Matt Gabe...
Matt was born and raised in New Jersey. He and Bruce Springsteen have this in common, and both are always eager to tell you all about it. After being introduced to, and falling in love with, graphic design in high school he pursued a degree in design from The College of New Jersey (a very real, and not made-up school). After graduating, Matt worked a few design jobs in advertising in New Jersey and then New York City before deciding to move to California.
The goal in California was to get a design job in the Action Sports industry, but Matt ultimately ended up with his first packaging design job at a computer software company. For those curious, computer software is the complete opposite of action sports — but Matt was happy to have the job, which meant he could move off his friend’s couch, and get his own place.
After working on some very fun package designs for some very lame computer games, Matt started to look for a new opportunity. As luck would have it, Mattel had an opening on the Hot Wheels packaging team. As a life-long appreciator of cars, Matt jumped at the opportunity and in 2009 he was hired as a contract package designer on the Hot Wheels team.
From 2009 until today (minus a few years in the middle that we don’t need to talk about), Matt has worked on just about every toy line and sub-brand within the world of Hot Wheels. Early on in his Hot Wheels tenure he worked on large scale tracks and playset packaging. More recently he has been dedicated to the packaging design of the core diecast (Singles, 5-Packs, Multi-Packs, Mystery Models, Promo Cars, and HW NFTs) and Silver Series (previously known and “Themed” internally, or “Premium Basics” among some collectors) lines, and even some special products for San Diego Comic Con and Mattel Creations — one of which received an award from Graphic Design USA Magazine for Outstanding Packaging.
2024 will be a banner year for Matt. In addition to the incredible gift of being the guest of honor at the 38thAnnual HW Collector Convention, Matt has also gotten to design his first Hot Wheels Original casting, KeiSwap™. In what he can only imagine is a Hot Wheels first, Matt was responsible for the casting design, vehicle name, deco design, and the packaging art work — he even got to write the new model copy featured on the back panel of the package. He loves Hot Wheels, and hates sleep.
Matt is excited and humbled to work on such an amazing brand with the most amazing die-hard fans and collectors. He is very much looking forward to spending time with everyone at the convention in October!
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