As a gifted teenager Svenni dropped out of high school and moved from north-east Iceland to Reykjavik to study graphic design at the Art Academy. Here he met Klang founders Mundi and Ivar. Soon they were talking about ‘The Game’ - you guessed it, SEED. After the Art Academy, Svenni worked with various design agencies and moved to Berlin with Siggi Eggertsson for a while, enjoying the good life the city offered in bucket loads.

Soon he moved back to take on the challenge of designing within the digital world: he joined a small team working on a mobile game called QuizUp. It became incredibly successful, no 1 on Apple App Store. It even led him to work in LA on the TV adaptation of it before it all crashed.

But by then Klang had formed and Berlin called him back. Ivar recalls: ‘I still remember how excited I was five years ago when you agreed to join, not only was I getting a super-human-designer, but also a dear friend to hang out with in Berlin.’ And hang out they did. In between all the fun, Svenni laid down some of the key cornerstones of SEED’s branding, and helped the founders present their vision to funders, proving an invaluable player in securing SEED’s backing.

As CEO Mundi puts it, this was a crucial time in SEED’s development: ‘Svenni helped shape the core foundation of how we would structure our user interface. If it had not been for his excellent keynote skills, it would have been so much harder to communicate our vision of SEED.’

Svenni’s hand is seen in the logos of SEED, hence why many of you will already know his work. It’s there in the look, tone and feel of much of the screenshots from the game. He also took part in the game design process, speaking up for accessibility and user experience. Soon he brought Samet in to the UI team, and they became friends. As Samet puts it on Slack when I reach out to him for this article: ‘Svenni has been more than a colleague to me and he is such an amazing man that I love asking for his opinion or help and enjoy his wisdom.’

Such sentiments are felt across the company. Hossein, Klang’s Lead Artist, calls Svenni ‘a full package’ game designer, someone who understands mechanics, has a great eye for aesthetics, knows a shit ton of tools and is not afraid to learn more’. While Micha, Game Engineer, remembers fondly his ‘LEGO-building-blocks-selection-UI rework’, as well as their participation and near victory in Games-Dev Towerfall tournament at Awesome Prototype in 2019.

After half a decade, Svenni’s journey is about to take another turn: Iceland calls him back for an exciting (yet to be announced) project. So while we’re celebrating his anniversary at Klang, we’re also, somewhat oddly, wishing him all the best for the future. He’s a real Klanger, and so we expect to enjoy beers together next summer when he’s back in Berlin for his annual summer visit.