Less Hulk, More Bruce Lee

The ubiquitous design process leads to what JDK calls its Living Brand concept. "We had an early belief that design distinction is what drove things on every level," says Jager, who's 47 but looks much younger. "The Living Brand is about how to synchronize the emotional, rational, and cultural ideas of a brand into a cross-fertilized form."

Nowhere is the Living Brand more apparent than in Patagonia's upcoming spring footwear line. The project had multiple chefs and thus all the ingredients for a disaster: Patagonia licensed Wolverine Worldwide, a billion-dollar shoe manufacturer that not only produces its own line but also has deals with Caterpillar, Harley-Davidson, and Hush Puppies, among others, to do the manufacturing. Wolverine--which had worked with JDK on the hugely successful Merrell line--recruited Jager. "It was an interesting dynamic," says Wanda Weller, a Patagonia design director, "because with three parties, you're kind of always like, 'Who's on first?'" But with design, one plus one plus one doesn't always equal three--sometimes it adds up to ∏. "With Michael, it's almost as if there's no ego," she adds. "Even if he's working in an environment where there is turmoil or conflict, he just rises above and uplifts. He is one of the most optimistic people I've ever come across."

From this collaborative triumvirate emerged the slogan "One small step," a succinct capture of Patagonia's pro-environment philosophy of best quality, least harm. In this case, however, JDK's client came away with not only a line of shoes, boots, and sandals, but also a bonus product. James Lindars, JDK's "3-D design director," is obsessed with the burgeoning do-it-yourself movement; after several verbal jam sessions with Jager, he came up with a shoe for Patagonia that distills the company's 35-year history into a single, slightly odd-looking DIY shoe: a modern homage to a Native American moccasin--three pieces of leather and a footbed that are assembled by the customer. No adhesives, no toxins, no sweatshops. And not only are the mocs constructed of scrap leather, the packaging pouch is made from surplus material, too. It's a wearable philosophical statement, built from trash. "There's this idea of having a creative spine that makes everything work," Weller says. "The consumer may not know what the backbone is, but they still think, 'This works, this is beautiful, I get it.' With Michael and his team, there is so much thought on the back end that creates that subtlety of effectiveness."

The X Prize

Jager was surprised JDK even received a request for a proposal from Microsoft, let alone made it to the final three. "I was like, Microsoft is calling us?" he laughs. At the time, JDK was pushing capacity and Microsoft didn't exactly have a reputation for risk taking. But Jager was intrigued to see the guts of the machine. At least as important, he had a 13-year-old son: "Going into that meeting, I told those guys, 'This is great for me regardless, because my son thinks this is the coolest thing in the world.'" Then Jager--and Bruce Lee--closed the deal.

Microsoft's goal with Xbox 360 was to reach a more mainstream gamer while staying true to its hard-core, hard-won audience. It's a classic catch-22 of brand maintenance, the consumer-electronics version of going from indie-music darling to heavy rotation on Clear Channel. Microsoft's resident enfant terrible and development guru J Allard was keenly aware of the conundrum. "When we talked about the qualities of the brand that we wanted in 360, I immediately gravitated to Burton," writes a caffeinated Allard, who is a boarder in his own right, in a late-night email. It "prides itself on innovation and product quality, but more important, has scaled without selling out."

As JDK worked with the Xbox 360 team, they continued to build on the Bruce Lee idea. The final reverse-parenthesis design [ ) ( ] of the console is itself Jager's symbologic conjuring of the martial-arts master, representing the inhalation of breath before a strike. JDK helped design a font specifically for every aspect of the new system. Even the crossbar of the B in "box" packs a punch--it's shaped like a specialized type of box cutter, an Olfa knife. "When animated, this mark could unleash a razor-quick assault," Jager says. "Very Bruce."