Donna Fasano (1972, Chicago, United States), Artgineer. Design & Fabrication Studio of Limited Edition Word Puzzles, & Custom Services. Based in the Santa Fe Arts District, Denver, Colorado.

My career began in technical theatre in Chicago, working with the wardrobe teams at Steppenwolf and The Goodman, then expanded overseas as a set designer for Club Med, working in Mexico, the Bahamas, and stateside. A chance encounter with an old friend while in Colorado for a wedding landed me back in the states and Denver, where I worked as the designer and fabricator of a large events company.

The events of 9-11 changed the events and entertainment industry, so I pivoted to retail and found myself applying my technical skills with Whole Foods Market in IT. The culmination of that time was spent at the regional level, creating systems training documentation and providing IT services to the Rocky Mountain Region.

With a desire to return to my love of design and fabrication, I left WFM after 14 years and started my design and fabrication studio, The Owl & The Hourglass. Both a fine art studio and available for contract work for design/fabrication, I adopted the title "artgineer."

What I do is the artful application of precise practices and techniques similar to those used in engineering. This approach gained me professional national recognition in 2024 by Women in Toys, Licensing, and Entertainment (WiT) as a finalist nominated for the Wonder Women Awards: Independent Designer, and my original limited edition word puzzle game, Lots-O-Letters. More recently, I have been working as a contractor with the Denver Art Museum (DAM) to design games to include in their exhibits, such as Where the Wild Things Are: The Art of Maurice Sendak (2024-2025), and Lunar Phases: Korean Moon Jars (2025). In June 2025, I completed the design, art direction, and led fabrication for It’s Teatime O’Clock!, a multi-generational, permanent activity space at The Kirkland Decorative and Fine Art Museum, now part of DAM.