When she is not thinking about crosswords, she can be found knitting, engaging in vicious games of Settlers of Catan, or rooting on the Yankees, Rangers, Giants, and Swarthmore Garnet. Her puzzles have appeared in the Inkubator, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, and Universal Crosswords. #42: Grading on a Curve | (with Martha Jones) Her hobbies include gardening, words, plumbing and the laying of tiles (ceramic, not Scrabble), words, knitting, words, reading, words, and playing Zoom Boggle with the word-playing grown-up offspring. She also plays violin: she had been practicing in preparation for a few summer weeks in Québec with music- and word-playing siblings. It’s all for the fun of it, but it is nice to be published, too - so, she thanks Inkubator! She wishes she had more time to devote to this all important pastime … But there is work: not words, but statistics. Soon, innumerable hours with grids, Google, and Crossword Compiler had gone by.

When graduate studies brought her to the States, she was introduced to the NYT crosswords … and found that these have a different feel from their counterparts in Montréal’s “La Presse.” As years and Sunday NYT puzzle-books went by, the temptation to try her hand at puzzle composition was irresistible.

And she still plays ‘au Scrabble’ with her siblings and parents - happily, the letter Z is much easier to place in French, and worth just as much as it is in English. Julie has since childhood loved words, and word games … in French. She has been solving crosswords for decades but never tried her hand at constructing one until the 2020 quarantine when she realized that she’d better stop baking and find another hobby or things were going to get ugly! Julie Bérubé Rachel is an archival producer for documentary films, and lives in Berkeley, CA, with her husband, two kids, incredible dog, and sort-of-ok cat. Her goal in the crosswording realm is to diversify the landscape so crossword puzzles that incorporate references to women of color are used more in mainstream publications. She is an avid reader and loves to listen to podcasts. She is learning to play guitar and makes up her own song parodies and performs them for friends and family. You better believe that she is going to use a music reference whenever possible in her puzzling career. Music trivia is her JAM (see what I mean about the puns?), and she is well VERSED (see, did it again!) in popular music of a lot of different genres from the 70s thru the 90s and early 00s, but not so much the late 00s because the kids today just don’t know anything about real music. She’s a scientist by profession with a great sense of humor and a love of puns, wordplay, and memes. Meconya has always had a lifelong curiosity to know the hows and whys of EVERYTHING, which would explain her newly found passion for crossword puzzle construction. Meet the Constructors! Meconya Alford (she/her) When she’s not busy editing, making puzzles, or editing puzzles, she likes to get out and about with her daughters, watch old movies with her husband, and take long walks around Oakland. Her crosswords appear every Tuesday in Vox and have also been published by AVCX, the New York Times, Crosswords Club, and Marie Claire. She is thrilled to be an Inkubator alumna for many reasons, but particularly because she enjoys supporting new constructors. Juliana is a crossword editor/constructor and mom in Oakland, California. Inkubator Alumnae Juliana Tringali Golden (she/her) When she’s not doing design-things, she can often be found plant-moming, cooking, or teaching STEAM workshops to young kiddos over Zoom. She has had a hodge podge of design experience so far, from product development to UI design to brand storytelling. Although she’s dabbled in some construction, Alex considers herself very much a crossword-novice and secretly marvels over all the clever puzzles she gets to lay out each week. Is The Inkubator’s designer, a scrappy creative based in NYC.

Sf chronicle crosswords