About me, the TLDR; version.
I’ve been building stuff for the web since 2009. Over the years I’ve worked at startups in Vancouver (CA), worked as an IT consultant in Belgium for 10 years and eventually I took the leap to the freelance lifestyle and never looked back.
Over the years I’ve built backends, frontends and even did a little devops when the need arose. My tech stack consists mainly of Typescript and Node. I prefer working with frameworks like Angular, React and NestJS. Over the years I started focussing more on building sustainable websites and web applications. Prioritizing highly optimized code with less dependencies and web hosting that is 100% powered by renewable energy.
The longer version.
I graduated college in 2013 but I’ve been building stuff for the web long before that. I started building websites back in 2009 using Dreamweaver. I quickly lost interest in web development and decided to pursue another passion, 3D modeling and game development.
I enrolled in college with the idea of graduating as a game developer but strangely enough, along the way my interest in web development rekindled and since then I never looked back. I went all in with learning the complete flow from server management to backend and frontend.
After graduating in 2013 I applied for an Australian Working Holiday visa and got approved. A month later I hopped on a plane and spent the next six months cruising through Queensland in a beat-up red campervan.
Those six months changed my perspective of what my life should look like so it made sense that shortly after arriving back home, I applied for a Canadian Working Holiday visa. The approval only came a few months later so in the meantime I was working as an IT consultant for a Belgian company developing websites and applications for a range of clients.
Three months later I received a message that my Working Holiday visa was approved so I quit my job and left for Canada.
I arrived in Vancouver in the beginning of October 2014 and ended up staying in Canada for 10 months. During my time there I worked for several startups as a frontend developer. The fact that these were remote jobs allowed me to roadtrip through British Columbia and experience what Canada had to offer.
Channelling my inner cowboy, I worked on a ranch tending to horses and doing general maintenance work on the farm itself. Weirdly enough, I’m pretty scared of horses but still, my time at this ranch will always be one of my best memories.
After staying on the ranch I rented a small Fiat 500 and did a roadtrip through Jasper and Banff camping along the way using gear from Walmart and trying to work in between with spotty 3G, or even 4G if I was extremely lucky.
Where Australia had a big impact on how my life should look like, Canada was the adventure that shaped how I wanted to work. I loved the startup life and being able to work remotely while doing micro adventures really suited me.
Eight months flew by and before I knew it, I was back in Belgium. But, you guessed it, not for long.
After a month, I was on a plane again, this time for a three month backpacking trip through Asia. In the end I spent time in Thailand and the Philippines. beach bumming and island hopping whenever I could.
After the Asia adventure, I started working as an IT consultant for a Belgian company. I had the opportunity to work for a lot of interesting clients doing front and backend work and after 10 years I decided that it was time to venture out on my own and become freelance.
I’ve been freelancing ever since doing mostly the same type of projects but with the added benefit of being able to be more selective in the tech stack I want to use. I love working with Typescript and node using frontend frameworks like Angular and React and NestJS for backend.
Building stuff for the web started as a hobby and I was really lucky to be able to make it my main source of income. Throughout the years though, I sort of lost track of why I wanted to build websites in the first place.
I started running on autopilot, doing the same type of client work day in and day out. Recently though, I started to fall in love again with building websites and I have Buildloom to thank for that.
Buildloom is one of my personal projects. A platform designed to be a solid and sustainable foundation for every website I build. All websites that run on Buildloom are powered by renewable energy.
Aside from that, I’ve also gotten really into bird watching. The most elusive bird I’ve spotted so far is the Bearded Reedling. It took six visits to the same spot to finally be rewarded with a glimpse of the elusive bird. There’s something very satisfying in seeing a certain bird after looking for it for several weekends in a row.
I’ve also built my own campervan to function as a remote office to be able to work from anywhere. Together with my wife, we bought a new Fiat Ducato back in 2019 and converted it over the course of two years. Building everything ourselves: kitchen, water installation, bed, seating area. We even have a diesel heater which was a blessing on our cold evenings in Sweden.
A brief history of projects
2009 - My very first website. A small portfolio showcasing some of my 3D modeling projects.
2011 - Website for a local Golf course. The very first website that wasn’t a personal portfolio.
2013 - The first iteration of my travel blog Seek to Travel. It’s main purpose was to keep friends and family updated of the adventures in Australia.
2014 - The second iteration of my travel blog rebranded as Go Find Water. I ran this blog together with my wife, she would write the blog posts and I would handle the technical stuff. At it’s peak we had about 5000 unique visitors per month. Eventually our interests shifted so in 2026 we pulled the plug.
2014 - Some startup work in Canada. Built responsive themes for AdvisorWebsites and refactored the existing frontend code of Bucketlist.org and implemented a complete redesign.
2014 - Launched Free.FlorianRamakers, a website to download free to use stock photos accompanied by a newsletter with over 900 subscribers. Shortly after launch, downloads spiked to 1000+ per month. Due to time constraints I had to shut this project down two years later.
2015 / 2021 - Working as an IT consultant for various companies like Sodexo, Audi, Sanoma Energy Lab, … building dashboards, websites, blogs using a variety of technologies like Angular.js, Angular, Node and Wordpress.
2021 / onwards - Freelancing as an Angular/React developer building websites and web applications. Currently in the process of launching Buildloom and going back to what I really love doing, building custom websites for small companies.
Need a new website that's good looking, works great on any device, network AND built in a way that's sustainable?
Let’s make it happen