Michael Flarup, Designer and Founder of Northplay

This time we’re talking with Michael Flarup. Michael is many things: the head of a game studio, a speaker at Adobe Max, an author, and more. But most of all, Michael is a designer. He’s most well-known for his decades of work as an icon designer on some of the most beloved apps on iOS and macOS under his Pixel Resort banner. He’s released two books on the history of the art form: first around iOS, then focusing on macOS. Now he runs a game studio, Northplay, where they’re hard at work on their next game, Dinolords!

First, Last, Everything is a podcast exploring people’s personal relationships with technology. In each episode, host Jonathan Reed gets to know a guest through three pieces of tech: their first inspiration, their last obsession, and the one that meant everything to them. From some software or a computer to a weird gadget or a first camera. Pretty much anything goes.

In addition, each episode features the ‘Something’ segment, a small dive into the past to talk about a piece of technology that you may not have heard of. Weird, ahead of its time, an abject failure or success, whatever it was, it was certainly… something.

This episode’s links

Pixel Resort.

Northplay.

Buy The iOS Icon Book and The macOS Icon Book.

Sign up for Michael’s newsletter.

Buy Michael’s design tools and icons.

Michael’s ‘First’ pick: Amiga 2000

Michael’s ‘Last’ pick: Apple Vision Pro

Michael’s ‘Everything’ pick: Adobe Photoshop on Wikipedia

‘Something’: ‘The First Digital Camera Was the Size of a Toaster’ - IEEE Spectrum

Interview with creator Steve Sasson: Linda Hall Library on YouTube

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First, Last, Everything

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