzzles!

Recently I completely redesigned our garden. Working around the limitations of some very uneven land and an existing brick wall. I maximised the use of every section whilst also creating something visually stunning day and night.

Day
Night
Before

My life-long dream is to one day be able to completely design our house from the ground up. It is after all the ultimate personal user experience!

Technology

For as long as I can remember I’ve had a deep-rooted interest in technology. Not just for any gadget or gizmo boasting many bells and whistles but for deeply considered, expertly designed, innovative products that are built 100% for the user - the perfect blend of both great hardware and software.

Expectations are so high now the world is used to such refined experiences through our smartphones and favourite apps, I can’t wait to see how this will continue to influence the wider world of technology to come.

Photography

I’ve always enjoyed photography - it was one of my favourite subjects at school. The blend of science and art is fascinating!

Nowadays, I’m ashamed to admit it but I take more photos with my phone than my DSLR. They have truly come a long way but never quite reach the sense of accomplishment you get when successfully capturing a photo the way you intended to manually.

I recently invested in a drone, which nicely merges my love of technology and photography together. It’s fantastic to have the ability to take photos from above and angles you just wouldn’t normally be able to reach.

Cookery

Over the years I’ve grown to really enjoy preparing and cooking food. I love learning different cooking techniques - particularly barbecuing and more recently Neapolitan pizzas from scratch and baked in a pizza oven (a cliché lockdown purchase!). It’s really rewarding to eat something that you have spent time practicing and perfecting.

Craft Beer

I was never really a beer drinker growing up but now with the huge choice of expertly crafted brews and the wide variety of flavours I have become smitten by the passion and craft these new-age breweries have brought.

I enjoy visiting breweries to really get a taste of their passion… Oh and a few of their beers too! I’ve also begun dabbling in making my own pale ales.