Panelists: 

Elvira Barriga

Elvira (Elle) is Creative Director & Visual Experience Design Director at Local Projects. She is most passionate about shaping creative processes and mentoring talent while looking for powerful concepts that enrich our environments with meaning, beauty and surprise. Elle has worked internationally with prominent museums and galleries, cultural and governmental institutions, universities, publishers, architects and global brands. She was a Creative Director at Imprint Projects NYC and the Creative Director for the Brands and Environments team at Bruce Mau Design in Toronto. Prior to moving to North America, she was a partner at the internationally-recognized graphic design studio Blotto Design in Berlin and a freelance Art Director for Meiré und Meiré.

Reena Merchant

Prior to her current role as Sr UX Manager at Sony PlayStation, Reena was Sr Customer Experience Manager at Citrix, leading design of the flagship product, GoToMeeting. Previously Reena was UX Manager at Rogers and managed a design team at BlackBerry, spearheading the design of mobile, tablet, desktop and internet applications. Reena is an advisory board member for the Master of Human Computer Interaction and Design (MHCID) program at the University of California, Irvine. She has conducted design research and teaching projects for OCAD University, University of Toronto, and California College of the Arts.

Jae Park

Jae is Executive Creative Director for Devices and Services Design Group at Amazon. His team is responsible for Fire TV, Tablets and Alexa devices. Before joining Amazon he worked as principal designer on Windows Phone and helped usher in Metro design at Microsoft. Jae majored in Industrial Design from RISD.

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