John Elordi is the father of Australian actor Jacob Elordi and a house painter by trade. Unlike his son, John has never built a public career in entertainment. The clearest picture of him comes from Jacob’s own accounts: a Basque family background, a childhood move to Australia, years of manual work, and a father whose example shaped the way Jacob thought about discipline and responsibility.
In Jacob’s 2022 GQ profile, John is described as a house painter who spent 13 years building the family home in Brisbane. Jacob also called his father a “totem of the kind of man that I would like to be,” making John’s influence on him one of the best-documented parts of his public profile.
Key takeaways
- John Elordi is Jacob Elordi’s father and worked as a house painter.
- Jacob has identified his paternal background as Basque and said his father grew up around Markina before moving to Australia as a child.
- John spent 13 years building the Brisbane home where Jacob grew up.
- John and his wife, Melissa Elordi, have four children; Jacob is the youngest and has three older sisters.
- The latest verified public appearance identified for John was in London on August 19, 2026.
John Elordi profile summary
| Detail | Verified information |
|---|---|
| Known for | Father of actor Jacob Elordi |
| Occupation | House painter by trade |
| Family background | Basque |
| Childhood | Grew up around Markina in the Basque Country |
| Migration | Reported to have moved to Australia at age eight |
| Wife | Melissa Elordi |
| Children | Four |
| Latest verified appearance | August 19, 2026, London |
Basque roots and a childhood move to Australia
Jacob has spoken directly about his paternal heritage. In a 2020 GQ video interview, he corrected a description of himself as being of Spanish descent and said his family is Basque.
A 2025 interview added more detail. Jacob said his father grew up around Markina in the Basque Country. Some later biographies describe John more specifically as being born in Markina-Xemein, but the stronger first-person account establishes where he grew up rather than a documented birthplace.
El País reported in 2022 that John was eight when his family emigrated to Australia. The exact year of the move has not been firmly established in the sources used for this profile.
One part of the family migration story has often been oversimplified. Some profiles have stated that John himself arrived in Australia with only eight dollars and cut sugar cane. A more detailed 2025 Fotogramas interview, however, ties that story more clearly to John’s father, Joaquín Elordi. Jacob described his grandfather as the family member who arrived with eight dollars, worked cutting sugar cane and later brought the rest of the family to Australia.
That distinction matters. John’s childhood migration is well supported as part of the family story, but the eight-dollar and sugar-cane account is better attributed to Joaquín rather than John.
A working life outside entertainment
John’s documented career is in painting, not acting. GQ identifies him as a house painter, and one of the most striking details Jacob has shared is the amount of work his father put into the family home.
John spent 13 years building the Brisbane house in which Jacob grew up. The detail helps explain why Jacob has repeatedly associated his father with physical work, endurance and discipline rather than with public recognition.
There is also documentary evidence consistent with the family’s painting business. Historical Australian Business Register records list an entity originally named “JOHN & MELISSA J ELORDI” and record the trading name “JOHN ELORDI PAINTING” from 2000.
The registry itself does not identify the people listed there as Jacob Elordi’s parents, so the record should be treated as corroborating rather than independently proving the family connection. It is nevertheless consistent with the names, occupation and Australian setting described in interviews.
The registration remains active, but its substantive details were last updated in 2017. That is not enough to establish whether John still works professionally as a painter on a day-to-day basis in 2026. The most accurate description is that he is a house painter by trade.
The example Jacob says his father set
John’s importance in Jacob’s story is less about public achievement than about example. In GQ, Jacob described his father as someone whose toughness and work ethic shaped his own ideas about adulthood.
That influence also appears in the way John approached Jacob’s early acting ambitions. Public accounts describe him as pragmatic about the difficulty of making a living as an actor. In January 2026, Jacob revisited that period during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, recalling that his father had encouraged him to keep a practical backup plan.
The caution did not amount to opposition. As Jacob’s career developed, John and Melissa remained involved and supportive. GQ reported that both parents owned T-shirts featuring many of Jacob’s screen characters, a small but concrete detail that shows their interest in his work without turning it into a larger claim about family dynamics.
By early 2026, Jacob had reached a new career milestone with an Academy Award nomination. Reporting on his television appearance described John celebrating from Australia with champagne and a phone call to his son. The moment is consistent with the broader picture Jacob has given over time: a father who was realistic about the risks of acting but supportive once his son committed to it.
Family life with Melissa Elordi
John is married to Melissa Elordi, Jacob’s mother. Together they have four children, and Jacob has said he is the youngest, with three older sisters.
The family’s history also includes a move from Brisbane to Melbourne while one of Jacob’s sisters attended the Australian Ballet School. Jacob later returned to Brisbane. The episode is one of the few publicly documented examples of the family making a major practical change around one of the children’s pursuits.
John and Melissa have occasionally appeared at public events with Jacob as his profile has grown. In January 2026, they attended W Magazine’s Best Performances Party in Los Angeles. On February 13, 2026, Getty Images documented John, Melissa and Jacob at the Vogue Australia Summer Ball at Sydney Opera House.
Those appearances have made John more recognizable to the public, but they have not turned him into a conventional celebrity figure with a public-facing career of his own.
Public appearances and current relevance
As of September 2, 2026, the most recent verified public appearance identified for John took place on August 19, 2026. He joined Jacob and Kendall Jenner for a meal at Cipriani in London, an outing covered the following day by Vogue.
John’s presence at that dinner establishes only that he was in London with his son. It does not confirm where he permanently lives, whether he remains actively employed as a painter, or what he thinks about Jacob’s personal relationships.
The same restraint applies to other details commonly attached to celebrity-family profiles. A reliable exact date of birth or current age for John has not been established in the sources supporting this article, and there is no credible basis here for a net-worth figure, salary estimate or acting filmography.
There is also a separate historical John Elordi in the Basque Museum & Cultural Center’s records who was born in 1917 and died in 2008. That person is unrelated to this profile and should not be confused with Jacob Elordi’s father.
Conclusion
John Elordi’s public story is comparatively simple: he is a tradesman, a father and part of a Basque family whose history continued in Australia. The most revealing facts about him are not celebrity details but practical ones—the painting work, the 13 years spent building the family home, and the example Jacob says he drew from that effort.
His relevance comes largely through Jacob’s own descriptions of him. Those accounts present John not as a public figure seeking attention, but as a working father whose influence became visible because his son chose to speak about it.