Makenzie Brown knew what she wanted to do when she was three years old. Then she spent the next twenty years getting foggier about it, the way everyone does. What snapped her back was watching her own preschooler paint at the kitchen table every single day and thinking, why am I not doing that?

So she started painting again. And because she's a designer, she built rules for it: fixed canvas sizes, a locked color palette, a Figma board that tells her she isn't allowed to add a new color until six months in. Her words: the restraint leads to more creativity.

We talk about the solo mountain bike ride she took at nine years old, and the letter she wrote to her principal when she got home, which turned into a school choice fight in Vermont that changed things for other kids in her town. We talk about the mentor at The North Face who plucked her out of an internship, brought her along to Mountain Hardwear, and is now her daughter's godfather. Why she'd rather be an art director than a creative director, and what actually happens to your creativity when you get promoted. Why she needs to make physical things in a year when everything else is a screen.

And we close on her answer to the question I ask everyone, which is the simplest one anyone has given me: movement in nature. Plus the best advice I've heard on this show for people stuck in a city. Play hooky. Go ride for three hours. Get a margarita on the way home.

Makenzie Brown is a freelance art director and brand designer based in Boulder, Colorado, and the founder of Cereal for Dinner. She studied at Middlebury College, RISD's Summer Institute, and California College of the Arts, then spent her in-house years in the outdoor industry at The North Face, Mountain Hardwear, and Specialized before going out on her own. Alongside the client work she paints, and sells originals and prints through Cereal for Dinner Shop. She lives in Boulder with her husband, her daughter, and her dog, Chicken.

Follow Makenzie:

Cereal for Dinner https://cerealfordin.com
Shop https://cerealfordinnershop.com
Shop Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cerealfordinner_shop/

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

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#OutsideIsMagic #MakenzieBrown #CerealForDinner #BrandDesign #ArtDirection #GraphicDesign #Painting #Boulder #Colorado #CreativePodcast #DesignPodcast #Freelance #OutdoorIndustry #MountainBiking #MakeThings

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.

The first trick Christian Rigal ever learned on a BMX bike was a tree ride, at a Burger King in Moraga, California. Twenty five years later he rides mountain bikes for a living and, in his words, all he is doing is driving around looking for cool trees to ride his bike on.

Christian spent a decade as a pro BMX rider, earning X Games Real Street medals and filming video parts on both sides of the lens. Then Brandon Semenuk put him on a mountain bike and it changed the trajectory of his career. In this episode we get into what it means to carry a street rider's eye into the mountains, why he took a conscious step back from filming other people to focus on his own riding, and how he learned to stop measuring himself against friends who have been mountain biking their entire lives.

We also go deep on the trail he built on the Oregon coast near Pacific City. Thirty six days straight of building through the winter, roughly six of them spent hand placing moss and ferns so the trail would look like it belonged in the forest, and so the hillside would not wash out into it. Then we get into what happens after a project is done: why he insists on premieres and printed photos, why he gave away tires and pumps and helmets like it was Christmas, and why a video that only lives on Instagram never felt like enough to him.

Christian Rigal is a professional mountain biker and filmmaker who runs Rigal Visuals. He came up through BMX riding for United Bike Co, earning X Games Real Street medals (silver in 2017, bronze in 2018 and 2019) and appearing in video parts including Markit Zero. He moved to mountain bikes around 2018 and his films include Redemption, By The Homies, the Five Ten short Crossover, and Long Story Short for Specialized. He is supported by Specialized, Scott, Fox Racing, and Five Ten.

Follow Christian:

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/christianrigal/
Rigal Visuals https://www.instagram.com/rigalvisuals/

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

Subscribe for new episodes. If this one hit, share it with a friend.

#OutsideIsMagic #ChristianRigal #MountainBiking #BMX #MTB #TrailBuilding #RigalVisuals #Filmmaking #PacificNorthwest #Podcast

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.

Matt Quann spent his design career being asked to make the logo bigger. So when he started his own cycling brand, he took the logo off entirely. Thirteen years later, Ornot is still made in the USA, still small on purpose, and still one of the most quietly loved brands in cycling.

We go back to the early Grinduro days and trace the whole arc: the personal project that turned into a real company, teaching himself the business side one Google search at a time, why he chose Bay Area manufacturing when Asia was the easy route, and the two rules that carried him through thirteen years: I don't want this to be bigger than me, and I have this thing, I don't want to break it.

We also get into aging out of hands-on design and what saved him from it, how San Francisco shaped the brand, Tam Week punch cards, the floral jersey he refused to make, the logo-covered jersey he sold for less on purpose, and how to actually support small brands beyond buying their stuff.

Matt Quann is the founder and owner of Ornot, a San Francisco cycling apparel brand he started in 2013. A former bike racer and graphic designer, he built Ornot as the answer to billboard kit: minimally branded clothing, most of it made in the USA, designed around one question: is this something I want? Today Ornot is a team of eight or nine with its own storefront in San Francisco.

Follow Matt:

@mattqornot https://www.instagram.com/mattqornot/
@ornotbike https://www.instagram.com/ornotbike
Ornot https://www.ornotbike.com

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

Subscribe for new episodes. If this one hit, share it with a friend.

#OutsideIsMagic #Ornot #Cycling #MadeInUSA #GraphicDesign #SmallBrand #BikeIndustry #Podcast

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.