John Connolly

Principal, Executive Creative Director

With a talent for impeccable design and detail, as well as a deep love for beauty, order and typography, John’s masterful, guiding hand can be felt in all manner of IOP brand identity, brand story design execution, digital and print projects.

A welcome calm, unwavering voice in the midst of even the most chaotic project, John is known around the office as our “feedback whisperer.” He’s able to draw out commentary from clients — even when they can’t say, or don’t know exactly why a concept feels not quite right — and then interpret the learning for successful team resolution.

In addition to his IOP work, John shares his knowledge and love of graphic design and typography as a teacher at his undergraduate alma mater, The University of the Arts. He’s been a guest speaker at SUNY New Paltz School of Fine Art and the Business School, as well as The University of the Arts 50th Graphic Design Anniversary Symposium where he gave a talk and was honored to introduce a seminal film by one of their legendary professors, Inge Druckrey.

John was the art director for Architecture Magazine and assisted in the design of Edward Tufte’s Visual Explanations. He is a member of the AIGA and also served for three years on Appleton Coated’s National Design Council, helping to guide the company on trends in the paper and the printed communications marketplace. His work has been published in ID Magazine, Communication Arts, Graphis and others.

In college (before Macs!) his graphic design professors transformed how he saw the world — from big picture messages and how they were delivered, down to the detail of what characterized letters and set them apart. He further pursued his creative vision with an MFA in Graphic Design from Yale University.

John divides his time between Brooklyn (where his dog Jack runs in nearby parks several times a day), Philadelphia (where he teaches), and the Boston suburbs — where he’s from and often attends gatherings with his seven nieces and nephews.