First Year As A Freelance Front-End Developer in Manchester
Recap of my first full time year as a freelancer π₯³π¨π»βπ».
Intro


I've been carrying out freelance work on and off for several years, but always alongside full time employment.
2018 was my first year as a full time freelancer. Thanks so much to everyone who helped me along the way and your support!
This post is more of a 'recap' list that I can refer back to over time. If there's anything you'd like me to expand on, let me know. Throughout the year I wrote posts at various milestones, if you'd like to read those, here they are:
TL:DR;
Workshops, working with various agencies, gaining new clients and friends, writing articles, supporting the community with UpFrontConf, McrFRED and the Manchester Tech Slack Group.
Launched my π¬ first screencast series and achieved a bunch of personal goals.
Recap
Workshops
- Ran a day workshop for UpFrontConf
- Ran a day workshop for the BBC
- Ran a three day workshop for the BBC
π Woohoo! Feedback from my @BBC workshop came in: " Very engaging and helpful, and enjoyed the breadth of topics and demos".
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) May 2, 2018
If you'd like me to run a workshop for you, find out more info: https://t.co/Ocpu36rGsh
or get in touch: https://t.co/F1xZRF9nMB
Case Studies
- Helped McCann with various projects and in-house training and tooling
- Recruited and put together a Front-End Team and delivered two major projects for Telux
- Built a Style Guide and Component Library for the online e-commerce State Supply
- Built the first Digital Annual Review for the Together Trust Charity
Read the full Case Studies here
Articles
- Smashing Magazine Article
- Front-End Developer Tips
- Development Environment Machine Setup Screencast
- Virtual Box Brew Install Error
- Old School Web Development Techniques
- Web Community Leads Summit
- Front-End Developer Workspace in net Magazine
- Takeaways from Todd Gardner's Talk on The Developer's Guide to Promoting Your Work
Community Work
Organised and ran UpFrontConf, along side fellow co-founders Dan Donald, Jack Sheppard and the McrDig team.
And thatβs a wrap! @upfrontconf @wesbos #upfrontconf pic.twitter.com/IKTTRxcXhb
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) March 16, 2018
#upfrontconf Speakers. Had a great time and learned a lot. Thanks π https://t.co/TKN6asKWne pic.twitter.com/zrDopctDSt
— Dean Whittaker π¦ (@DeaNHtiD99) March 17, 2018
McrFRED
Continued to run McrFRED. Special thanks to the speakers and to everyone that came along. Let me know what topics you'd like to see this year!
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/01/08/mcrfred-56-jo-franchetti/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/02/05/mcrfred-57-chris-mills/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/03/02/mcrfred-58-dylan-schiemann/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/04/18/mcrfred-59-autotrader/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/05/04/mcrfred-60-phil-hawksworth/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/06/18/mcrfred-61-gareth-chidgey/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/07/01/mcrfred-62-andrew-betts/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/08/17/mcrfred-63-show-and-tell/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/08/29/mcrfred-64-doug-sillars/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/10/05/mcrfred-65-halloween-special/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/11/13/mcrfred-66-matt-claffey/
- https://s10wen.com/blog/2018/11/21/mcrfred-67-christmas-social/
Shout out to Alex Clapperton for doing a tremendous job at helping me out this year. Cheers Alex!
- Web Community Leads Summit
- Manchester Tech Slack Group
- 1000+ views on my CodePen - Flexbox: Various Columns, Colour Style Guide Demo
- MMU Meet the Meetups
- @nwdug
Itβs @s10wen from @Mcr_FRED on the power of meet-ups to help you get hired! @ManMetUni #meetthemeetups pic.twitter.com/CO7WAMlQcm
— Rick Threlfall (@rick_threlfall) October 10, 2018
Screencast
One of my personal favourite highlights, was creating my first π₯ online screencast series.

βΊοΈ Super excited for this one!
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) December 25, 2018
π¬ My screencast series is now ready and for Christmas you can pay what youβd like.
π If youβre interested in knowing more about setting up and maintaining a dev machine, this oneβs for you: https://t.co/XluZM9ghtE
Merry Christmas! π
Other Thoughts
Email Productivity
Filtering and organising emails was one of the quickest and most noticeable improvement on my productivity this year. I wrote more about this in my first month post. If you haven't done this yet, I'd recommend giving it a go!
Personal and Work Goals
πΉ Learned to play 'Misty' on the piano.
βοΈ Enjoyed nice coffee, thanks Pact Coffee!.
ππ»ββοΈ Switched going to the gym for working out at home.
π Less commuting / time stuck in traffic driving.
πΆπ»ββοΈ Walking: Ambleside, Marple, Scotland, Wales.
π· Moved all my photos off Flickr ππ».
π Added a 'dark mode' to my site.
πΎ Gaming: Halo, Forza 4.
ππ»ββοΈ Added slides regarding Mental Health to all workshops I gave and received positive feedback every time.
π¨ Getting rid of material items.
π» Less alcohol.
π₯ Lots more Vegetarian / Vegan food.
ππ»ββοΈ Meditation course / Headspace.
Spending the day in Leeds with some super talented folks today ππ»@LiamHutchinson_ @WengersToyBus @csswizardry pic.twitter.com/AhDbHfWmR8
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) February 12, 2018
π«π Had a top day out with Harry Roberts and met Bryan James, the awesome person who created this:
Finally got around to getting my @WengersToyBus 'In Pieces' print framed π·π¦π¦ππ’π ππ‘π¬π³πππ π ππππͺπ«ππππππππππ¦πππ©ππΏ pic.twitter.com/QQtRbVxxLa
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) April 30, 2016
ππ»ββοΈ Marple 10k - 08/09/2018.
β° #y3p - 19/05/2018.
π³ Bonsai Trees.
πΈ Got my first payment, thanks @smashingmag.
Random
π It seems Apple got my message, thank you!
Dear @Apple,
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) January 15, 2018
Retina MacBook Air, please.
Yours,@s10wen.
https://www.apple.com/macbook-air/
π¦ Most Popular Tweet - 34.4K impressions
Super happy and proud about this: I'm on the front page of @smashingmag sat next to none other than @chriscoyier! Thanks to @rachelandrew @smash_it_on for reviewing π» pic.twitter.com/99HO4DnD1T
— Simon Owen π (@s10wen) March 13, 2018
πΆ My Spotify 2018. Minutes Listened: 42,046, Top Artist: Mogwai.
Closing
That's a wrap, here's to 2019. It's going to be a big one! πΆπ»
If there's anything I can help you with. Please, get in touch.
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