You found it
How this site was built.
I built this portfolio with AI tools and directed every step. It took more than 40 hours of my own time, on top of decades of archiving and saving my work so there was something real to build from.
The effort behind it
Not whipped up in a couple of hours.
It took a couple of days, careful work and a lot of feedback. I was particular about how every page looks and works on phones and desktops.
hours of my own time
days, start to finish
rounds of direction and feedback
pages, each checked on phone, tablet and desktop sizes
It all ran within my regular Claude paid plan, with no extra usage fees. The experience is in the hours and the judgment, not in burning through tools.
What it saves
saved on hosting over three years
Then: $350+ for three years of hosting, almost $120 a year.
Now: $0 to host this site.
I still pay about $20 a year for the domain name. The saving is hosting only, and it comes from learning AI and hosting the site myself.
What I did, and what the AI did
Before any building, I did the research. I used Perplexity and Firecrawl to study how other marketing leaders present themselves, and I organized what I learned in Obsidian, my second brain.
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Then I wrote the brief, chose the structure and supplied the case documents and the numbers myself. Claude Code did the drafting, layout and code, working in Google Antigravity as the code editor. I reviewed every page, corrected what was wrong, and removed anything I could not back up with a document.
It is a small, fast site with no tracking. The long videos sit on YouTube as unlisted, the site is published on Netlify's free plan, and a Cloudflare Pages copy is kept as a free backup. The contact form sends messages straight to me. It is also a working example of how I use AI: to move faster on drafts and builds, with a person accountable for the facts.
Then and now
My old site was not a template. I built it myself on WordPress and Bluehost, and it took thousands of dollars and many hours to get right. I am proud of it, and it taught me a lot.
Then
Now
- Then. Hosting cost me $350+ for three years, almost $120 a year, plus about $20 a year for the domain name and hours of manual upkeep.
- Now. Free hosting. I still pay about $20 a year for the domain name. I applied current UX, accessibility and speed practice, with AI doing the heavy lifting.
The lesson is the same one I give clients: the tools change, and the people who learn them early move faster.
The stack
From research to launch
Research first: Perplexity for cited research, Firecrawl to read pages, and Obsidian as my second brain. Then Claude Code builds inside Google Antigravity. Long videos go on YouTube as unlisted, Netlify publishes the site, and Cloudflare Pages is the free backup. Total hosting cost: $0.
The archive behind it
This site started with decades of saved screenshots, photos and files. This five-minute slideshow is that archive: a visual record of the work, the brands and the people across my career.
