I’m a staff engineer who loves turning business goals into calm, clear WordPress systems. I start with the why, then shape readable architecture, steady processes and DevEx that help teams work with more confidence and less friction.
Most of my work sits in that awkward middle layer where requirements are fuzzy, legacy code is doing its best, and people still need to ship things without setting off every alarm in the building. I enjoy taking that mess, untangling it, and creating systems that feel predictable instead of precarious.
What I do
These days, I split my time between architecture, DevEx, and the kind of engineering work that makes teams collectively sigh with relief.
That usually means:
- Understanding the business problem before touching the solution
- Shaping plans that reduce ambiguity and make tradeoffs visible
- Designing architectures that don’t crumble when you look at them sideways
- Building tooling and workflows that help engineers move faster
- Pairing with people to tackle tricky, ambiguous problems
- Smoothing the day-to-day experience so teams feel calmer
Earlier in my career, I spent time as an engineering manager. That gave me a healthy respect for communication, alignment, and the very real difference between “the right solution” and “the solution this team can ship safely right now.”
How I think about engineering
I have spent most of my career working on WordPress at scale. Multisites. Legacy codebases that need to evolve. Editorial teams with sharp workflows. My focus is on the foundations that let those systems change safely.
I am interested in how AI fits into that work in a real, practical way, not as a toy, but as a teammate that handles the repetitive glue while humans shape the architecture and constraints.
Some principles I try to work by
- Clarity beats cleverness. If I cannot explain it, we should not ship it.
- Structure reduces ambiguity. Typed inputs and outputs make AI and humans both more reliable.
- Developer experience multiplies output. Friction is a tax on every project.
- Calm systems win. Good architecture makes change boring instead of risky.
- AI works best with guardrails. Use it where patterns are clear, and feedback loops are tight.
Things I have built or maintained
A few of the tools and libraries I have worked on over the years. Some started as client needs. Most exist to make engineers lives a little easier.
- Safe SVG – A WordPress plugin that lets you safely upload SVG files to the media library by sanitising inline SVG content. View on wordpress.org →
- SVG sanitiser library – A PHP library that strips unsafe elements and attributes from SVGs so that teams can rely on vector assets without worrying about security surprises. View on GitHub →
- wp-scaffold – A starting point for modern WordPress projects, with structure, tooling, and patterns that aim to reduce friction for teams working across multiple codebases. View on GitHub →
- DevEx and CLI tooling experiments – Internal tools for commands, scaffolding, and AI assisted code generation that try to bake good defaults into the everyday developer workflow.
Speaking and writing
I like sharing what I learn, especially around migrations, AI-assisted workflows, and developer experience. I have spoken at events like WordCamp London, and I write on this site whenever I feel like I have something genuinely useful to share.
I prefer writing things that help people think, not just implement.
Outside of work
I’m based in Cornwall with my family.
When I’m not working, I’m usually being climbed on by my daughters, recovering from BJJ, planning overly ambitious side projects, or drinking coffee I’ve convinced myself is “research.”