The Episcopal Academy

Challenge

Alumni magazines live or die by relevance. The Episcopal Academy asked Open Haus to design Connections, its biannual alumni publication that reaches graduates from every decade of the school’s history. The challenge wasn’t just design. It was creating a publication that could speak to an 80-year-old class of ’62 graduate and a 25-year-old recent alum in the same breath, one that stayed true to EA’s prestigious brand while feeling current, warm, and genuinely worth reading.

Solution

Over nearly a decade of collaboration, Open Haus has developed a design system for Connections that balances consistency with evolution. Each issue organizes a dense mix of editorial content—feature stories, athletic updates, arts coverage, faculty profiles, Class Notes submissions, and archival material—into a publication that flows naturally and rewards readers who want to stay a while. Photography is treated editorially, given the space and context it deserves. Typography creates hierarchy without making it feel corporate.

Result

Connections has become one of EA’s most durable and valued communication tools: a twice-yearly touchpoint that deepens alumni connection to the school, supports fundraising and engagement efforts, and reinforces EA’s identity as an institution that cares about the full arc of a person’s life, not just their years on campus.