KEVIN FINN

Author, Speaker, Designer

Kevin Finn is an author, a TEDx speaker and an internationally recognized designer. He began his career in Dublin at the studio that has designed all of U2’s album covers and associated material. He then spent seven years as Joint Creative Director at Saatchi Design, Sydney, part of the Saatchi & Saatchi global network, before taking a radical turn and setting up his independent design practice—TheSumOf—in remote Australia working with local Aboriginal organizations alongside national and international commissions. He is now based in Brisbane, Australia.

He is founder, editor and publisher of the independent design journal Open Manifesto, which ran for 15 years (2004 - 2018) over eight issues and featured design legends Milton Glaser, Bob Gill, Michael Bierut, Jessica Walsh and George Lois, to name a few, alongside influential thinkers including Edward de Bono, Noam Chomsky, Adam Grant, as well as an ex-CIA operative, a real life super hero and an actual cyborg, among many others.

His book ‘Brand Principles: How to be a 21st Century Brand’ was released in 2022. In 2025, he relaunched his multicultural design trivia project DESIGNerd, the game where the most influential designers in the world test your knowledge—and share theirs.