With great delight, we will be having the amazing Marcy Sutton as our September speaker. Tickets are available August 31 and the event will be held at Galvanize in Pioneer Square.

Marcy is an Accessibility Engineer at Adobe and an AngularJS core team member. Her background in photojournalism, art and web design combined with a passion for web accessibility helped her to become a persuasive storyteller and public speaker at conferences all across the world.

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How do you define creativity and apply it in your career?
Creativity is original thought and problem solving. In my work as an accessibility engineer, creativity and user-centered design play a huge part. Design in this practice goes beyond the visual to also include semantics and multi-modal interaction. I’ll ask questions like, “what would a delightful screen reader experience sound like?” Or, “can we tweak this approach slightly to be more feasible in the time we have?” When creativity is really flowing, the answers to those questions will inform other things I’m working on, such as blog posts or conference talks. When I can see patterns and connect the dots in different areas of my life, I feel the most creative.

Where do you find your best creative inspiration?
I find the most inspiration when I travel to new places. In transit, I put my headphones on (a.k.a. my comfort blanket) and listen to music, naturally feeling inspired to catch up on projects. On a perfect day, I’d head to a place where I could bike to a modern art museum and scout out street art along the way. These moments help me stay fulfilled for months at a time.

What’s the one creative advice or tip you wish you’d known as a young person?
Don’t be so hard on yourself if your skills don’t fit neatly into a box, especially as a developer with a creative side or a designer with a technical side. Do work you’re passionate about and your talents & strengths will emerge.

Who would you like to hear speak at CreativeMornings?
I would love to hear from Matt May, my colleague from Adobe. His background as an accessibility evangelist paired with his sermons for the Buddhist church could make for something really interesting.

What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done?
Recently, I was asked to emcee one day of Cascadia Fest, a web community conference at Semiahmoo Resort north of Bellingham. When I arrived the night before, someone suggested I do costume changes. I happened to be staying with a friend with a basement full of costumes, and my destiny was written. I introduced 11 speakers, including Q&A and announcements, with 9 costume changes including a Canadian Mountie, Mexican wrestler, Batman onesie, pirate, and full-sized bear. If I had any shred of fear of public speaking before that, it’s surely gone now. The most rewarding part for my self-humiliation was hearing comments like, “costume changes make me happy” and “this was my first conference; you made it very special.” These are the things that will make me smile when I’m old and grey.

Where is your favorite place to escape?
I escape into nature any chance I get, no matter the season. Living in Washington, we are truly fortunate to have such beautiful trails in our backyard. As my work and public speaking career have continued to blossom, I have to build time into my schedule to unplug and turn off all the notifications and distractions. The wilderness is my favorite place to do that.