MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota — As a new parent, Jeff Johnson received advice from a friend that stuck. 

“We don’t really remember things. We don’t,” Johnson said. “What’d you get for your 11th birthday? Who knows. But we only remember experiences.”

Johnson’s experiences at a young age shaped his future career. The 54-year-old grew up on a farm in rural North Dakota. 

“I was just a kid on the farm who was much more interested in the design on the feed bag then actually feeding the hogs,” Johnson said. 

A fascination with comics and pop culture inspired Johnson’s work, starting with his first big client out of college designing the branding for Fruitopia; TIME magazine named it the number four brand of the year. 

Through his south Minneapolis-based business, Replace, Johnson has dreamed up branding for well-known names including Geek Squad, Jonny Pops, Schmidt beer, and the Minnesota State Fair. 

But his greatest project is an unpaid gig and his clients have been with him since day one. 

“I never planned on it being a 20-year project or lifetime project but now I couldn’t imagine not doing it,” Johnson said. 

Johnson is a father to two sons — Milo, 20, and Ozmo, 18. 

For Milo’s first birthday, Johnson created a poster as an invite for his son’s party. The party is also when Johnson and his wife, Molly Johnson, announced Molly was pregnant with their second child. 

What started as a simple invite has spiraled into painstakingly detailed posters for his sons’ birthdays. 

“Unending hours. Just silly. This is where being a farm kid from North Dakota really, really helps because you’re so used to being bored,” said Johnson, laughing. 

The process starts with Johnson taking hundreds of photos of his sons until they find the perfect pose. Then the real work begins in Adobe Photoshop where Johnson assembles hundreds of layers to come up with one image. 

Every year, there’s a theme. 

“I completely cannibalize everything on the internet. Just find all kinds of different scrap material. So it’s not AI, it’s like AD… artificial dumb,” Johnson said. 

For Ozzy’s fifth birthday,  he was a bluebird. Age six, he was a karate guy with six arms. For his eighth birthday, Ozzy requested 38 different elements. 

“He wanted a squid; he wanted a nuclear explosion; he wanted a dragon; he wanted a raygun; he wanted an axe,” Johnson said. “I think as they’ve gotten older, they’ve assumed the role of art director.”

“You get to feel like a celebrity since day one so that’s nice. Yeah, it means a lot,” Ozzy said. 

Year 16, he was really into the video game Overwatch. A sign of the times as everyone was cooped up during the pandemic. 

“They become documents of just like what they were kind of into in those years,” said Johnson. 

It’s also a chance for Johnson to learn more about his sons’ hobbies and interests. For example, one year Milo was really into chillwave music so Johnson had to learn all about it. 

In April, Johnson started working on Milo’s 20th birthday poster. Milo is studying nuclear engineering at the University of Oregon, finishing up his freshman year. 

Milo’s idea included him holding an equation in his hands. 

“That becomes part of the memory too is like he and I coming up together to figure out how can we take this idea and put it in something that has some sort of thematic material. Then he’ll remember that and every poster becomes a little bit of a document of that memory,” Johnson said. 

Year 20 is Milo’s favorite poster. 

“It’s freaking awesome,” said Milo over FaceTime in June. 

The family’s home in south Minneapolis is covered with framed posters on each level of their home. 

“Every time I walk through the hallways of my house it’s sort of like I get to really reflect on my past selves or how I’ve transitioned throughout my lifetime,” Milo said. “My dad has made these really awesome mile markers throughout my life.” 

Johnson estimates that Milo’s latest poster took about 100 hours to create. Johnson has only missed a couple of years, one of them being when his mom was very ill. 

“It’s way more expensive than like buying him a jacket or something like that. It’s kind of indefensible. But they’re also just these beautiful things that become these little partnerships that we have,” Johnson said. 

Now that Milo lives out of state, it’s a way for Johnson to learn more about what’s going on in his life. 

“I think he’ll do it as long as he has the faculties to do it. Yup. I’m sure,” said Jeff’s wife, Molly. “Some people, like me, make layered cakes for birthdays, and then my husband makes… multi-layered posters.” 

Ozzy just graduated from high school and plans on attending Columbia College Chicago to study graphic design, like his dad. 

“I think if I have kids I’ll be making them really cheesy posters too,” Ozzy said. 

Both sons are adventurous and have made it a priority to explore the world. 

“For me as a dad now, I’m becoming an old man. I’m reminded every time I see these posters… what they were into at that particular moment because you forget. You forget all those things. Then it becomes more important about the story,” Johnson said. “Each poster is a story. Each poster is a story of that particular moment in their lives.” 

See all of Milo and Ozzy’s posters, here. 

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