Why I'm building a digital garden
My personal manifesto for rejecting 'the niche'. An introduction to this digital garden and how it serves as a map of my brain.
Published on [updated on ]
Why one box is not enough
For years, I thought about starting a website. The advice was always the same: ‘find your niche’.
Should it be a professional tech blog? An art portfolio? A place for my research? The pressure to choose one box felt paralyzing, because I am not a niche.
I am a software engineer, a contemporary artist, and a neurodivergent researcher.
So I decided to build a space that could hold all of it. This approach lets me:
- Follow my curiosity wherever it leads.
- Explore the interesting, cross-pollinating ideas between my different worlds.
- Share my work in a way that feels authentic, with my perspective as the only connecting thread.
My space for curiosity
A digital garden is simply a website that grows and evolves organically, like a real garden. For me, it’s a living ‘user manual for my brain’ and the primary way I explore tech, art, and identity. It’s where I document my hyper-fixations and creative explorations. It’s a space for curiosity.
Here, you’ll find things like:
- My guide to Tbilisi’s clothes swap scene.
- A neurodivergent glossary.
- A story of how nerdy curiosity makes my work better.
How I embrace the process
What that means is this space is intentionally imperfect. It’s not about polished, finished articles. It’s about the process of learning and connecting in public. I think of it in stages:
- Seeds: Half-formed thoughts, new questions, and early concepts.
- Sprouts: Notes that are growing as I do more research and connect them to other ideas.
- Blooms: More complete, polished pieces of thought and discovery.
The goal is to show the work, the learning, and the connections as they happen. It’s also a low-pressure way for me to practice writing in public. I want to write and publish a book someday, and this garden is my training ground.
This is my corner of the web. Welcome 🩷
A few quick questions
What exactly is a digital garden?
It’s a personal site that’s more about the process of learning than about publishing finished articles. I think of it as a collection of notes, ideas, and links that are constantly growing and connecting.
It’s less of a formal blog and more of a living, evolving map of my brain.
How often will you be posting?
Honestly, I don’t have a schedule. As a neurodivergent person, I’ve learned that forcing a rigid schedule is the fastest way to burn out.
I’ll post when I’ve fallen down a new rabbit hole or have a new system to share. It could be three times a week or once a month, depending on my energy and curiosity.
How did you build this site?
As a developer, I really wanted to build it myself from scratch. It’s built with Astro, and all my content is written in Markdown.
The entire project is open-source, and you can see all the code on my GitHub.
What if I have feedback or want to connect?
That’s the best part. This is a two-way conversation. If a post resonates with you or you spot a mistake, I’d genuinely love to hear from you.
The best way to reach me is to send an email to [email protected].