Tom Watson
I build products and the teams behind them.
I started as a product designer, built teams at Pinterest and Facebook shipping products used by billions of people, led product at Framer, and now run Glass, a photography platform I co-founded.
Originally from Oregon, I'm currently based in Amsterdam with my wife, two boys, and a dog.
Not short.
Work
Glass
2019 – Present
Co-founded and built Glass into a sustainable, subscription photography platform with thousands of paying members. I lead product and design across iPhone, iPad, and web, while also owning company-level decisions about team, strategy, and business model.
OpenAI
2020
Supported the GPT-3 launch by designing key developer-facing surfaces, including the Playground, documentation, and marketing site. At the time, OpenAI was a small research lab and this was right before they launched ChatGPT starting the AI revolution.
Framer
2018 – 2019
Led product through the Framer X launch, shipping one of the first design tools built around real React components. Established the early component store ecosystem and worked directly with enterprise customers to shape practical workflows for prototype-based design.
2013 – 2018
Grew from product designer to design manager while Pinterest scaled from millions to hundreds of millions of monthly users. Led the Product Design Standards (PDS), an initiative that unified Pinterest's design language across iOS, Android, and web — the company's first system-wide redesign. Also shipped early product work including Messages and launched the Portland product office.
2009 – 2013
As one of Facebook's early product designers, I helped set core foundations during a period of hypergrowth. I created the first Facebook Interface Guidelines, designed early mobile experiences across iOS, Android, and mobile web, and shipped products including Places plus numerous Photos and Profile features. I also played a major role in recruiting and hiring designers, helping build the team alongside the work.
Earlier
Blue Flavor
2006 – 2009
Seattle Children's Hospital
2005 – 2006
Everdream
2004 – 2005
The Japan Exchange and Teaching Program (JET)
2003 – 2004
Education
Willamette University
1999 – 2003
A liberal arts education that, unbeknownst to me at the time, was a perfect introduction to digital product design, along with a minor in Mathematics that sharpened my systems thinking. My senior project explored genetic algorithms and their application to the game of Go. It performed only slightly better than random, which still feels like true undergrad research in the best way.