I’m Brendan Barry — a design leader with 15+ years of experience shaping complex information into clear, useful, and compelling visual systems. My work sits at the intersection of information design, data visualization, UX, and brand, with a focus on building design practices that scale across products, teams, and organizations.
Most recently, I spent seven years at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, where I established and led the Data Visualization Team within the Economic Research Department. In that role, I partnered closely with economists, analysts, product owners, and leadership to modernize how research and data were communicated to policymakers, peers, and the public. I oversaw the design and evolution of flagship publications, developed interactive, data-driven tools adopted across the Bank, and helped define standards for visual consistency, accessibility, and editorial clarity.
Before the Fed, I led global design teams at Euromonitor International, progressing from individual contributor to Head of Design. There, I worked across product, research, sales, and marketing to evolve the company’s visual language, design interactive dashboards and data products, and scale syndicated data-visualization content used by clients worldwide. That experience shaped my approach to design leadership: pragmatic, collaborative, and grounded in business and user needs.
Across roles, my core strength is translating complexity into clarity — whether that’s economic research, financial data, or technical subject matter. I’m as comfortable setting design direction and mentoring teams as I am working hands-on with typography, layouts, systems, and data. I’ve built and managed teams, chaired cross-functional committees, established workflows and templates, and partnered with stakeholders to ship work thoughtfully and reliably.
Outside of client and organizational work, I maintain a daily design blog, Coffee Spoons, where I write about data visualization, information design, and visual culture. I also pursue genealogy and family-history research — a practice that reinforces the same skills I bring to design: rigorous research, attention to detail, and narrative synthesis.
I’m currently seeking a full-time, in-house design leadership role where I can help teams communicate complex ideas clearly, build durable design systems, and elevate the quality and impact of their work.
You can view selected work here, read more writing at Coffee Spoons, or connect with me on LinkedIn.