Ember User Stories: Trevor Dobbyn

We built Ember for all types of creative professionals, no matter which industry they work in. This week, I’m really excited to share an interview with Trevor Dobbyn, a professional architect who set up his own firm last year.

Hi Trevor —Can you please tell us more about who you are and what you do?

My name is Trevor Dobbyn and I’m an architect based in Dublin, Ireland. I have been a professional registered architect for over 15 years. Having spent several years working for other offices, I set up my own company in 2013: Fabrica Architects Limited (and I’ve built the website with RapidWeaver.) Ever since, I’ve been enjoying the highs and lows of being self-employed!

As the owner and director of Fabrica Architects, my main focus is to provide professional architectural services for clients in Ireland; I specialise in bespoke residential design, energy & thermal performance of buildings, and design details. 
I have also become involved in web design through my experience with RapidWeaver.

It is really wonderful to see and learn from such a great community of designers and developers who work and supply themes and addons for RapidWeaver. It was through this that I came across Ember and Clear.

Given that you’re an architect, I’m guessing you must be looking for inspiration constantly. Do you look at sources outside of your field of expertise?

In general, my main inspiration comes from other architects or projects I’ve seen. I do however like to break this down into certain areas, for example: particular light fittings, materials, furniture, etc. I also tend to follow a few graphic design and web design blogs as well, to look for inspiration outside of my primary domain of expertise.

What type of images do you have in your library? Tell us about the collections that you are using…

I have a lot of snaps related to architecture: buildings, fittings, landscapes, and generally, things that inspire me or help explain a design. I also like to gather visual resources from the RapidWeaver community & from online tutorials as I learn more about web development. Finally, I have also set up collections revolving around beautiful examples of websites, graphic design, and general inspiration or mock-ups for clients.

What does a typical day look like? How does Ember fit in your daily workflow?


I usually leave Ember running in the background, on my Mac: I’m still getting used to snapping screenshots & websites! If I’m at a particular stage of a project I might collect images and annotate them to discuss it with clients. I also use Ember to annotate previous projects and help clients understand the design I am presenting to them.

What are your favourite features in Ember?


My favourite feature is the iCloud sync across multiple devices: the iPad is great for browsing on the couch with a glass of wine and the images are accessible on my desktop or phone. If I’m in the office or out and about the next day, I know that my library is always available with me. And both the Mac and iOS versions are really well made and simple to use!

Thanks to Trevor for sharing this with us. To learn more about him, follow him on Twitter, or check out his work on his website. Stay tuned for more Ember User Stories and in the meantime, read our previous posts here!