9 Lessons I Learned From Melanie Perkins About Design, Scaling a Startup, and Democratizing Creativity
In 2007, a young university student in Perth, Australia, found herself frustrated. She was teaching her classmates how to use complex design software—programs that required endless tutorials, clunky manuals, and hours of trial and error just to create something as simple as a yearbook.
Her name was Melanie Perkins, and she had a peculiar kind of clarity. Where others saw a difficult but accepted reality, she saw an unnecessary barrier.
Why should design be locked away behind layers of complexity, understood only by professionals? Why couldn't it be as simple as dragging and dropping shapes on a page? That thought—so deceptively simple—would become the seed of Canva, one of the most widely used design platforms in the world.
But the story of how Melanie Perkins took that seed and grew it into a global company valued in the tens of billions is not the usual Silicon Valley tale of serendipitous connections and endless venture capital. Instead, it is a story of grit, persistence, and an unyielding belief that creativity belongs to everyone.
There is something almost paradoxical about her journey. Perkins was not from San Francisco or New York. She was not surrounded by investors or a ready-made startup ecosystem.
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Her name was Melanie Perkins, and she had a peculiar kind of clarity. Where others saw a difficult but accepted reality, she saw an unnecessary barrier.
Why should design be locked away behind layers of complexity, understood only by professionals? Why couldn't it be as simple as dragging and dropping shapes on a page? That thought—so deceptively simple—would become the seed of Canva, one of the most widely used design platforms in the world.
But the story of how Melanie Perkins took that seed and grew it into a global company valued in the tens of billions is not the usual Silicon Valley tale of serendipitous connections and endless venture capital. Instead, it is a story of grit, persistence, and an unyielding belief that creativity belongs to everyone.
There is something almost paradoxical about her journey. Perkins was not from San Francisco or New York. She was not surrounded by investors or a ready-made startup ecosystem.
9 Lessons I Learned From Melanie Perkins About Design, Scaling a Startup, and Democratizing Creativity
In 2007, a young university student in Perth, Australia, found herself frustrated. She was teaching her classmates how to use complex design software—programs that required endless tutorials, clunky manuals, and hours of trial and error just to create something as simple as a yearbook.
Her name was Melanie Perkins, and she had a peculiar kind of clarity. Where others saw a difficult but accepted reality, she saw an unnecessary barrier.
Why should design be locked away behind layers of complexity, understood only by professionals? Why couldn't it be as simple as dragging and dropping shapes on a page? That thought—so deceptively simple—would become the seed of Canva, one of the most widely used design platforms in the world.
But the story of how Melanie Perkins took that seed and grew it into a global company valued in the tens of billions is not the usual Silicon Valley tale of serendipitous connections and endless venture capital. Instead, it is a story of grit, persistence, and an unyielding belief that creativity belongs to everyone.
There is something almost paradoxical about her journey. Perkins was not from San Francisco or New York. She was not surrounded by investors or a ready-made startup ecosystem.
Her name was Melanie Perkins, and she had a peculiar kind of clarity. Where others saw a difficult but accepted reality, she saw an unnecessary barrier.
Why should design be locked away behind layers of complexity, understood only by professionals? Why couldn't it be as simple as dragging and dropping shapes on a page? That thought—so deceptively simple—would become the seed of Canva, one of the most widely used design platforms in the world.
But the story of how Melanie Perkins took that seed and grew it into a global company valued in the tens of billions is not the usual Silicon Valley tale of serendipitous connections and endless venture capital. Instead, it is a story of grit, persistence, and an unyielding belief that creativity belongs to everyone.
There is something almost paradoxical about her journey. Perkins was not from San Francisco or New York. She was not surrounded by investors or a ready-made startup ecosystem.
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9 Lessons I Learned From Melanie Perkins About Design, Scaling a Startup, and Democratizing Creativity
9 Lessons I Learned From Melanie Perkins About Design, Scaling a Startup, and Democratizing Creativity
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Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940184445953 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Digital Products Management |
| Publication date: | 10/05/2025 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 370 KB |
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