McKinley Johnson has taught technical fashion courses and costume design for over twenty-five years at Dominican University and various institutions around Chicago, including Columbia College and The Art Institute of Chicago. His craftsmanship as a master-tailor / cutter, in the Chicagoland theatre community and especially the Goodman Theatre, has spanned over three decades. He has built costumes for such legendary Broadway designers as Paul Tazewell (Hamilton), Susan Hilferty (Wicked), and Catherine Zuber (Moulin Rouge). In 2016, as the production manager and cutter for local Chicago fashion designer Michael Alan Stein's Spring Collection, his skills were on full display during New York's Fashion Week where his handiwork was noted by critics for its fit and cut. Currently, he is researching and developing a musical, with a local playwright, that focuses on 1930's Zoot Suits and the political upheaval those outfits garnered as the first protest garments to be seen in American culture. He holds a BFA from Howard University and MA from University of Illinois at Chicago.