Who is Curio?

Ever since meeting in design school over a decade ago, Nate and Damein have collaborated in one way or another, pushing ideas back and forth and refining them until they are just right. For the last 12 years, it has always been a two-person team.

Nate McCracken

Nate is the creative powerhouse and mechanical mastermind behind Curio's designs. He is constantly dissecting mechanisms and rethinking interactions in unexpected and incredible ways. Ever since his first design with Craighill, the Jack Puzzle, in 2017, Nate has been obsessed with mechanical puzzles and puzzle design. 

Damein Williams

While Nate has the ideas, Damein brings them to life. Damein handles the technical side of things: refining the details of each design, building prototypes, and working with factories to source and manufacture the designs.

Long ago, Nate made an iPhone note called “what makes a good puzzle.” This was after working on the Jack Puzzle and Venn Puzzle at Craighill. At the time, we were just starting to work on the Tetra Puzzle.

That note listed ten fundamentals of good puzzle design and helped make the Tetra Puzzle great (in our opinion). The list defines shape, difficulty, story and many other concepts. It’s gone through some edits and we’ve found ways to bend some rules and break others. We still largely follow the same guidance on every puzzle we design.