Simone Giertz

Early Life and Family Background

Simone Luna Louise Söderlund Giertz was born on November 1, 1990, in Stockholm, Sweden. She grew up in Saltsjö-Duvnäs, a suburb east of the capital. Her mother, Caroline Giertz, is a novelist and television presenter known for hosting the paranormal reality series Det okända.

Giertz is a direct descendant of Lars Magnus Ericsson, the founder of the telecommunications giant Ericsson. Even with this lineage, she did not immediately pursue engineering.

During primary school, she was the only girl in her class to choose woodworking over sewing, citing the Disney character Gyro Gearloose as an early inspiration for her interest in invention.

At age 16, Giertz moved to Hefei, China, for an exchange year. She learned basic Mandarin and appeared on a local sitcom during her stay. While she was abroad, her parents divorced, a fact she learned only upon her return to Sweden. Following this period, she enrolled at a Swedish boarding school in Nairobi, Kenya, where she studied Swahili.

She later returned to China for six months to teach English in Nanhai, Guangdong.

University and Technical Training

Giertz enrolled at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm in 2010 to study Engineering Physics. She selected the program because she believed it was the most difficult subject available and wanted to prove her intelligence.

She dropped out after one year, describing the curriculum as "too dry" and stating she felt she was not "smart enough" for the theoretical demands at the time. In February 2025, the University of Skövde awarded her an Honorary Doctorate in Informatics, recognizing her contribution to making technology accessible.

After leaving KTH, she attended Hyper Island, a digital creative business school in Stockholm, starting in 2013. It was here she discovered a practical interest in hardware hacking. A lecture on open-source electronics sparked her realization that she could build physical objects without a traditional engineering degree. She began experimenting with Arduino microcontrollers and simple code.

Journalism and Early Career

Before her focus shifted entirely to robotics, Giertz worked in communications and journalism. In 2012, she served as an editor for the official website of Sweden, Sweden. se, managing the Chinese-language version. She also worked as a reporter for a Swedish Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) website.

Her time in sports journalism ended after an incident where she was removed from an interview with fighter Alexander Gustafsson for asking an unvetted question about his past. She later sexism in the industry as a contributing factor to her departure.

In 2014, she traveled to San Francisco for an internship at Punch Through Design, a hardware engineering firm. She worked as a "Maker in Residence," tasked with documenting projects to demonstrate their LightBlue Bean microcontroller. When her visa expired, she returned to Stockholm and moved into a houseboat she had converted from a 1940s vessel.

It was during this period of financial constraint that she began building the "shitty robots" that would later define her public profile.

MMA Journalism and The Shift to Hardware

Before her emergence as a prominent figure in robotics, Simone Giertz pursued a career in sports journalism, specifically focusing on Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). Following a brief and unfulfilling stint studying engineering physics at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, she pivoted to writing.

Her interest in combat sports, particularly the UFC, led her to secure a position as a reporter for a Swedish MMA news outlet around 2012. Giertz practiced Muay Thai and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu during this period, which informed her reporting.

Her tenure in sports journalism was marked by significant friction. In a 2023 interview, Giertz detailed an incident involving Swedish UFC fighter Alexander Gustafsson. During a press engagement, she asked Gustafsson about his criminal record, a topic she had not cleared with his management beforehand.

The question resulted in her immediate removal from the interview. This event, combined with what she described as a sexist work environment and personal concerns regarding the long-term brain health risks of combat sports, precipitated her departure from the industry.

Following her exit from MMA journalism, Giertz enrolled at Hyper Island, a digital creative business school in Stockholm, in 2013. It was here that she shifted her focus from writing to hardware. She attended a lecture on open-source electronics which introduced her to the Arduino microcontroller.

Unlike her previous physics studies, which she found abstract, the practical application of coding to physical objects resonated with her. She began experimenting with basic electronics, a hobby that would soon eclipse her interest in advertising.

San Francisco and The "Toothbrush Machine"

In 2014, Giertz relocated to San Francisco, California, to fulfill an internship requirement for her Hyper Island program. She secured a role at Punch Through Design, a hardware engineering firm known for its work with Bluetooth Low Energy and Arduino integration.

While the internship provided technical experience, Giertz found the client-focused nature of the work restrictive. To satisfy her creative impulses, she began building useless machines in her spare time, using her bedroom as a makeshift workshop.

Her breakthrough occurred in August 2015. Giertz originally built a robotic helmet equipped with a toothbrush arm as a pilot prop for a children's electronics show she hoped to pitch in Sweden. When the show concept failed to gain traction, she uploaded a seven-second GIF of the device to the internet.

The "Toothbrush Machine" featured a robotic arm mounted on a skateboard helmet that aggressively and ineffectively brushed her teeth. The clip went viral on the social news site Reddit, specifically within the subreddit r/shittyrobots.

The community response was immediate. Users on the forum dubbed her the "Queen of Shitty Robots," a moniker she adopted.

The video amassed verified view counts in the hundreds of thousands within days, signaling a clear demand for her brand of "mechanical comedy." Unlike traditional maker content that emphasized precision and utility, Giertz's work celebrated failure.

She followed this success with a series of intentionally dysfunctional inventions, including a "Wake-Up Machine" that slapped the user with a rubber hand. By late 2015, her YouTube channel saw a spike in subscribers, crossing the 100, 000 mark in early 2016.

Early Viral Metrics and Content Strategy

Giertz's rise coincided with a shift in online video consumption toward short, shareable visual gags. Her content strategy relied on a specific formula: a relatable problem, an over-engineered solution, and a comedic failure. Data from late 2015 shows that her "Breakfast Machine" video, released in November, quickly surpassed 1 million views.

This metric validated her pivot from traditional employment to full-time content creation.

By the end of 2015, Giertz had created a new genre of tech entertainment. Her work attracted the attention of Adam Savage, former co-host of MythBusters, leading to a collaboration with his network, Tested, in 2016.

This partnership provided her with access to professional fabrication tools and a broader audience, marking the end of her early experimental phase and the beginning of her career as a professional inventor and presenter.

YouTube and The "Queen of Shitty Robots"

Simone Giertz's rise to digital prominence began on her self-titled YouTube channel, which she created in March 2013. Her content strategy initially focused on "shitty robots", automata designed to perform simple tasks engineered to fail in comedic, frequently chaotic ways.

This unique niche resonated with internet culture, earning her the moniker "The Queen of Shitty Robots," a title that originated from the Reddit community /r/shittyrobots and which Giertz subsequently adopted as her official brand.

Her breakthrough occurred in August 2015 with the release of "The Toothbrush Machine," a helmet-mounted robotic arm that aggressively brushed the user's teeth. The video went viral, establishing the template for her subsequent projects: a deadpan presentation style, complex mechanical engineering, and inevitable, messy failure.

By March 2016, her channel had surpassed 100, 000 subscribers, a rapid trajectory fueled by a series of high-performing uploads.

Notable Projects (2015, 2018)

Between 2015 and 2018, Giertz released a succession of inventions that defined her early career. These projects frequently utilized Arduino microcontrollers and simple servos to automate daily routines, with results that prioritized physical comedy over utility.

The "Lipstick Robot" video, released in February 2016, proved pivotal. It caught the attention of Adam Savage, former co-host of MythBusters, leading to a long-term professional relationship. Giertz began collaborating with Savage's Tested network later that year, gaining access to mentorship and advanced fabrication tools.

This partnership marked a shift in her content, blending her chaotic humor with more rigorous maker techniques.

Transition and "The Every Day Calendar"

In April 2018, Giertz announced she had been diagnosed with a non-cancerous brain tumor, a meningioma. Following surgery in May 2018 and subsequent radiation therapy in 2019, her content began to evolve beyond the "shitty robots" persona. She publicly discussed the pressure of maintaining a comedic character based on failure and expressed a desire to build functional, high-quality products.

This pivot culminated in the launch of "The Every Day Calendar" on Kickstarter in October 2018. Designed as a physical habit-tracking device with a printed circuit board (PCB) as the interface, the project signaled her transition from performance art to industrial design.

The campaign was a significant success, raising over $590, 000 from more than 2, 000 backers. The product shipped to backers in 2020, establishing her new company, Yetch.

By July 2019, Giertz had retired the "Queen of Shitty Robots" title. In a Patreon post from that period, she stated she had "abandoned the concept" as she felt the joke had played out.

She later confirmed this renunciation in a 2023 interview, reflecting on the persona as a defense method that allowed her to preempt criticism by framing her work as intentionally bad. Her channel, which surpassed 1 million subscribers during this transitional period, continued to grow, reaching over 2.

6 million subscribers by 2023 as she focused on ambitious builds like "Truckla", a Tesla Model 3 converted into a pickup truck.

Hosted Web Series and Collaborations

Following the viral success of her early robotic inventions, Simone Giertz expanded her portfolio beyond her personal YouTube channel, securing hosting roles on established platforms and collaborating with prominent figures in the maker community.

Her work during this period transitioned from solitary builds to large- productions, frequently involving teams of engineers and media professionals. Between 2016 and 2025, she served as a presenter for science and technology series in both the United States and Sweden, while maintaining a steady output of collaborative projects.

In April 2016, Giertz formally joined the team at Tested. com, a multimedia network founded by MythBusters hosts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman. Her induction into the "Tested family" marked a significant shift in her career, providing her with access to professional fabrication workshops and mentorship from Savage. Her debut contribution was a collaborative build with Savage titled "The Popcorn Machine Helmet."

The project involved a remote design phase where Giertz, then based in Stockholm, coordinated with Savage in San Francisco to engineer a helmet-mounted dispenser capable of feeding popcorn to the wearer. The device utilized a vacuum-formed delivery method and a servo-controlled trapdoor.

This partnership established Giertz as a regular contributor to the channel, where she appeared in numerous "One Day Builds" and segments focusing on rapid prototyping and problem-solving.

Later in 2016, Giertz was recruited by the toy company GoldieBlox to host Toy Hackers, a web series designed to encourage interest in (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) among young girls. The show premiered on September 7, 2016, and ran for 17 episodes.

In her role as host, Giertz guided viewers through the process of "hacking" everyday toys to create functional machines, such as a "DIY Boombox" and a "Mailbox Alarm.".

The series combined stop-motion animation with live-action tutorials, positioning Giertz as a mentor figure alongside a cast of child influencers. Following the conclusion of Toy Hackers, she continued her partnership with the brand through 2017 with a spin-off titled Scrappy Robots with Simone Giertz.

This initiative involved re-editing her existing, frequently adult-oriented content into child-friendly formats to make engineering concepts accessible to a younger demographic.

In her native Sweden, Giertz secured a broadcast television role in 2017 as the co-host of the TV6 comedy-science series Manick. Partnering with comedian Nisse Hallberg, she applied her signature "shitty robot" aesthetic to solve trivial daily inconveniences. The program's premise required the hosts to invent creative, frequently absurd, mechanical solutions for problems such as waking up on time or brushing teeth.

Although the show aired exclusively in Sweden, it demonstrated her ability to translate her internet persona into a traditional television format. During the production of Manick, Giertz also participated in promotional campaigns for the telecommunications company Ericsson, leveraging her family's historical connection to the company's founder, Lars Magnus Ericsson.

Giertz's collaborative work frequently extended to fellow creators within the YouTube maker community. A notable partnership formed with German inventor Laura Kampf. In late 2016, the duo constructed "The Pussy Grabs Back Machine," a satirical robotic response to comments made by then-presidential candidate Donald Trump.

The device featured a rubber hand attached to a method that would strike the groin of anyone who attempted to grope the wearer.

While the project garnered significant media attention, it also caused friction with Giertz's corporate sponsors due to its political nature and profanity. This incident led Giertz to publicly address the challenges of balancing sponsor expectations with creative freedom, prompting her to launch a Patreon page to secure direct viewer support.

Her most ambitious collaborative project, "Truckla," launched in June 2019. Giertz assembled a team including Laura Kampf, mechanic Marcos Ramirez, and automotive YouTuber Rich Benoit (of the channel Rich Rebuilds) to convert a Tesla Model 3 into a functional pickup truck. The project was a response to the unavailability of an electric pickup truck on the market at the time.

The build required extensive structural modifications, including cutting the chassis of the vehicle, reinforcing the rear frame, and fabricating a custom truck bed. The resulting video documenting the process accumulated over 8 million views within ten days of its release.

The project not only showcased Giertz's ability to lead a complex engineering team also served as a catalyst for her invitation to the official unveiling of the Tesla Cybertruck later that year.

Beyond formal series and build teams, Giertz made several high-profile appearances that solidified her status as a public figure in the technology sector. In late 2016, she appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, where she demonstrated her "Lipstick Robot" on the host. The segment introduced her inventions to a mainstream American audience.

Two years later, in 2018, she delivered a TED Talk titled "Why you should make useless things." In the presentation, she argued that building non-functional or absurd machines alleviates the pressure of perfectionism and genuine creativity. To illustrate her point, she wore a custom-built exoskeleton that allowed her to wave to the audience using large mechanical hands.

Giertz also engaged in cross-channel collaborations with other engineering-focused creators. In February 2018, she worked with William Osman to modify her 1970s electric car, a CitiCar she named "Cheese Louise." Osman engineered a system that allowed the vehicle to function as a giant computer mouse, controlling a cursor on a laptop as Giertz drove it around a parking lot.

These collaborations served a dual purpose: they provided technical assistance for projects that exceeded her individual skill set and cross-pollinated audiences between different science and technology channels.

Her network of collaborators expanded to include Physics Girl (Dianna Cowern) and the team at Corridor Digital, with whom she produced a promotional video for the HBO series Westworld in 2018. In the video, Giertz attempted to build a robotic replica of herself, playing on the show's themes of artificial intelligence and consciousness.

The Truckla Conversion Project

In 2019, Simone Giertz initiated her most ambitious engineering challenge to date: the conversion of a Tesla Model 3 into a functional pickup truck.

Motivated by the absence of an electric truck in the automotive market and her unwillingness to wait for the rumored Tesla Cybertruck, Giertz purchased a brand-new Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus with the specific intent of cutting it apart. She named the vehicle "Truckla.".

The project required a departure from her previous solo builds. Giertz assembled a team of automotive experts and makers to ensure the vehicle remained structural and road-legal. The core team included mechanic and artist Marcos Ramirez, electric vehicle specialist Richard Benoit (known for his channel Rich Rebuilds), and German maker Laura Kampf.

They selected the Model 3 specifically for its steel chassis, which offered easier fabrication options compared to the aluminum frames of the Model S or Model X.

Engineering and Fabrication

The conversion process began with the permanent removal of the vehicle's rear roof and passenger cabin sections. Because the Model 3 uses a unibody construction, removing the roof compromised the car's structural rigidity. To address this, the team fabricated and installed a custom roll cage and reinforced the rear chassis beams. This reinforcement prevented the body from twisting during operation.

For the truck bed, the team grafted components from other vehicles to create a finished look. They used a truck bed cut from a Ford F-150 and a rear window assembly salvaged from a GMC Canyon.

The electronics presented a significant hurdle; removing the rear seats and sensors triggered numerous error codes in the Tesla's operating system, which Benoit had to mitigate to keep the car drivable. The final build retained the original Tesla battery pack and drivetrain, preserving the vehicle's range and acceleration.

Viral Launch and Reception

Giertz released the project video on June 18, 2019. To accompany the build log, she produced a parody television commercial directed by Jacquelyn Marker. The commercial featured the slogan "Available Nowhere" and mimicked the aesthetic of traditional truck advertising, showing the vehicle hauling lumber and driving through rough terrain.

The video generated immediate interest, accumulating over 3 million views within the three days and surpassing 8 million views within ten days.

The project drew attention from Tesla officials. Although Elon Musk did not publicly congratulate Giertz on Twitter, Tesla invited her to the official Cybertruck unveiling event in Los Angeles in November 2019.

Giertz brought Truckla to the event, where it garnered significant attention from attendees and press outside the venue, serving as a counterpoint to the angular, stainless steel design of the official Cybertruck.

Long-Term Status and Upgrades

Unlike of Giertz's "shitty robot" projects, Truckla remained in active use as her daily driver. In March 2023, she released an update video detailing repairs and upgrades performed after four years of ownership.

The vehicle received a suspension lift, a fully functional tailgate (which had been fixed in place originally), and a new bed liner to address waterproofing problem. She also introduced "Chargla," a robotic charging assistant built on the Viam robotics platform, designed to automatically plug the charging cable into the vehicle's port.

"I chose the Model 3 because it has a steel chassis. The Model S and Model X are aluminum, and I don't know how to weld aluminum. Also, the Model 3 is cheaper." , Simone Giertz on selecting the donor vehicle.

The Truckla project marked a shift in Giertz's career from comedic, intentionally flawed robotics to complex, functional fabrication. It demonstrated the viability of aftermarket modifications for electric vehicles and established her reputation within the automotive DIY community.

Yetch and Product Design

Following her diagnosis and subsequent recovery, Giertz pivoted from her "Queen of Shitty Robots" persona toward functional product design. In May 2022, she officially launched Yetch, a product design company and online storefront. The name is a phonetic spelling of her surname, Giertz, which English speakers frequently mispronounce.

The brand operates on the philosophy of creating "unique solutions to everyday problems," marking a professional transition from performative engineering to consumer hardware development.

Giertz stated that this shift was driven by a need for career sustainability beyond YouTube performance and a desire to solve genuine logistical frictions she encountered in her personal life.

The Every Day Calendar

Giertz's commercial release was the Every Day Calendar, a physical habit-tracking device. The concept originated during her recovery from brain surgery, when she sought a tangible method to track daily meditation and yoga without relying on smartphone apps.

Unlike traditional electronics where the circuit board is hidden, the calendar features a printed circuit board (PCB) as its primary front face. The design uses gold-immersed copper pads as capacitive touch buttons; when a user touches a date, an LED illuminates to mark the completed habit.

She launched the project on Kickstarter on October 23, 2018, with an initial funding goal of $35, 000. The campaign raised $593, 352 from 2, 305 backers. The final product features a bamboo backplate and open-source schematics, allowing users to repair or modify the hardware. Giertz described the device as a "gold star system" for adults, designed to visualize long-term consistency rather than penalize missed days.

Coat Hingers

In November 2023, Giertz returned to crowdfunding for her second major hardware release, the Coat Hinger. The product is a foldable coat hanger designed for shallow closets and tight spaces where standard hangers do not fit perpendicular to the wall.

The design consists of stainless steel wire and an acetal hinge that allows the hanger to collapse, reducing its depth by approximately 50% while still supporting a garment.

The development process spanned three years and involved 124 physical iterations to refine the hinge method and weight distribution. The Kickstarter campaign raised over $569, 000 from 4, 099 backers. Giertz the project as an example of her new design ethos: identifying a specific spatial problem, standard closets being too deep for narrow urban apartments, and engineering a mechanical solution.

Puzzles and Novelty Items

The Yetch store inventory includes items that subvert traditional product expectations.

Design and Manufacturing

Giertz oversees the research and development phase in her Los Angeles workshop, frequently documenting the prototyping failures in her content. While early units are hand-fabricated, final production is outsourced to manufacturers in Guangdong, China.

She has spoken publicly about the logistical challenges of hardware production, specifically regarding the Screwdriver Ring, which factories refused to produce due to the complexity of machining a tool-grade bit into a jewelry form factor.

to mass-market products, Giertz releases high-end furniture pieces, such as the Spool Table, a side table designed to resemble a giant needle and thread. She maintains a degree of open-source ethos; for the Build Dice, Yetch offers a free printable paper version for those who cannot afford the machined aluminum set.

Diagnosis and "Brian"

In April 2018, Giertz began experiencing significant pain in her right eye and socket, a symptom she had initially dismissed as allergies due to persistent swelling in her eyelid. After seeking medical attention, an MRI revealed a mass in the front right lobe of her brain.

On April 30, 2018, she publicly announced the diagnosis via a YouTube video titled "I have a brain tumor." In the video, she disclosed that she had a Grade I meningioma, a benign tumor approximately 4. 6 centimeters (1. 8 inches) wide, roughly the size of a golf ball.

Giertz method the diagnosis with her characteristic humor, naming the tumor "Brian" (an anagram of "brain") to make the frightening situation more manageable. She launched a public campaign she called "Evict Brian," documenting her medical journey with transparency. The tumor's location posed risks to her vision and cognitive function, necessitating extensive surgical intervention.

Surgery and Initial Recovery

On May 30, 2018, Giertz underwent an open craniotomy to remove the meningioma. The procedure, which lasted several hours, was largely successful, though surgeons were forced to leave a small portion of the tumor tissue behind because it was attached to serious blood vessels and nerves where removal would have been too dangerous.

Following the surgery, Giertz shared photos of her extensive surgical scar, which she jokingly referred to as her "supervillain scar." Pathological analysis confirmed the tumor was benign. Her recovery involved significant physical rest, during which she stepped back from her regular workshop projects.

During this period, she focused on smaller, manageable tasks, which eventually inspired the creation of her "Every Day Calendar," a product designed to track daily habits like meditation and yoga that aided her rehabilitation.

Recurrence and Radiation Therapy

In January 2019, less than a year after her initial surgery, Giertz announced that follow-up scans showed the remaining fragment of the tumor had grown. While still benign, the regrowth required immediate treatment to prevent further expansion. Giertz shifted her slogan from "Evict Brian" to "Burn Brian" as she prepared for a regimen of radiation therapy.

She underwent six weeks of fractionated radiation therapy in May and June 2019. The treatment involved daily sessions where her head was immobilized using a custom-fitted thermoplastic mask. Giertz documented the grueling nature of the treatment, noting the extreme fatigue and the preventative medication she took to protect against chance cognitive side effects like dementia.

Artistic Response and Long-term Health

True to her maker roots, Giertz transformed the medical equipment from her treatment into art. After completing her radiation course, she kept the thermoplastic mask used to hold her head in place and modified it into a lamp, physically reclaiming the object that had represented her illness.

In a unique act of closure, Giertz entrusted a glass slide containing a sample of her tumor tissue to her friend Ariel Waldman, a documentarian and explorer. Waldman transported the sample to Antarctica in late 2018, exiling "Brian" to the most remote continent on Earth.

By 2023, Giertz reported that her health had stabilized. In an interview, she revealed that subsequent MRI scans showed her brain had physically shifted to fill the void left by the tumor removal, a recovery phenomenon that surprised her medical team. As of 2025, she continues to receive regular monitoring remains active in her engineering and creative career.

Public Speaking and Media Appearances

Simone Giertz has leveraged her digital success into a strong career in public speaking and traditional media. Between 2015 and 2025, she transitioned from short-form web content to hosting television series, delivering keynote addresses at major conferences, and appearing on late-night talk shows.

Her media presence frequently centers on the themes of engineering education, the value of failure in the creative process, and the intersection of robotics and comedy.

In September 2016, Giertz made her American network television debut on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. During the segment, she demonstrated several of her "shitty robots," including the "Lipstick Robot," which malfunctioned as intended by smearing cosmetics across her face and the host's.

This appearance introduced her work to a mainstream audience outside the maker community. Following this exposure, she expanded her television portfolio in her native Sweden. In 2017, she co-hosted the comedy-science series Manick on TV6 alongside comedian Nisse Hallberg.

The program featured the duo inventing creative solutions to everyday problems, mirroring the format of her YouTube channel with a higher production budget.

Giertz also partnered with the toy company GoldieBlox in 2016 to host Toy Hackers, a web series designed to encourage girls to pursue fields. The show featured Giertz guiding child guests through engineering projects, such as building "glitter-blasting" devices.

This role solidified her status as a role model for young women in technology, a position she further established through her collaboration with Adam Savage.

Starting in 2016, she became a regular contributor to Savage's Tested network, where she documented complex builds, including the "Popcorn Feeding Helmet." Savage later her as a significant peer in the maker movement, and she appeared as a guest on The Adam Savage Project podcast in September 2020.

Her most significant public speaking engagement occurred in April 2018, when she delivered a TED Talk titled "Why you should make useless things." In the presentation, Giertz discussed how building non-functional robots helped her overcome performance anxiety and perfectionism.

As of late 2025, the talk had accumulated millions of views across platforms and remains a core component of her professional brand. She continues to speak at technology and design conferences, with industry bureaus listing her speaking fees in the $30, 000 to $50, 000 range for live events.

Her lectures focus on "The Art of Making Useless Things" and the importance of enthusiasm over expertise in early-stage innovation.

In the audio, Giertz has been a featured guest on prominent technology podcasts. In August 2025, she appeared on the productivity podcast Cortex to discuss her design workflow and the operations of her product design studio, Yetch.

She also discussed her transition from content creation to physical product manufacturing on Behind the Tech with Kevin Scott in July 2022. These appearances allow her to examine the business logistics of the creator economy, contrasting with the comedic tone of her video work.

Selected Media and Speaking Chronology

Health Challenges and "Brian"

In April 2018, Giertz faced a significant medical emergency when she was diagnosed with a benign brain tumor. She publicly announced the diagnosis on her YouTube channel, naming the tumor "Brian." The mass, identified as a meningioma the size of a golf ball, was located behind her right eye.

On May 30, 2018, she underwent extensive surgery to remove the growth. The procedure was largely successful, though surgeons were forced to leave a small fragment of the tumor attached to a serious blood vessel to avoid the risk of a stroke.

Giertz documented her recovery with characteristic humor, sharing photos of her surgical scar, which she referred to as her "super villain scar.".

The ordeal did not end with the initial surgery. In January 2019, Giertz revealed that the remaining fragment of the tumor had shown signs of rapid regrowth. Unlike the intervention, this recurrence required a course of radiation therapy rather than invasive surgery.

She underwent six weeks of daily radiation treatments, a period she dubbed "Burn Brian." During this time, she created art using her radiation mask and continued to produce content, using her platform to demystify the experience of serious illness for her younger audience.

By mid-2019, she had completed the treatment and returned to her regular schedule, though she has spoken openly about the lasting physical and emotional toll of the experience, including fatigue and the anxiety of chance recurrence.

Residency and Living Arrangements

Giertz has maintained a unique method to her living environments, frequently treating her homes as extended fabrication projects. After moving from Sweden to the United States in 2016 to work with Adam Savage's Tested network, she initially resided in San Francisco.

Her housing history includes a notable period in Stockholm from 2012 to 2016, where she lived on a houseboat she had renovated herself. This experience heavily influenced her design philosophy, prioritizing compact, functional spaces over sprawling square footage.

In 2020, Giertz purchased a small property in Los Angeles, California. The house, measuring approximately 630 square feet (58 square meters), became the subject of a long-term renovation series. Rather than standard remodeling, Giertz applied her engineering skills to create custom solutions for the limited space.

Notable modifications included a "puzzle table" that could be hidden away, a vertical "plant stripper pole" for indoor gardening, and a stained-glass window featuring a lemon tree design.

She described the workshop attached to the house as the "butthole of the house," a purely utilitarian space distinct from the carefully curated aesthetic of the living quarters.

As of late 2024, she continued to reside in this Los Angeles home, describing herself as an "immigrant from Sweden" who had lived in the US for nearly a decade, implying long-term residency status such as a Green Card.

Companions and Pets

Giertz's personal life is frequently featured in her work through her pets, who frequently serve as test subjects for her inventions. Her most prominent companion is Scraps, a three-legged West Highland White Terrier mixed breed. Scraps is a rescue dog who had already lost a leg prior to Giertz adopting her around 2020.

The dog's mobility challenges inspired several of Giertz's engineering projects. In 2023, noticing that Scraps was experiencing joint pain in her remaining front leg, Giertz consulted with veterinary prosthetics experts and built a custom motorized exoskeleton.

The device was designed to provide torque assistance to the dog's limb, reducing the effort required to walk. She also constructed a "selfie booth" for the dog using LEGO Mindstorms, which dispensed treats in exchange for the dog triggering a camera shutter.

In late 2025, Giertz expanded her household with the addition of a second dog named Bubba. Originally belonging to her partner, the dog moved into her Los Angeles home permanently that year.

While Giertz remains protective of her romantic life, rarely featuring partners in her content, she confirmed the relationship in the context of her expanding family of pets. She also cares for a cat named Futs, who has appeared in background shots of her home tours.

Personal Philosophy and Interests

Beyond her public persona as an inventor, Giertz has cultivated interests that balance the high-energy demands of her career. She has frequently meditation as a serious tool for managing the stress of online fame and her health battles.

Her method to "making" has also evolved in her personal life; while her career began with "shitty robots" designed to fail, her personal projects in the 2020s shifted toward solving genuine problems in her daily life, such as space-saving furniture and accessibility tools for her pets.

This transition mirrored her recovery from the brain tumor, moving from chaotic, performative failure to intentional, functional design.

Honorary Academic Recognition

In March 2025, the University of Skövde in Sweden conferred an Honorary Doctorate in Informatics upon Giertz. The university's faculty board selected her for the distinction to recognize her contributions to technical education and her ability to inspire interest in fields through digital media.

The academic ceremony took place on March 21, 2025, where she formally accepted the title. In their citation, the university administration noted that her work "challenges how the world thinks about technology" and praised her method of framing failure as an essential component of the learning process.

This marked her major academic honor, acknowledging a career built on practical engineering skills acquired outside of traditional degree programs.

Streamy Awards

The Streamy Awards, which honor excellence in online video, have frequently recognized Giertz's contributions to the science and technology sectors. Between 2017 and 2022, she received multiple nominations across changing category titles, reflecting her evolution from building comedic robots to executing complex engineering projects.

Her 2018 nomination for Branded Content stemmed from a promotional campaign for the HBO series Westworld, in which she constructed a humanoid robot modeled after herself. The project demonstrated her ability to merge high-concept engineering with entertainment, securing her a place among the top creators in the advertising space.

Although she did not win the competitive Science and Engineering category in 2021 or 2022, her consistent presence on the ballot placed her alongside other prominent figures in the maker community such as Mark Rober and Stuff Made Here.

Shorty Awards and Social Impact

The Shorty Awards, which celebrate real-time content on social media, honored Giertz for her work in destigmatizing women's health problem through engineering. In 2022, her collaboration with the feminine care brand Kotex, titled "The Menstruation Machine," received an Audience Honor.

The project involved building a mechanical model to visually demonstrate the shedding of the uterine lining, a concept she executed with her characteristic blend of mechanical rigor and accessibility. This specific award highlighted her capacity to use her platform for educational advocacy beyond pure entertainment.

Earlier in her career, the 9th Annual Shorty Awards in 2017 named her a finalist in the category. This recognition came during the peak of her "Queen of Shitty Robots" era, validating her unique method to science communication that prioritized humor and trial-and-error over polished tutorials.

Industry and Cultural Honors

Beyond formal award ceremonies, Giertz has received significant industry acknowledgments that validate her status as a leading figure in the maker movement. In December 2019, Wired magazine featured her on its cover, a distinction reserved for influential figures in technology and culture.

The profile detailed her transition from viral comedy to serious product design, cementing her reputation as a legitimate hardware entrepreneur.

Her "Truckla" project, the conversion of a Tesla Model 3 into a pickup truck, garnered attention from the automotive industry. Following the project's viral success in June 2019, Tesla invited Giertz to the official unveiling of the Cybertruck in Los Angeles in November 2019.

Her attendance was widely covered by tech media, which viewed her presence as an acknowledgment by the manufacturer that her modification had preempted their own product announcement.

In May 2024, Giertz organized and hosted the "Inventee Awards," an independent event designed to honor fellow inventors and makers on YouTube. While not an award she received, the initiative established her as a central node in the engineering creator community, allowing her to confer recognition upon peers for categories such as "Best Failed Prototype" and "Most Unnecessary Invention."