Camella Lobo & Alex Stapleton - Heat Waves

Camella Lobo is the Director of Content Design at LA-based digital agency, Heat Waves, where inclusion, innovation and empathy are at the core of its business. Camella is a thought leader in the digital space with 15+ years experience in defining and executing best-in-class, highly scalable content experiences. She is passionate about advocating for users and has played a central role in developing Heat Waves accessibility practice since joining in 2021.

Prior to Heat Waves, Camella spent a number of years leading the Content Design team at Disney Parks & Resorts, which ignited her passion for digital accessibility. If there is one thing she’s learned in her career, it’s that some of the world’s largest organizations consider digital accessibility a complex challenge. It became her focus to not only demystify accessibility in order to evolve her own work, but also help other technologists, creatives and companies do the same.

Camella’s accessibility journey is also a personal one as the mother of an autistic child with a rare genetic disability called Rett Syndrome. Her daughter, Lourdes, continues to motivate her to better understand and advocate for improving accessibility both in the online and offline world.

Alex Stapleton is an industry-leading creative strategist who specializes in innovation and product design. Over the past 10 years, she has created experiences for Nike, Apple, Hulu, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Beats by Dre.

Her background in anthropology, specifically interdisciplinary archaeology, along with her neurodivergence has shaped her worldview and approach to the work she produces. Her disability has both been a strength and struggle in her career. In sharing her experience, she hopes to help destigmatize mental health and neurodiversity, while shifting environments and systems to be more empathetic and accommodating for everyone.

She is currently the Design Director at Heat Waves and is evolving research practices to incorporate inclusivity from the earliest stages of the design process.