Reduce the noise. Amplify the signal.
The public home for my independent practice. A quiet, typographic site that sets out what the tools believe, then shows the three products without overselling them.
Read the build note ↗Product Designer & Engineer.
Independent by nature. Curious by default.
I turn complex problems into useful, thoughtful products.
↗ runwayInterface study · Work in progress
Notes / A little more headspaceA little more
A little more
headspace.
A place for ideas to land.
Room for them to grow.
Keep the important things close.
Your notes. Your files. Your workspace.
↗ Ideas worth keeping ↗
↗ A work in progress ↗
A home for your notes. Built around your files.
Exploring storage, sync and an editor that keeps Markdown on disk, with SQLite making it useful. Part of my independent practice, Flowforest.
Read the build note ↗
Capture a thought.
Keep it yours.
Your voice → Markdown
On your phone.
Private voice notes, ready as Markdown.
Live English transcription happens entirely on your phone. Pause, tag and save a thought, then keep the Markdown file in a folder you choose.
Read the build note ↗Make space
for a good idea.
for a good idea.
a little less screen time.
a little more thinking time.
a little more thinking time.
✎／◯
A quieter place to think with your hands.
A Pencil-first journal for iPad. Exploring the feel of digital ink, a custom brush engine and the simple rhythm of one page per day.
Read the build note ↗
The block editor, outside WordPress.
A standalone desktop experiment with Gutenberg’s editing canvas, a simple page list and local JSON files. A look at the prototype, with source code to explore.
Explore the experiment ↗A little room to experiment.
Small tools, visual studies and ideas followed out of curiosity.
A look inside my R&D folder.
Generative art
Canopy ↗
An evolving canopy of particle trails. Explore how local rules, layered noise and colour build an organic whole.
Open experiment ↗Generative art
Stipple Contours ↗
A study in dots, contours and seeded variation. Adjust the parameters and explore the composition.
Open experiment ↗Interactive tool
Hours in a Week ↗
Make time tangible: colour a weekly grid to explore where the hours go. Your choices stay in this browser.
Open experiment ↗Workflow experiment
PageSpeed Automation ↗
Compare website audit results through the PageSpeed Insights API. Requires your own Google API key.
Open experiment ↗API experiment
Dropbox Save URL ↗
An interface for saving a remote file into Dropbox and checking its progress. Requires your own Dropbox access token.
Open experiment ↗The space between
design and code.
What I’m bringing from 15+ years of making things
into a practice of building with agents.
Bus 351,
on schedule or late?
A weekday workflow that checks live departures
and sends one sentence to WhatsApp.
Solar state
of charge.
An hourly message with one number,
straight from the Victron VRM API.
Street ready. Court approved.
A Shopify storefront for basketball shorts and accessories, bringing a bold streetwear identity to desktop and mobile shopping.
Explore the project ↗A welcoming place for a different way to learn.
A bold, people-led website for Allegra School in Coffs Harbour, bringing school life, useful information and enrolment into one welcoming experience.
Explore the project ↗A softer way to explore Bellingen.
A destination website concept bringing local places, events and community together.
Explore the project ↗A digital home for culture and connection.
Bold typography, warm colour and photography bring the festival to the screen, connecting the program, news and ways to get involved.
Explore the project ↗Built on trust. Designed for connection.
A digital home for electrical expertise, bringing commercial and residential services into one clear experience.
Explore the project and recording ↗
A clear stage for a writer, teacher and speaker.
A minimal website built around Emma’s words, with calm typography and subtle movement keeping the experience simple and easy to navigate.
Explore the project ↗A simple website where the words do the work.
Brand and website design for a creative copywriter, using a restrained visual system, small interactions and strong performance to keep the writing central.
Explore the project ↗
A clear voice, on the web.
Website design and development for journalist and writer Jenna Meade. An earlier chapter of my independent practice.
Explore the project ↗
A dreamlike digital home for retreats at sea.
A brand and website redesign pairing immersive imagery with a spacious reading experience to introduce yacht retreats and help facilitators imagine what is possible.
Explore the project ↗02 / ExperienceA broad practice.
A broad practice.
A connected skill set.
From pixels to production lines, each chapter adds a different way of seeing a problem.
Experience, mappedSelect a chapter to explore
Discipline
Product & UX
Visual & brand
Code & systems
Physical making
Strategy & leadership
Agentic development
Areas explored in this chapterA map of practice, not a proficiency score.
2026 — Present
Flowforest / Independent product practice
Bringing product thinking, interface design and agentic development together through Runway, Flare and Slate. An ongoing interest in physical making continues through 3D printing.
View full experience ↗A designer who builds.
A builder who asks why.
I’m John, a Product Designer and Agentic Developer based in the Nambucca Valley, Australia. I bring 15+ years across graphic design, UI/UX, web development and creative leadership to the things I make.
I co-founded a creative agency, worked independently across time zones and led front-end design and development at We Are Coast. Along the way, I’ve run CNC machines and industrial printers. Working with real materials has a way of sharpening how you solve problems.
These days, I’m building local-first knowledge tools through Flowforest, using agents to help turn product ideas into working software. Away from the desk: family, surfing, running and making things.
More about my experience ↗