William Thames Blacklock
Projects
Featured Case Studies
What I Do
Design
Designing products, campaigns, and visual systems
I help teams shape clear product experiences and brand systems that translate strategy into work people can understand, use, and remember.
- Product design
- UX and interface design
- Campaign and marketing design
- Art direction
- Design systems
- Print and collateral
Build
Building fast, useful, launch-ready experiences
From AI-assisted prototypes to production-ready websites, I work quickly to test ideas, tighten direction, and ship with confidence.
- AI-assisted websites
- Landing pages and product launches
- Rapid website builds
- Interactive experiences
- Digital campaigns
- Creative web projects
Systems
Creating systems that scale creative work
I design repeatable workflows, operating structures, and creative frameworks that help teams move faster without losing quality.
- Design thinking
- Creative workflows
- AI-supported creative pipelines
- Content and campaign frameworks
- Design operations
- Automation and tooling
My experience
Work experience spanning 15+ years of creativity, imagination, and passion.
Clients I've worked with
A decade building brand identities for global tech leaders and influential local businesses.
Awards & recognition
Creative leadership that directly drove agency-wide recognition and growth.
IBM
Design Team MVP Award
2020
W3 Awards
2-time Award Winner
2006, 2009
ADDY Awards
2-time Award Recipient
2006, 2007
PRINT Magazine
Regional Design Showcase
2006
I’m a designer, creative operator, and absolute systems nerd based in the heart of Austin, Texas.
For over 15 years, I’ve been building at the intersection of high-level strategy and deep-focus execution. If you’re looking for a designer who just wants to make “pretty brand guidelines” to sit on a shelf, I’m probably not your guy.
I’m a user-first designer who believes that empathy is the only real shortcut to quality. I don’t just design for screens; I design for the person on the other side of them.
Design is Only as Good as the Sales it Drives
Out here in Texas, we don’t much care for fluff. I’ve built my career on a simple, stubborn conviction: If design doesn’t drive sales, it isn’t doing its job. But “driving sales” isn’t about tricking people; it’s about a deep, empathetic understanding of what a user actually needs.
Whether I’m lead-managing a global innovation framework for IBM Garage or crafting an annual report for Mainspring Schools, I start by getting into the head of the human using the product.
I’ve spent a decade and a half dual-wielding my skillsets. On one hand, I’m a Right-Brained creator—passionate about UI/UX, visual storytelling, and high-end art direction. On the other, I’m a Left-Brained analytical operator. I’m a Certified Scrum Master who lives for Agile roadmaps, KPI tracking, and conversion metrics. I want the work to look incredible, but I want the NPS score and the business value to look even better.
Pushing the Limits with AI
I’ve always been an explorer, and right now, the frontier is AI. I don’t just use AI; I experiment with it to see where it breaks. I’m obsessed with pushing the limits of prompt engineering and content automation to shorten the distance between a wild idea and a live, high-performing product.
For a project like Beast Putty, I used generative AI to catapult a campaign from zero to 34,000 views in 21 days. I’m constantly looking for ways to blend old-school craft with new-school tech to help teams move at “startup speed” without losing the human touch.
The Soul of a Maker (and a Huge Otaku)
When I’m not in a Figma file or a JIRA backlog, I am likely deep in a rabbit hole of anime. I’m a massive fan—so much so that I’ve got a podcast dedicated to it. That same passion I have for world-building, character arcs, and the “why” behind a story is exactly what I bring to my design work.
I think the best products are like the best anime: they have heart, they have purpose, and they make you feel something.
As the great Dieter Rams said:
“Good design is as little design as possible.”
Dieter Rams
I live by that. I want to strip away the noise and get to the core of the problem. No ego, no agency fluff—just quality work that solves real problems for real people.
Life in the Hill Country
When the screens finally go dark, you’ll find me soaking up the Texas sun. I love hiking the Hill Country, slow-cooking a meal for the family, or heading out for some saltwater fishing (because freshwater fish just don’t have that same grit). If I’m not near the coast, I’m probably on a tennis court or recording the next episode of the pod.