Meet Rob LaFeve
This story was originally posted on Cremalab.com on December 17, 2013
Who are you?
Rob LaFeve
Hometown?
Born in Hibbing, MN (Fun Fact: hometown of Bob Dylan)
Why did you move to Kansas City?
To attend Calvary Bible College
What did you study?
I studied multimedia and biblical studies. I dropped out after three semesters. But I did already have a multimedia degree from back home.
How did you become a part of Cremalab?
After leaving school, I got an internship at the American Royal Association and had a few standard print design jobs. Along the way, I met George. He and I talked about working together in some capacity and just stayed in touch. I kept working and somewhere along that timeline George started Cremalab and secured a large contract. This all happened at the same time I was looking for something new, so I joined Cremalab.
What do you do for Cremalab?
I initially started out being primarily focused on design comps, strictly as a designer. Over the years, through necessity, I started getting exposed to front end development by working alongside developers as well as being really interested in that particular skill. I started taking on more and more of the responsibility of front end design implementation (creating markup and styling). Now, the majority of my time is spent on code, and we have since brought on another designer which has allowed me to really focus on expanding and developing my skills as a developer, which I am really loving.
What’s your favorite thing about working at Cremalab?
First, I really enjoy the people I work with. There are tons of shops that provide similar services, but I think our culture and environment is pretty unique in that we are all friends. We have a culture that really fosters learning, and expanding upon and gaining new skills. My experience here is really a picture of that. I have always been encouraged and supported to take on new responsibilities and challenges. So I would say our environment and our team is why I look forward to coming to work in the morning; working alongside really amazing people and learning new things.
What drew you more towards development?
I had a desire to actually own more of the process of taking concepts that I was designing, seeing them come to life, and proving those concepts in the final medium [the browser]. Not only designing the aesthetic, which is fun in itself, but making it modular and anticipating what the design is going to do on each device it’s on. Sometimes it’s easier to experiment in the actual environment. Also, my desire for consistency and organization in styles, grids, and typography, is much easier to set up and maintain in code.
What three sites do you spend most of your time on?
- Stackoverflow.com
- Smashing Magazine
- Engadget.com
- Pitchfork.com
What tools do you use on a daily basis in your work?
Sublime, Sketch, Terminal, SASS, Stylus, Git, Github, Safari (not Chrome!), Jekyll, Haml, my iPhone and iPad to test.
If you didn’t do design or development, what would you like to do instead?
I used to do music pretty heavily so I would probably play more as my creative outlet. For a living, it sounds cliche, but there isn’t really anything else I’d rather be doing. I really enjoy what I do.
Favorite thing about Kansas City?
BBQ
Favorite BBQ place?
Oklahoma Joes
Least favorite thing about KC?
The Royals ;)
What place would you most want to visit?
I’d like to take the generic European tour and see some of those really old places.
Like what?
England…Germany would be interesting, and Rome. The whole thing, all of it. Actually, it would be really sweet to go see Mayan Ruins, I just watched a documentary on that. Oh, and Egypt. I guess I just want to go everywhere.
What is in your current music rotation?
I’m really enjoying Heavenly Beat and a lot of other musicians on the Captured Tracks label. Of course I’m an Rdio guy so I love to frequent the activity feed of people I’m following and see if there’s anything there that looks interesting. I’m usually scavenging stuff from Ross.
How long do you spend brushing your teeth?
Can’t say that I’ve actually timed it, but I feel like I have a pretty thorough brushing pattern that I go through. I try to floss as much as possible but I could probably be more consistent. But probably around two minutes. How long are you supposed to brush your teeth?
Current favorite restaurant? Item at it?
I’d have to say Blue Koi. Cue the team giving me crap about this, but every time my wife and I go we both get the exact same thing: Chicken with black bean sauce. Pretty much the best thing you can get.
How do you like your coffee?
Just black, as is. I prefer medium to light roast, and I am really not a french roast fan at all.
What’s the coolest thing you ever done?
I don’t know if this is cool or not, but my wife and I have two-year old twin boys. When they were born, it was an emergency c-section type thing and I was live-streaming the birth process out to the waiting room where my wife’s sister and parents were, watching it on their phones. I felt pretty cool. I think I was wielding an iPod touch and a video camera for the whole thing when I probably should have been holding her hand, but no one told me to stop.
What’s the last movie you watched?
Gravity. My wife and I didn’t really like it all that much. But currently, we are marching through X-files on Netflix.
What’s the last book you read?
I’m ashamed to admit how little I read, but the last book I read was Eloquent JavaScript. I didn’t finish it. Still working on it.
If it was your last day on earth, what would your last meal be?
Hmmm. I’m going to have to choose the chicken with black bean sauce from Blue Koi. It might be a toss up between that or a rack of ribs.
Have you ever written a song or poem about someone else?
Yeah! I used to write lots of music. My wife gives me crap about the fact that I haven’t written a song about her. But, my reasoning is that a lot of the fuel for the songs I used to write was the typical relational turmoil and breakups. I naturally wanted to write music in the vein of my heroes, Radiohead, so of course it had to be dark :)
Which way does the toilet paper fall?
It depends whether you have small children in the house. I have four kids that are under 5 yrs old, which is kind of crazy. Before children, I would say over…always. But since I’ve had kids I’ve become more pragmatic about this and putting it under prevents them, in most cases, from unrolling the entire thing. But my preference is over.
What or who, are you a closet fan of?
My personality just doesn’t lend myself to being closet anything. I’m pretty vocal about what I do and don’t like.
Do you have any strange phobias?
I don’t know if this is a phobia, but I am really, really adverse to the feeling of stickiness. Which again is something I’ve had to get over with having kids. It’s not something I’ve gotten over, but something in which I’ve been made aware. I have an illogical fear over certain insects which my wife loves to tease me about. Cilantro is also a phobia. Cilantrophobia.
Soapbox?
Put your crap in the dishwasher.
If you could have any super power, what would it be? Why?
My son Jude has made me really think about this a lot lately…he’s really into any super heroes. I think the ability to travel at the speed of light would be really nice in order to get to places quickly. Actually, teleportation. The speed of light is too slow.
Three things on your life bucket list?
- I’d like to go on a tropical vacation with my wife. Once without my kids, and then again with them.
- You know what, I don’t really have a bucket list. I’m pretty much just a day-to-day guy.
- Oh, and the Grand Canyon.
- Also, given the opportunity to travel in space, I wouldn’t do it.
