Amazon Prime: The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Pop-up
Client: Amazon Prime Video | Role: Sole Developer & Lead Technologist
The Challenge: Managing Massive, Instant Demand
When Amazon Prime Video announced it was bringing the iconic Carnegie Deli back to life for a limited-time pop-up, the question wasn't if people would come, but how to manage the overwhelming demand. The primary challenge was to architect a bulletproof online reservation system that could withstand a massive, instantaneous traffic spike from thousands of fans, ensuring a fair and seamless booking experience for a mainstream audience.
The Solution: A Cloud-Native, Scalable Reservation Platform
As the sole engineer, I designed and developed the entire reservation platform. The architecture was built on AWS and engineered specifically for high availability and performance under extreme load. Key components included:
- A Modern Frontend: The public-facing website was a sleek, responsive application built with Next.js, React, and TypeScript.
- Scalable Cloud Infrastructure: The system was deployed on AWS, leveraging EC2 auto-scaling groups and load balancers to automatically provision new server and database instances in real-time as traffic surged.
- High-Performance Caching & Database: A Redis cluster was used for high-speed caching of availability data, while a MongoDB cluster provided a flexible and resilient database backend.
- Strategic API Integration: To ensure reliability for the core booking logic, I integrated the system with the battle-tested OpenTable API, offloading the final scheduling step to their robust infrastructure.
The Result: A Webby Award-Winning Experience
The platform performed flawlessly, handling the immense traffic without a hitch and allowing thousands of fans to successfully book their spot. The event was a massive PR success, featured in Vogue and BuzzFeed, and ultimately culminated in a 2019 Webby Award for Best Popup Shop.
My Proudest Moment
While the incredible press coverage was inspiring, my proudest moment was learning our work had won a Webby. For our team, and for me as the sole engineer who built this mainstream, scalable system from the ground up, it was a true moment of joy and validation.