Dyson
Almost 5 years art directing and owning Figma component libraries that whole product teams built from. The work is under NDA, so the specifics stay general.
Proof
The proof is clickable.
No logo wall to take on faith. Below is work you can open, products that are live, and one number you can watch move in real time. If something here looks too good, click it and check.
Work I Own and Built
I ship the whole thing, not a slide about it.
Ruck Authority
A content platform for rucking. Brand, site, 70+ research-backed articles, interactive tools, a self-hosted newsletter, and automated social.
What it proves: Design, build, content, and AI search visibility in one live property.
Read the case study →State Line Recovery Dharma
A site for a Buddhist recovery group on the Wisconsin-Illinois line. Calm, legible, meeting-first.
What it proves: Brand and web for a real community group, built to be easy to update.
Read the case study →Recovery Calendar
A clean meeting and milestone calendar for people in recovery. Designed, built, and shipped end to end.
What it proves: Product design plus front-end build, not just a static mockup.
Read the case study →Resumaker
A tool that turns a plain work history into a structured resume. Form to formatted document.
What it proves: Interface design and working application logic, end to end.
Read the case study →Mission Deck
A focused tool for building and running mission-style decks. Designed and built as a product.
What it proves: Product thinking carried all the way into shipped software.
Read the case study →Lettercarry
A self-hosted newsletter platform Joel built and runs. It powers the Ruck Authority email list.
What it proves: Infrastructure built and operated, not a plugin configured.
The joel.design client portal
The system clients log into for designs, files, invoices, and updates. Built into this site.
What it proves: A working client-facing system Joel designed, built, and runs every week.
Brand and Logo Work
Selected brand and logo work.
These are real brand and logo pieces from across my career, including agency and in-house work. Not every one is a paying Milwaukee small-business client, so the labels stay plain: brand identity, logo, packaging, print.
AI-Search Visibility, Measured
I built a site to get cited by AI search. It worked.
Most people guess at whether AI search sees them. I built Ruck Authority to be found, parsed, and cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews, then I built a tool to measure it.
The Citation Engine tracks how many pages get cited across AI search. On Ruck Authority it moved from about 693 to about 975 cited pages in 8 days.
That is live telemetry, not a screenshot from a deck. On a call I will share my screen and we can watch the real numbers together.
Senior Background
About 15 years. Most of it on serious products.
I have designed since 2010. The work has run from local festivals to global product teams, and the standard has stayed the same.
Milwaukee Tool
Design work for one of the most recognized brands built in this region. High volume, high standard, real deadlines.
Kohl's
Brand and microsite work at retail scale, including the Marc Anthony microsite shown above. Big-brand polish, applied carefully.
Next Move