Designing a Digital Home for Chemi Rosado-Seijo

Project Overview

Design and development of the website for Puerto Rican artist Chemi Rosado-Seijo. The goal was to create a simple space, inspired by the clarity of museum websites, where his body of work, documentation, and artistic practice could live in an organized and accessible way.

Project Story

At the end of last year, together with my favorite creative director, Hugo Reyes, we built the website for Chemi Rosado-Seijo. Chemi is an artist with a very particular style and truly committed to the communities he chooses to work with. For me, it was an honor to support his vision as an artist from my humble corner.

When I was around 13–14 years old, my stepfather, a Belgian artist/architect, took me and my whole family to see a neighborhood in Naranjito where an artist had painted all the houses green. Fast forward about two decades and I receive an email from Chemi Rosado-Seijo interested in developing his website/portfolio with me.

Chemi needed a virtual place where his portfolio and information could live since, when applying for grants, most of the time they require a website.

I had recently finished the website for my good friend JQS from Estudio Santos (she was the one who referred him to me), and I enjoyed so much helping translate her work into a digital space —in a way where the idea, concept, inspiration, artistic process, and ultimately her body of work could all live together in one place while honoring the artist’s vision. It felt like a great experience and one where I could truly contribute from my expertise. So when a fellow artist of hers reached out, I was immediately excited.

It wasn’t until our meeting that I discovered the dude on the other side of the screen had been responsible for the houses painted in different shades of green in that neighborhood I had visited during my teenage years.

Chemi is a skater who studied art at the Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico. One of his early artistic interventions consisted of installing a diving board Trampolín—the kind commonly seen in private pools— on the Dos Hermanos Bridge in San Juan, a spot frequently used by locals to jump into the ocean.

Trampoline intervention, Dos Hermanos Bridge.
Images courtesy of the artist.

As he told me the story behind this and other early interventions in his career, he also shared how at that time he lived off his art while paying for everything out of his very limited pocket. Nothing was left over, and the reward was purely the fulfillment he felt seeing his functional work being used by a diverse group of people across the island, across ages and social classes.

After understanding the vision behind his body of work, we began the task of gathering information about it across the cyber world, while he shared folders and folders filled with writings, images, and videos documenting different projects throughout his trajectory as an artist.

What I discovered online and inside those folders was an artistic career deeply rooted in social commitment, very much in the spirit of “manos a la obra,” or “rolling up your sleeves to get to work,” or “if you want change, you have to make it yourself.”

It turns out Chemi was also one of the people responsible for the famous La Perla Bowl, and that the neighborhood he painted green was a project called El Cerro, where the entire community participated.

La Perla Bowl, San Juan.
Image courtesy of the artist.

One thing that particularly caught my attention was a short teaser video about the project where a woman describes the time when Chemi was leading the community with the idea of integrating all those houses built along the hillside with the colors of the mountain itself —as if the community, together with its structures, could become one with nature.

El Cerro community project, Naranjito.
Image courtesy of the artist.

Doris proudly listed some of the tasks she carried out as part of the project and, describing Chemi as an adopted son, said: “I loved it. I feel proud and happy. It was a divine therapy.”

From that moment on, it became clear what my work and responsibility were: to represent not only Chemi’s work clearly and accurately, but also the impact behind it and why his bio describes him as a “social-engaged artist.”

Chemi Rosado-Seijo walking through El Cerro during the community painting project, Naranjito.
Image courtesy of the artist.

While working on his website, I felt deeply connected to his work. His pieces and interventions are filled with anti-colonial messages and social critique, and they come from a very badass place —from a culture that I’ve always carried close to my heart.

I remember when I was younger tagging along with my older brother while he went skateboarding with his friends. I remember experiencing that rebellious Caribbean punk energy as a spectator, and Chemi’s work is full of symbols and a very specific tone from that world.

I can say the series I enjoy the most within his repertoire is Tapando para ver. I love how it shows zero reverence toward the press and how it uses elements from traditional marketing materials to deliver a clear and powerful message within an entirely new piece.

I also really enjoy History on Wheels. As part of this series, Chemi has built skateboarding ramps inside museums and created sculptures using wheels and other essential parts of a skateboard, highlighting the intense wear and use that skateboards go through.

Tapando para ver series.
Images courtesy of the artist.

History on Wheels series.
Images courtesy of the artist.

For the website, Chemi told me he wanted it to be as simple as possible and referenced the MoMA website as inspiration.

Together with Hugo —who helped me with the art direction for typography, colors, and the graphic essence of the site— we built exactly that: a homepage that is clear, simple, but still full of personality.

We created a Work section where featured projects appear as blog-style entries containing all their details, videos, and images.

Something cool I had the opportunity to develop was the section where all the project photos live. For this website we chose the free Shopify theme Ritual, which didn’t include a native gallery section where images could be displayed and clicked to view them up close.

With the help of Sidekick, Shopify’s AI tool, I created an editorial-style gallery to fulfill Chemi’s request that each project include its own photo gallery.

This project was equally fun and inspiring. It reminded me how much I enjoy working with artists and how good it feels to support them in a world they don’t always feel comfortable navigating.

Being that bridge between the pure essence of the artist and the creation of digital spaces that represent them properly brings me a lot of satisfaction.

I hope life continues to place artists in front of me who make me reflect on life, society, and community —and who remind me that if we want to live the utopia, we have to embody it and get to work.

Project Details

• Project: Website for Chemi Rosado-Seijo
• Role: Website design & development
• Creative Direction: Hugo Reyes
• Platform: Shopify
• Theme: Ritual
• Custom Development: Editorial image gallery for project documentation
• Year: 2025