I’m Adam.
Senior Product Designer based in Toronto, Canada, designing WordPress products since 2008.
Most days I’m shoulder-to-shoulder with PMs, engineers, and founders — turning rough ideas into something people actually enjoy using.
At Automattic, I work on products and experiences across the WordPress ecosystem.
Claude and Cursor are on the team too. I describe a screen; minutes later it’s a real pull request, not a static mock. I build the patterns and tooling so the whole team can move that way, not just me.
Public work: profiles.wordpress.org/adampickering · github.com/adampickering
How I work
Tools and tactics for shipping faster.
Claude Code & Cursor
I work in the codebase. Claude pairs with me on Vue, React, theme.json, and custom blocks.
Figma & design tokens
Figma is where the visual decisions live. Tokens flow into code so the system stays one system.
Storybook + MCP
Built a Storybook for AIOSEO that AI agents can read. Five HTTP endpoints, one fetch, the whole system.
WordPress block dev
theme.json, Gutenberg, custom blocks. Years of shipping production WordPress UI for plugins used on millions of sites.
Agent-readable brand
Voice, color, type, and patterns, structured so an AI agent can ingest them and stay on-brand without me reviewing every output.
Async writing
Daily docs over meetings. Decisions in writing so the team can move without me in the room.
A few stops along the way
Automattic
Senior Product Designer
2026 → NOW
Awesome Motive
Senior Product Designer
2025 → 2026
Rocketgenius
Senior Product Designer
2019 → 2025
Astoundify
Founder & Senior Product Designer
2012 → 2020
Mint Themes
Founder & Product Designer
2009 → 2013
HostPapa
Technical Support
2008 → 2011
How I got here
A quick story.
Originally from the UK, now in Canada. Games, then dial-up, AOL, Geocities — the hobby turned into a job.
In 2012 I co-founded Astoundify, building WordPress themes and plugins for thousands of independent makers.
Joined Rocketgenius in 2019 and spent nearly six years on Gravity Forms — design system, form builder, conditional logic, entries, notifications, settings. Led design on Gravity SMTP from scratch.
After that, I joined Awesome Motive, working on AIOSEO and building tooling around design and AI-assisted product development.
Now I’m at Automattic, continuing to work at the intersection of product design, WordPress, and design engineering.
They ship faster, I spend less time finishing Figma files.
Outside work: dad, weekend sourdough, easy mark for a new tool.
If you’re working on something in the WordPress, AI, or design-engineering space, I’d love to hear about it.