Meet the Beasts: Antonio Rusevski

We’re an eclectic bunch here at B’stro. Our team comes from 10 different native countries and is fluent in 14 different languages. We’re in our 20s, 30s, 40s and 50s—and we have the wildly different worldviews to match. We embrace our diversity. It challenges creative thinking and produces genuine originality. BSTRO’s designers, developers, writers and strategists use their unique perspectives to examine creative projects from every angle as they work side-by-side—questioning, anticipating and solving potential issues before they arise. One of the goals of B’stro Engage is to show the personalities behind our work. We’re not only opening up a dialogue with peers, partners and professionals but also showing the diversity of thinking and personality that goes into every project we take on. We figured there would be no better person to start with than one of the first employees to join Jill in her kitchen in Bernal Heights more than 10 years ago. It is time to “Meet the Beast,” with Antonio Rusevski. Full name Antonio Rusevski Nickname Anters Panters (and others that are less “work safe”). Title Creative Director What you really do Errrythin’. I’m really a jack of all trades. I tackle design challenges from conception to execution. A huge part of my role is providing creative direction and inspiration to the rest of the design team on a daily basis. Your first day at BSTRO I got a call from B’stro’s first employee, Sharon (we went to school together), to assist with some production and Photoshop work. By the end of the day I had come up with the headline and creative execution for an ad for NEC. That was how I became employee #2. What was the headline…? “Slides are for girlie men.” How do you overcome creative blocks? Sometimes switching to a different project helps. I like to think I’m focusing on something else productive while my subconscious is dealing with the block. We have a very talented team so I like to incorporate their thinking whenever possible. We hold regular, short out-of-office meetings for brainstorms. More often than not, that change of setting helps people think differently. Interests Scuba diving, sharks, music, cooking, underwater photography Who do you follow on Twitter? I like to think I managed to avoid the Twitter craze so I don’t really follow anyone. What’s on your daily must-read list? Several tech/design blogs Ars-Technica, Gizmodo, Mashable, Engadget, BGR, Abduzeedo, NOTCOT, Adweek, I Love Typography. I also pay close attention to news aggregators such as popurls. Favorite quote “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” – Ferris Bueller Most memorable BSTRO experience It has to be working in the original BSTRO (Jill’s kitchen/basement) in Bernal Heights. Little Sydney would be running around while cool lounge music was pulsating in the background. Lunch break was burritos on the sunny deck. It’s awesome to see how far we’ve come in 10 years but those were great days too, when we were a lot smaller. Favorite album Smokers Delight by Nightmares on Wax Favorite movie A tie between Blade Runner and Alien First job As a kid my summer job consisted of loading up trucks (and my belly) with boxes of chocolates in a chocolate factory. What you wanted to be growing up An astronaut. I find that scuba diving is the closest I can get to the experience. Fill in the blanks… 1. I should have worked on my car yesterday. 2. I wish that I could scuba dive everyday for the rest of my life. 3. The first thing I do when I get to work is have an espresso, chocolate croissant and read my emails.