About

Johnathan
Schaaf

I've spent my entire career in the design business across multiple disciplines: brand, print, digital, web, UI/UX, and illustration. I bring all of that experience to every project, along with my own personal, human touch.

I've worked three ways: on in-house design teams, inside agencies, and currently for my own practice. Each one taught me something different. Eight years at Carhartt taught me how a brand actually gets used day to day, across e-commerce, retail environments, campaigns and product identity, and how much of design is keeping things consistent long after the launch. Agency work at Jackson Dawson and Transcend Creative Group taught me how to move quickly across wildly different industries — Volvo, Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Lincoln — without losing quality. Working for myself taught me the part clients feel most: being easy to work with matters as much as the work itself.

The through line is that I design for how things get used, not just how they look. At Michigan First Credit Union I led interface design for the mobile banking app, the online banking site and internal tools, working alongside product managers and developers, running user research and writing the documentation that kept everyone building the same thing. At Transcend I directed digital design for experiential and training events, where the work had to hold up at large format and in front of a room.

As a business owner, I've handled creative direction and digital design for a host of clients in technology, marketing and retail. Websites from wireframe through final visual design, brand systems, marketing assets for screen and print, and illustration and storyboards when stock imagery wouldn't do.

My degree is a BFA in Graphic Design from College For Creative Studies in Detroit, where the department gave me its Best Senior Thesis award. I work in Figma and the Adobe suite, and I read enough HTML, CSS and JavaScript to speak the same language as front end developers — to hand them something they can actually build, and to know what I'm asking for.

How I work is simple. I start by understanding what you actually need, before anything gets designed. Then I work in the open — sketches, options, revisions — so you always know where things stand. No mystery, no big reveal at the end that nobody expected. I'd rather be the trusted partner you check in with than a vendor you hand a brief to.

Based in Metro Detroit, Michigan – able to work with clients anywhere.

• 01

  Brand Identity

• 02

  Logo Design

• 03

  UI / UX Design

• 04

  Web Design

• 05

  Art Direction

• 06

  Print & Collateral

• 07

  Illustration & Storyboards

• 08

  Design Systems

• 09

  Graphic Design