A.01
The way I see it
I read a brand the way its market will — the whole system at once, before a single pixel is placed.
Santana Thrasybule
Design | Creative Leader
25+Years of senior & art-direction work
100’sClients across a plethora of industries
$5M+In brand & campaign value delivered
A quarter-century of senior design and art direction, hundreds of clients across a wide range of industries including studio and tech — making brands look like they’ve already arrived.
Now · Jul ’26
Building
WELLS feature film
In development
Reading
The Story Brand
Donald Miller
Studying
AI Tools & After Effects
Sharpening the toolkit
Last shipped
KeepUsPostd iOS & Android
Live in both app stores
01Background & Working Style
A design leader
who thinks in systems
→ Disciplines
Brand SystemsCreative DirectionUX / UIPackagingMotion & VideoWeb DesignBrand StrategyFigmaAdobe CS
Every color, every corner radius, every line of copy is a promise. Keep those promises and a brand earns trust before it says a word — break them and no budget buys the credibility back.
I build the brands people trust and the products they touch — identity systems, the interfaces and packaging in front of them, and the campaigns that introduce them. I care about the pixel a customer sees and the system underneath that keeps every touchpoint consistent.
Twenty-five years of senior design and art direction — today as a Senior Designer at CDK Global, the Fortune-500 automotive-retail technology company, holding brand and product work to an enterprise standard. I also build and ship my own ventures — writing and producing for feature films and TV shows, and a creator platform.
I do my best work owning the messy middle: run the audit, shape the system, push the guidelines through, and still sweat the details people notice. These days that also means the AI tools I use every day — I design and vibe-code alongside Claude Code, then hold its output to the same standard I’d expect from anything shipped to production. (This site is one of those builds.)
Santana Thrasybule Design | Creative Leader
Through the years
- ’00 Freelance Client Design
- ’12 Corporate Design
- ’20 KeepUsPostd founded
- ’24 Multi-brand studio & consulting
- ’26 Open to select engagements
02How I Think & Build
Selected work in
vision and craft
Two ways of seeing the same work — the whole system at a glance, and the details most people never notice. Hover to look closer.
A.02
Down to the detail
Then the focus narrows — to the corner radius, the kerning, the details people feel before they can name them.
03Experience
Twenty-five+ years
raising the standard
ContentsTwo roles · one throughline
I.
Senior DesignerEnterprise standard
CDK Global · Brand & Product
2021 — Present
II.
Founder / Lead DesignerStartup → enterprise
Independent design & brand consulting
Est. 2000
CDK Global is a leading automotive-retail technology company — the dealer-management software and connected systems that run car dealerships and link them with the automakers behind them. As a senior designer there, I hold brand and product work to a Fortune-500 standard across the platform.
-
Brand Systems at ScaleEnterprise‑wide
Identity systems and guidelines engineered to hold across products, teams, and channels.
-
Creative & Art DirectionCross‑brand
One coherent visual voice across campaigns and touchpoints.
-
Product & UX DesignEnd‑to‑end
Interfaces designed to convert today and still feel considered a year from now.
One throughline runs through all of it: twenty-five years taking brands from first idea to market — identity, packaging, web, and launch — for founders, startups, corporations, and nonprofits across a plethora of industries. The same discipline that makes a Fortune-500 look inevitable, whether it’s a first-time founder in a garage or a company scaling into new markets. I also write and produce for feature films and TV, and found and run my own ventures — so I create as an owner and operator, all the way through.
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Idea to MarketEnd‑to‑end
Assessment, ideation, scripting, storyboarding, design, and launch — the whole arc, not just the logo.
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Any Budget, Fortune‑500 LookStartup → enterprise
Making brands of any size look like they’ve already arrived.
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Founder‑OperatorMy own ventures
Writing and producing for feature films and TV shows, and a creator platform — built and shipped, not just designed.
04Independent Products
Four ventures,
built & still building
Four ventures I’m building — each with its own brand voice: colors, type, and tone independent of one another.
ContentsFour ventures · this file
I.
WELLSIn development
Ida B. Wells film · brand, campaign, merch
B.01
II.
Up For BrunchOpen for business
Casual brunch cafe · brand & identity
B.02
III.
Division GamesIn development
Placeholder — short description line
B.03
IV.
KeepUsPostdLive
Influencer-partnership platform for local brands
B.04
Plate IB.01Film & Legacy
In Development
A story they tried to bury, given the frame it deserves.
A feature film on the life of Ida B. Wells that I’m writing and producing under Wild Mercy Pictures — carried by a brand, campaign, and merchandise initiative that gives back to her legacy.
Plate IIB.02Hospitality
Casual, comfy, and always up for brunch.
A casual, comfy cafe serving traditional brunch fare — pancakes, eggs, and waffles. I built the full brand: identity, logo, color scheme, and the visual elements that shape the overall aesthetic.
B.03 · Plate III
Division Games
Thriving on competition between NFL fans.
A 30-minute game show where celebrity contestants answer trivia about the team they represent — or historic matchups between two rivals. A charismatic host doubles as referee, and each episode closes with a trophy segment and a cash prize donated to the winner’s cause.
- Role
- Creator · Format & Brand
- Format
- 30-min game show
- Status
- In development
NFL / Amazon are example partners only.
Plate IIIB.03
Division Games · In development · 2026
Plate IVB.04Creator Platform
Live · iOS, Android & Web
Turn every happy customer into a creator.
A platform pairing local brands with everyday creators for reviews and rewards — designed and shipped end to end: the brand system, the app experience, and the go-to-market.
05Design Toolkit
The craft behind
the consistency
Six working disciplines, carried from first sketch to shipped brand — the same rigor at every scale.
D.01
Brand & Identity
D.02
Creative Direction
D.03
UX / UI & Web
D.04
Motion & Video
D.05
Tools
D.06
Practice
06 Contact
Let’s build something
worth remembering.
Starting something, scaling something, or ready to finally look the part — tell me where the brand is headed.