About David

David Sleight sitting on a couch facing the viewer

I’m a veteran design director specializing in user experience, platform architecture, and editorial design

I work at ProPublica, a non-profit investigative newsroom, where I lead a design practice that supports and extends our award-winning journalism.

I have directed projects recognized by the Pulitzer Prizes, the Online News Association, the Society for News Design, PDN, the Society of Illustrators, AI-AP, and have served as a judge for both American Illustration and American Photography. I’ve also been a Pulitzer finalist and the recipient of a Communication Award from the National Academies, as well as cited in several industry books, including Designing the Editorial Experience by Sue Apfelbaum and Juliette Cezzar, and Art Direction for the Web by Andy Clarke.

Previously, I was an independent consultant working with the likes of Birchbox, Nomad Editions, Novartis, Signpost, Thomson Reuters, and Qualcomm. Before that, I led the interactive design team at BusinessWeek, and helped build some of the first web-based textbooks at Pearson Education. I’ve also been a staff columnist for A List Apart magazine and a member of Readability’s board of advisors.

Oh, and it’s pronounced “slate.”

Here and Thereabouts

Highlights from other writing, appearances, and recognitions.

Colophon

This site is built with Jekyll. Body text is set in Signifier and Founders Grotesk by Klim Type Foundry, and the Stuntbox wordmark is set in Deming EP by Mike Fortress. Icons are sourced from the Ionicons library. And yes, unless otherwise noted, I really did shoot all the photographs you see on this site. If you’d like to use one for something, drop me a line. No stealing, please. Life’s better when we all play fair.