Let’s leave a good impressum on the web.

Hi there! I’m Sophia Lucero (not my full name, but that's a long story).

  • I’m co-founder of a grassroots organization in the Philippines that’s behind the pioneering web design conference in Asia, and other initiatives that nurture the local community, where I’ve flexed my volunteer muscles in event organizing, community building, mentoring, and speaking.
  • My actual day job is designing interfaces and developing front-end as an independent consultant for local and foreign companies, and occasionally writing about that.
  • I’m a fan of 🐈 cats, 🗺 travel, 🎨 art, 🎭 productions, 🏗 design, 💿 tech, 👻 procrastiworking, and the 🕸 Web.

I started Stellify in '06 to blog about things that interest me. Turns out a lot of those interests have shaped what I do today, and Stellify has been the home of my personal and professional pursuits ever since.

I also put together this list of things I believe in.

Contact / Network

I'm @sofimi on most of the social networks out there, so follow if you wish! Blogrolls aren’t in vogue anymore, but whoever I’m following in these places are great.

But what does it mean?

Stellify is a verb which means “to turn into a star; to cause to appear like a star; or to place among the stars, or in heaven” (Webster).

The word is said to be first coined by Geoffrey Chaucer in his poem, House of Fame. Here’s an excerpt:

The poet faints through bewilderment and fear; but the eagle,
speaking with the voice of a man, recalls him to himself, and
comforts him by the assurance that what now befalls him is for
his instruction and profit. Answering the poet's unspoken
inquiry whether he is not to die otherwise, or whether Jove will
him stellify, the eagle says that he has been sent by Jupiter out
of his "great ruth,"

House of Fame

Bill Long explains this further:

The original meaning of stellify is to “transform a person or thing into a star or constellation.” Thus, it is a term taken from the world of Greek mythology where a hero like Orion or a maiden like Cassiopeia was put in the heavens or stellified.

[…] As with stellar, the word stellify can refer to the ambitions of humans for "stardom." We can stellify a hero in the constellation of the national luminaries. A person can attempt to stellify himself by some kind of extraordinary achievement. This process can be called stellification.

Simply Stellar!

Ambition is just about the last thing I will ever possess, so I relish that irony, but I take the notion of “turning into a star” in a more symbolic sense of shining a light on something, or transforming into something better. Then throw in the idea that we’re all made of star stuff and it becomes this full circle thing of going back, going home, or becoming what you’ve been all along.

(Too much?)

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This 2019 version is a refreshed iteration of the 2012 site. Designed and prototyped in Figma and in the browser with handcrafted HTML, CSS, & JS. Images are unedited views from a plane before landing in Manila. Photos in the previous version are from this trip. Read more about my thinking & process here.

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Design × Code × Words for a better Web,
made in the Philippines by Sophia Lucero.