Clio Chaffardon

✦ Teaching Art Direction to Master-level design students within a contemporary, research-based approach. ✦ Designing course content around editorial systems, typographic experimentation, and concept-driven creative processes. ✦ Supporting students in building critical thinking, visual literacy, and design methods aligned with real-world applications. ✦ Bringing professional and international experience into the academic environment to prepare the next generation of designers.

✦ Co-founder of an independent creative studio crafting visual systems across editorial, spatial and cultural dimensions. ✦ Led the creative direction for visual identities, campaigns, and installations for institutions, hybrid venues and future-facing brands. ✦ Developed flexible design systems rooted in research, meaning, and visual storytelling — from experimental typography to editorial architecture. ✦ Collaborated with multidisciplinary teams (filmmakers, coders, writers) to translate complex narratives into cohesive, strategic design outputs. ✦ Advocated for a design practice that is intentional, adaptable, and engaged — bridging aesthetics, clarity and impact.

✦ Taught Creative Direction within the Communication Design MA programme, blending strategic thinking and visual experimentation. ✦ Mentored students on how to articulate conceptual frameworks, develop narratives, and prototype visual systems. ✦ Integrated professional case studies into the pedagogy (editorial, branding, campaign work). ✦ Promoted a radical and research-led approach to visual communication.

✦ Designed and delivered courses on typography and visual systems within the Faculty of Communication Sciences. ✦ Explored the relationship between language, form, and message in both digital and print media. ✦ Fostered autonomy and critical design thinking in cross-disciplinary cohorts of students. ✦ Connected academic theory with applied graphic practices in the context of contemporary communication.

✦ Led experimental typography workshops and research-based projects. ✦ Introduced modular systems, expressive typographic languages, and alternative forms of typesetting. ✦ Encouraged students to question typographic norms and explore the political, poetic and performative dimension of type.

✦ Graphic design and magazine layout for cultural institutions, including editorial work for Cinecittà. ✦ Developed refined, content-driven design approaches combining historical narrative and contemporary language. ✦ Delivered visual concepts aligned with institutional guidelines while introducing typographic nuance and editorial rhythm.

✦ Co-founded a design collective producing capsule collections of graphic objects and experimental editions. ✦ Oversaw creative direction, production, and brand storytelling. ✦ Created limited-run artefacts exploring the boundary between design, art, and everyday use. ✦ Promoted a self-initiated, independent design practice rooted in experimentation.

✦ Contributed to packaging and branding projects for major food brands (Barilla, Zuegg). ✦ Designed identity elements and restaurant branding for Barilla in NYC and Los Angeles. ✦ Balanced global brand standards with expressive local identity systems. ✦ Integrated storytelling into brand environments and packaging systems.

✦ Partner and lead designer in a collaborative studio practice. ✦ Worked across visual identity, editorial design, and exhibition graphics. ✦ Developed design systems for publishers, institutions, and events. ✦ Built long-term relationships with clients based on clarity, dialogue, and design excellence.

✦ Artistic direction for independent editorial projects and design objects. ✦ Focus on small-run publishing, visual essays, and printed experiments. ✦ Explored the intersection between narrative form, paper, and typographic systems.

✦ Visual design for international clients across identity and print. ✦ Developed clear, structured, content-led design solutions. ✦ Reinforced editorial and visual consistency across multilingual outputs.

✦ Collaborated on projects in cultural communication, signage, and graphic campaigns. ✦ Participated in typographic research, layout systems and conceptual identity proposals.

✦ Early-stage studio experience on identity and communication projects. ✦ Immersion in a collaborative design process oriented around structure, story, and clarity.