From Power Tools to Prototypes – Starting My Design & Dev Journey

I didn’t start in design. I didn’t come from tech. I came from muddy boots, switchboards, and early mornings on site.

I’ve worked in construction most of my life—electrician by trade—which meant problem-solving was part of my DNA. Fault find, fix, repeat. But when I started chasing ideas for my own startups, I quickly realised I had a different kind of wiring to figure out.

I’ve made every mistake in the book. Got over-excited about ideas. Got burned by agencies who overpromised and underdelivered. Pitched half-baked MVPs I was embarrassed by. It all led to the same realisation: if I wanted to build something that actually reflected my vision—I’d have to learn how to do it myself.

So I did.

Bit by bit, I started learning how to take my ideas from a scribble on a page to a working prototype. From there, I dove into UI/UX design, no-code tools, and eventually proper development with frameworks like Next.js. Every project has taught me something new, but Conlink—my first real tech idea—is what really sparked the journey. It started as an idea to solve a pain point I’d seen on site, and slowly evolved into something I could actually start to build.

I’m completely self-taught. The school of hard knocks. YouTube. Discord. Way too many browser tabs. But there’s something powerful about realising you can take an idea in your head and bring it to life on a screen.

Am I a pro? Not yet. I’m still finding my feet, and still learning to back myself. But I know now that I can do this. And I genuinely love the process. It scratches the same itch as solving a wiring fault—except now, I’m wiring together ideas, interfaces, and user flows instead of switchboards.

If you’re in a similar spot—stuck between a good idea and not knowing how to build it—just start. Learn by doing. Break things. Build again. It's messy, but it’s worth it.