Lead UX Designer & Developer
Dave Rees
I’m Dave Rees, a Bristol-based Lead User Experience Designer and Front-end Developer with over 20 years of experience delivering work in creative agencies. I specialise in designing and building accessible, user-centred solutions, with a strong focus on simplifying complex systems.
Clients
Experience
Insight Gathering
I help clients uncover visitor insights by combining qualitative research (surveys, interviews, workshops) with quantitative behavioural data from platforms like Hotjar, VWO, Microsoft Clarity and Google Analytics. Competitive analysis, both in-sector and out-of-sector, helps me to establish clear benchmarks for features, functionality and the user experience.
Through collaborative workshops, run in person or remotely, I support client teams in aligning their goals and aspirations for the platform. Structured ideation techniques such as prioritisation ranking and the MoSCoW method are used to resolve conflicting requirements and define a clear roadmap for future growth.
Post-research, I collate and analyse insights to identify patterns, gaps, and core requirements for the project. I present the research results to clients and workshop participants, helping to ensure all parties are fully engaged and are aligned on project direction.
UX Design & Architecture
Using visitor and business insights, I create personas that define key goals, frustrations, and behaviours. Visitor journeys are created which map the steps the user needs to take and the tasks they need to perform to complete their goals. The mapping exercise highlights patterns in content structure and informs the creation of an information architecture that scaffolds the structure of the new platform.
I specialise in the design of responsive UX wireframes for mobile, tablet and desktop - focusing on usability, information clarity, and accessibility. Interactive prototypes, whether in Figma, Sketch or HTML, help to validate ideas early with clients and users, allowing them to be iterative tested and improved.
My UX process culminates the creation of a detailed UX Specification which formalises personas, visitor journeys, information architectures, accessibility requirements, and the intended experience of every template and feature. The UX specification is a living document that provides a single source of truth for the design, development and client teams for the lifetime of the platform.
Front End Development
From early table-based websites to modern component-based frameworks, I’ve evolved alongside the web. Specialising in developing Craft CMS, Vue.js, Nuxt, and 11ty platforms, using modern build tools like Gulp, ES6 JavaScript, and LESS to deliver fast, accessible experiences.
Whether it’s a complex CMS-driven platform or a bespoke campaign site, I focus on delivering robust, performant solutions that aim to exceed project goals.
Business Development
Beyond UX and Development, I regularly contribute to business development - writing proposals, scoping projects, pitching for new business, and presenting to clients.
Working with cross-discipline teams, I bridge creative, technical and strategic perspectives - translating complex technical concepts into clear, user-centric plans for clients and colleagues.
Career History
MRM
Lead UX Designer & Developer November 2025 - Present
As part of a company restructure, my team was transfered from McCann to MRM. Roles, responsibilities and clients were retained, while providing the opportunity to work with a wider range of clients in the future.
McCANN
Lead UX Designer & Developer July 2006 - November 2025
I joined McCann in 2006 as a founding member of the UX & Development team. Initially the sole Interface Developer, responsible for all front-end development. As the team grew, my role evolved to leading the interface development team and taking responsibility for the overall user experience and platform strategy.
Carlson Marketing
Developer August 2004 - July 2006
Carlson Marketing was my first foray into the world of marketing. I joined as a Junior Developer was immediately put to work on upgrading existing websites from table-based layouts to standards compliant CSS. As I grew into a mid-weight developer, I took ownership of the interface development for the Goodyear, Dunlop and Crown Paints clients.
Personal Projects
Formula One Pitwall
I've been watching Formula 1 for most of life. There's something in the technical nerdery and team work that goes into getting each car onto track week after week, only for the results to rest on the talents of the driver.
With 24 races per year, across mutliple timezones, I was finding it hard to keep track of all the races. So I built a race calendar to track each weekend, session and their results.
It also gave me the opportunity to play with some different tools. I built the Pitwall on NUXT with Sizzle ORM to store all the data collected over the course of the season.
A full write up of the Pitwall will becoming soon, but I've recently migrated from Prisma ORM to Drizzle ORM due to Prismas diminishing support of NUXT, and have started to lean on the Open F1 project as a source of some of the data - predominately session tyre data. The roadmap for future improvements includes weather data for each race session and 3D track layouts, to highlight elevation changes.
