Dan Cruzat

summary

Senior Front End Engineer with 20+ years building UI for indie shops and household names. Portland OR, remote-native. My best work happens when I own the front end, the user layer; close to the design, close to the code, a mentor to guide the way.

Currently building in React, Vue and WordPress, with Astro and Next regularly in the mix.

I am madly in love with CSS, which is evolving faster than ever.

skills & experience

I have worked in web design and development for over 20 years, building experiences for indie businesses to enterprise titans, ui layers for software companies, client sites and landing pages for agencies. Full service & full stack for WordPress, UI chops & CSS specialization for React / Vue teams.


languagesTS, JS, CSS, HTML, SCSS, PHP, ES6

regularsNode, Tailwind, Astro, React, Vue, WordPress, Next, Nuxt, Craft CMS, NVM, GIT, Valet, Local, Docker

standardsResponsive Development, Testing, Performance Optimization, A11y / WCAG, Tracking & Consent

teamworkDevOps, Team Development & Dynamics, PM, Code Reviews, Dev Leadership & Mentoring

recentlyShopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Handlebars (& Stencil), Notion, Jira, Trello

mileage inAngular, Pantheon, Statamic, Laravel, Webflow, Slim, Gatsby, Bootstrap, Asana, JQuery

formersActionScript (AS2/AS3), Grunt, Gulp, CoffeeScript, Underscore, Foundation

extrasQA Testing and Support, Sound Design & Editing

RIP Flash, my ActionScript lays useless . . .

agencies & organizations

Aquent, Babcock & Jenkins, BASIC, The Beauty Shop, Centric Park, ConnectiveDX, creative FEW, Daylight, DXM, Emerge Interactive, EOLA Amity Hills, EY Design Studio, Futura Collective, Greystar, Hanlon Brown, ILTS, Mindjet, MIT, Monumental, Opus Creative, The Other Agency, Periscope Creative, Procter & Gamble, Razorfish, Rose CDC, Shirtspace, StudioLabs, Vitamin T, Webtrends, Yum!

brands handled

Adidas, AT&T, Audi, Autodesk, Best Buy, BikePunk, Cascade Brewing, Coca Cola, Comcast, Corelight, Gildan, IBM, Icon Tires, Intel, KFC, LinkedIn, Marchex, MGM Studios, Microsoft, NATIVE, Nike, Pacvue, Pampers, PELICAN, Providence Healthcare, Qwest, Riot Games, Rose City Rollers, Sitepoint, Sock It To Me Socks, Sony, Sterling Communications, Tide, TrustEngine, The Union Wine Company, VTech

projects & positions

Dan Cruzat : Senior UI & CSS Consultant

Est 2006 : WordPress, React, Vue, Next, Nuxt, Tailwind, SCSS

  • Developing 'Ursula' WP + Tailwind starter theme
  • Leveraging AI to accelerate development cycles
  • Full-cycle maintenance, upgrades & automated testing
  • Auditing styles & performance for micro-optimizations

Procter & Gamble : Front End Developer

4/2025 - 8/2025 : BigCommerce, Shopify, Vue, React, WordPress

  • Technical mentorship for PHP & CSS standards
  • Enterprise analytics tagging via BigCommerce
  • WP feature development & core upgrades
  • React/Vue component architecture

The Beauty Shop : Senior WordPress Engineer

10/2024 - 8/2025 : WP, Woo, Gutenberg, SCSS, WPEngine, ACF

  • Retainer-based maintenance & feature scaling
  • Modernizing & refactoring inherited legacy code
  • CSS performance & asset optimization
  • Bespoke Gutenberg & Elementor block development

Centric Park : Senior Engineer / UX Strategist

1/2024 - 9/2024 : WordPress, React, Vue, Tailwind, WP VIP

  • Repo ownership, code reviews & mentorship
  • Block-based theme architecture
  • Cross-framework UI component development
  • Optimization for performance & accessibility

Unisyn Voting Systems : Senior Interactive Engineer

8/2023 - 4/2024 : React, Tailwind, SCSS, Git, NPM

  • CSS Lead; established enterprise style standards
  • Engineered UI layers for core product suite
  • Bridged UX requirements with software engineering
  • Triage & resolution of complex user flows

StudioLabs : Lead Developer / WP Specialist

11/2021 - 3/2022 : WordPress, SCSS, WP Engine, ACF

  • Standardizing legacy themes to house specs
  • Rapid feature prototyping & deployment
  • Patching critical issues in legacy environments
  • Cross-functional team & QA coordination

Daylight Studio : Senior Interactive Engineer

10/2021 - 8/2023 : WordPress, Craft, Tailwind, SCSS, Pantheon

  • End-to-end feature production & maintenance
  • Multi-instance management via Pantheon
  • Technical liaison for 3rd party agencies
  • DevOps support & team coordination

Emerge Interactive : Lead UI / Theme Developer

2/2021 - 8/2022 : WordPress, SCSS, Docker, ACF

  • Project lead, repo ownership & code reviews
  • Custom layout systems & responsive frameworks
  • UX reviews & design-to-code fidelity
  • Cross-browser testing & UI bugfixing

ShirtSpace : Senior Web Developer

1/2021 - 5/2021 : Slim, SCSS, ES6, Lighthouse

  • Core Web Vitals audit & speed optimization
  • Interactive enhancements via modern ES6
  • UX strategy & engagement optimization
  • Legacy browser support & bugfixing

BASIC : UI / Front End Developer

3/2020 - 9/2020 : Next, Gatsby, StorybookJS, SCSS

  • UI for YUM! Brands delivery application
  • Merch store development for Riot Games
  • Collaborative peer-reviewed development
  • Resolving complex CSS/UI regressions

creative FEW : Front End / Support Developer

8/2017 - 9/2020 : React, Angular, WordPress, PHP, Gulp

  • Shared repo development & code reviews
  • Full-stack WordPress theme development
  • React & Angular component architecture
  • QA support & CSS oversight

Industrial Commercial Electric : Lead Developer / UX Support

9/2018 - 3/2019 : WordPress, PHP, ACF, SCSS, Gulp

  • Custom responsive theme architecture
  • Employee portal with secure login logic
  • Custom internal reporting systems
  • QA & cross-browser validation

Modern Adventure : WordPress Specialist

5/2018 - 1/2019 : Trellis, SASS, PHP, CMB2

  • In-house developer pairing & support
  • Client portal & minisite templates
  • Editorial blog & magazine layouts
  • UI troubleshooting & bug resolution

+Citizen (now EY) : Front End / CSS Specialist

6/2015 - 6/2017 : AngularJS, SCSS

  • XFinity customer portal development
  • Interactive component architecture
  • CSS Lead: code reviews & approvals
  • UI problem solving & QA testing

ancient history & trivia

PDX since 06, Chicago expatriot :
lifelong Doctor Who fan :
sampler and strangler of sounds since 199? :
once pulled caper with Pete Wentz & Jody Minnoch :
once cussed out by Dan Aykroyd