This is the portfolio and project space of @jjjjustin, a designer based in Boulder, CO. He specializes in branding, product design, illustration, and likes to build things.
🖼️ Selected Work
Tour Divide
Supply
EMPEETHREE
Don't Coast
Platform
Status

Selected Work

A selection of visual work across branding, product, and illustration: Photobucket, Arcadia, Origin, Urban Habitat Project, Canard, Daikon, Alpine Modern, and OneClock.

Photobucket — Contract Product Designer
Product DesignUX/UIDesign SystemsMobile

Worked on redesigning and modernizing Photobucket as it shifted from a legacy photo hosting site into a more private, social-first platform. Collaborated closely with product, engineering, and leadership to rethink core parts of the experience like uploading, organizing, and sharing photos. A big focus was simplifying clunky workflows and making the product feel more intuitive and cohesive overall. Contributed to building a more consistent design system while helping guide the platform toward a more personal, privacy-forward direction. A mix of quick improvements and bigger-picture thinking to help move the product forward.

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Arcadia — Brand Designer
Brand IdentityTypographyPrintCollateral

Brand refresh for a generational real estate company with deep roots and a quietly iconic reputation. Arcadia operates across residential, commercial, and development — a broad portfolio held together more by legacy and word-of-mouth than any formal brand presence. The challenge was giving that identity something tangible without losing what made it trusted in the first place. The work centered on a timeless wordmark and visual system built around values like family, patience, and integrity. Classic and simple, with an Old English element as a signature nod to the company's history. The goal was a brand that longtime employees would feel proud of and new hires could actually orient around — something that felt as established as the company itself.

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Origin — Head of Design
Product DesignUX/UIDesign SystemsMarketing

Booking and operations software for outdoor guides and adventure companies. As Head of Design at a small startup, the role covered a lot of ground — product, marketing, and everything in between. Most of the focus went toward designing new features and refining the visual language of a product that already had a real, active user base depending on it. That tension between moving fast and not breaking things people rely on shaped most of the decisions. Worked to bring more consistency and clarity to the product while keeping it functional and shippable throughout.

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Urban Habitat Project — Brand Designer
Brand IdentityPrintIllustrationCollateral

Brand identity for a Bay Area non-profit nursery specializing in native, pollinator-friendly plants. Urban Habitat's work spans plant donations, urban habitat restoration, and community education — all centered on preserving local flora and improving biodiversity in the region. The brand needed to reflect that mission honestly: grounded, community-rooted, and approachable without feeling generic. Built an identity that could work across signage, print, and outreach materials while staying true to the organization's neighborhood-level focus and the quiet importance of what they're actually doing.

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Canard — Senior Designer
Brand IdentityInterior DesignArt DirectionPrint

Canard is a creative studio and venture group with a portfolio spanning restaurants, cafes, wellness, fitness, hi-fi audio, and veterinary clinics. The through-line wasn't industry — it was a commitment to intuition-led, design-forward thinking at every level. As senior designer on a small founder-led team, the work went well beyond brand identity. We helped start businesses from scratch, designed interior spaces for restaurants, coworking offices, and clinics, and worked closely with founders to shape how their ideas came to life. A lot of these brands are rooted in Boulder, which added something extra — seeing the work out in the world in the place you actually live in is a different kind of satisfaction.

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Daikon — Senior Designer
Brand IdentityMarketingArt DirectionSocial

One of the brands built within Canard. Daikon started as a food truck serving banh mi-inspired sandwiches and grew into a two-location concept — born during COVID, which meant the brand had to be flexible from day one. The menu evolved, the hours changed, the operations shifted. The identity was built to move with it. Beyond the visual brand, a lot of the creative energy went into marketing through a YouTube channel of weekly shorts that built a genuinely engaged audience and community around the food and the people behind it. One of our best.

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Alpine Modern — Senior Designer
Brand IdentityEnvironmentalPhotographyPrint

Alpine Modern started as a home goods store and Nordic design-inspired print publication founded by Canard's Lon McGowan, and evolved over the years into a coffee shop and cafe carrying the same sensibility through. The space, the branding, and the experience were all cut from the same cloth — minimal, considered, and rooted in a specific design point of view. Brand and environmental work that had to hold up across the full arc of what Alpine Modern became.

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OneClock — Contract Designer
PhotographyPackagingArt DirectionMarketing

OneClock is a truly disconnected analog alarm clock that wakes you gently with exclusive music composed by human musicians — no phone, no notifications, no algorithm. Each day pulls from a set of layered tracks by War on Drugs' Jon Natchez, recombined differently every morning so it's familiar but never quite the same. Designed for optimal sleep and a more intentional start to the day. Through Canard, the work covered packaging design and a series of photos for marketing and advertising — a dreamlike photoshoot using surreal projections and vibrant color to capture something that felt more like waking from a good dream than an alarm going off.

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© 2026 JJJJUSTIN. All rights reserved.

© 2026 JJJJUSTIN. All rights reserved.

iPod with earbuds on yellow background

EMPEETHREE

A desktop MP3 player built for people who own their music. No accounts, no streaming, no subscriptions. Just your files, played well.

EMPEETHREE

EMPEETHREE started as a frustration with modern music players. Every app wants you to stream, subscribe, or surrender your library to the cloud. EMPEETHREE does none of that. It reads your local files, plays them without fuss, and gets out of the way.

Built for macOS and Windows. Gapless playback, waveform scrubbing, keyboard-first controls. The interface is minimal by design. The music is the thing.

EMPEETHREE
EMPEETHREE icon
EMPEETHREE search
EMPEETHREE shortcuts
EMPEETHREE full app
EMPEETHREE

Currently in development. More details at empeethree.app.

© 2026 JJJJUSTIN. All rights reserved.

Justin McKinley

Visual Designer
About

JJJJustin is Justin McKinley, a Boulder-based visual designer working at the intersection of brand, product, and crafted content. He has a trained eye for how ideas take shape across systems, objects, and experiences, informed by a background in digital and traditional ad agencies, in-house teams, and collaborations with writers, industrial designers, engineers, founders, and creative directors.

He approaches both independent and collaborative work with the same mindset, staying engaged, following ideas through, and allowing the process to inform the outcome. His work spans branding, product design, illustration, and art direction, with a focus on clarity, function, and honest expression.

Info
Location
Boulder, Colorado
Email
hello@justinmckinley.com
Phone
507-381-8977
Portfolio
jjjjust.in
LinkedIn
linkedin.com/in/jjjjustin
Work History
Visual Designer JJJJustin
Jul 2009–Present
Independent Creative · Boulder, Colorado
Product Designer Photobucket
Oct 2025–Jan 2026
Contract · Boulder, Colorado
Head of Design Origin
Aug 2022–Apr 2024
Full-time · Boulder, Colorado
Brand Designer BOA®
Dec 2021–Mar 2022
Contract · Denver, Colorado
Senior Designer Canard Ventures
May 2019–Nov 2021
Full-time · Boulder, Colorado
Designer Mountain Standard
Sep 2018–Feb 2019
Contract · Boulder, Colorado
Brand Designer Life Time
May 2015–Oct 2016
Full-time · Boulder, Colorado
Art Director Life Time
May 2013–May 2015
Full-time · Chanhassen, Minnesota
Product Designer NPR
Nov 2014–Feb 2015
Contract · St. Paul, Minnesota YourClassical.org
Graphic Designer Logic PD
May 2011–Dec 2012
Full-time · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Creative MPLS.TV
May 2011
Creative Collaboration · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Designer Life Time Fitness
Mar 2011
Contract · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Creative mono
Jun 2010–Sep 2010
Intern · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Designer space150
Jul 2009–Apr 2010
Intern · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Freelance Designer FRWD Co.
Jul 2009
Contract · Minneapolis, Minnesota
Apple Expert Best Buy
Sep 2008–May 2010
Retail Sales · Mall of America, Burnsville, Minnesota
Digital Print Operator MCAD Service Bureau
Aug 2007–May 2010
Part-time · Minneapolis, Minnesota

15+

Years across brand, product,
and digital design
Skills & Abilities
  • 15+ years working as a designer across branding, product, and digital design, in agencies, in-house teams, and independent practice.
  • High-level fluency across the full Adobe Suite (Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign, Premiere) and Figma for product and interface design.
  • Experience directing, shooting, and editing video content, from concept through final cut.
  • Comfortable moving between branding, product design, and physical building/fabrication, translating ideas into tangible outcomes.
  • Extensive experience collaborating directly with engineers and entrepreneurs, taking ideas from concept to shipped product.
  • A process-driven approach that treats independent and collaborative work with the same rigor and follow-through.
Education

Bachelor of Fine Arts, Design

Minneapolis College of Art and Design 2006–2010

© 2026 JJJJUSTIN. All rights reserved.