Portrait photography: Miri Biton, AKA Miricle
About
I believe every great website starts with listening.
Before we talk about colors, layouts, or code, I want to understand your business, your goals, and the people you’re trying to reach.
Because the best websites aren’t built from templates. They’re built on understanding.
Behind Nyx
A small studio built around real attention.
Nyx Web Design is led by Nicky Hornstein: one person who listens closely, thinks strategically, builds carefully, and stays involved after launch.
More than a designer
A strong website needs more than a beautiful layout. It needs clear messaging, thoughtful structure, clean development, accessible content, search-friendly foundations, and a plan for how the site will keep working after it goes live.
That is why I approach each project as both a creative and strategic partner. I think about how the site looks, how it reads, how people move through it, how search engines and AI systems understand it, and how easy it will be for you to keep using it.
Experience that crosses industries
Over the years, I have worked with therapists, nonprofits, artists, educators, financial organizations, service businesses, and companies of very different sizes. Every field has its own language, audience, and set of expectations.
That variety has shaped the way I work. I do not begin with a fixed template or a one-size-fits-all process. I begin by learning what matters in your world, what your visitors need to understand, and what your website needs to make possible.
How I work
My process is built around listening, asking the right questions, and turning complexity into clarity. I care about the details, but I also care about the bigger picture: what the website needs to say, who it needs to serve, and how it should support the next stage of your work.
You will always know what I am doing, why I am doing it, and what comes next. I do not disappear after a launch, and I do not treat your website as a finished object the moment it goes live. A good website should have someone behind it who understands it and can help it grow.
Why “Nyx”?
And about the name: “Nyx” has been my nickname for years, and it also happens to be the name of the Greek goddess of the night. The site’s design reflects a bit of that spirit: celestial, quiet, and full of small points of light, a calm space where creative ideas take shape.
That is also how I like a project to feel: calm enough to think clearly, honest enough to ask good questions, and focused enough to turn scattered ideas into something real.
Every project begins with a conversation, curiosity, and the belief that good design starts long before the first line of code.
Frequently Asked Questions
The questions behind the way I work.
Answers about the choices, values, and experiences that shape every Nyx project.
Why did you start Nyx?
Because I kept seeing talented people held back by websites that no longer reflected who they were.
Some had outdated designs. Others had beautiful websites that said very little. Many felt disconnected from their own online presence, as if their website belonged to a different stage of their business.
Nyx was created to change that. For me, building a website is not about filling pages or following trends. It is about understanding the person behind the business, finding what makes their work different, and creating a website that feels authentic, clear, and genuinely useful.
One project changed the way I think about websites forever. Creating a memorial website for my 18-year-old nephew, who was killed in action, emphasized something I had always believed: a website can preserve far more than information. It can reflect a person’s character, values, and the impact they leave on others.
That experience has stayed with me ever since. Today, every project begins with the same question: who are the people behind this work, and how can their website genuinely reflect who they are?
Why do you work with only a small number of clients at a time?
Because that is the only way I know how to do this well.
I do not believe thoughtful work can be rushed or squeezed between dozens of simultaneous projects. Every website requires research, conversations, decisions, revisions, and sometimes the freedom to stop and rethink an idea before moving forward.
Keeping my client list intentionally small allows me to stay involved throughout the entire process. You are never handed from one department to another, and you never become just another project number.
It also means I have the time to answer questions, solve unexpected problems, and continue supporting my clients long after their websites go live.
What makes working with Nyx different from working with a traditional web agency?
With Nyx, you are working directly with the person designing, building, and guiding your project from beginning to end.
There are no account managers translating conversations, no production pipeline, and no layers between your ideas and the person creating your website.
That does not mean every project follows the same formula. Quite the opposite. Every business has different goals, different customers, and a different story to tell. I believe the website should reflect those differences rather than fit them into a predefined template.
The relationship matters just as much as the final design, because the best websites are built through collaboration, not simply delivered at the end of a process.
In fact, many of my clients have become friends over time. I never expect that to happen, but I think it is a natural outcome of building something meaningful together.
Do I need to know exactly what I want before we begin?
Not at all.
Many of my clients arrive with ideas, notes, half-finished thoughts, or simply the feeling that their current website no longer represents them. That is completely normal.
Part of my job is helping you organize those ideas, identify what really matters, and turn them into a clear direction.
We will talk about your business, your audience, your goals, and what you want your website to accomplish. From there, we build the project together.
You do not need to have all the answers before reaching out. That is what our conversations are for.
Who do you enjoy working with?
I work best with people who care deeply about what they do and want their website to reflect that.
You do not need to know anything about web design or technology. Curiosity matters far more than technical knowledge.
The best projects happen when there is trust, open communication, and a genuine willingness to collaborate. I see every website as a partnership rather than a transaction.
Whether you are starting something new or giving an established business a fresh direction, my goal is always the same: to create a website that feels unmistakably yours.
Why do you always start by learning about the people behind the business?
Because people connect with people long before they connect with websites.
The design, the words, the structure, and even the smallest decisions become stronger when they are based on a real understanding of the business behind them.
That is why our first conversations rarely begin with colors, fonts, or layouts. They begin with questions about your work, your clients, your goals, and the values you want your website to communicate.
The technology matters. The design matters. But neither should come before understanding the person they are meant to represent.
That is what “Websites shaped around the people behind the work.” has always meant to me.