&Walsh crafts potent new visual identity for global creative agency GUT

GUT is a full-service independent ad agency headquartered in Florida and with offices in the US, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Canada and Europe. It describes itself as a "Brave Agency for Brave Clients", which supports the likes of Google, Stella Artois and Philadelphia Cream Cheese.

Founded in 2018, it worked with iconic New York studio &Walsh in the following year to craft its original, eye-catching logo, which took literal inspiration from the intestines of the gut.

Since then, GUT has expanded to over 500+ people in over seven countries worldwide. It's now partnered with &Walsh once more to develop a full branding system, including an entire asset library of custom illustrations and animations, a custom typeface, and visual continuity for the brand's international locations across Miami, Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Toronto, Mexico City, Los Angeles and Amsterdam.

The rebrand aimed to expand upon the original spiral intestines logo and develop its brand asset library to create continuity through different locations regarding typography, social media, photography, awards, company events, announcements, internal presentations and printed materials.

Graphic elements

To accomplish this, &Walsh built a library of brand elements and accompanying guidelines, including sub-brand logos, illustrations, patterns and a custom alphabet, creating brand consistency across each touchpoint.

This sophisticated guidelines system can easily be scaled and implemented across their different agency locations and creative departments worldwide.

Meanwhile, new illustrations by Marina Glikman and Jessica Gracia cover icons, city icons and trophies. These designs follow GUT's signature style and logo aesthetic, featuring the main brand ingredients in their texture, colour and shape.

The illustrations will also be used for key moments for the agency, such as new office openings and industry award announcements.

Finally, type designers Jessica Gracia and Yuxin Zhou have designed a new custom alphabet and numbers for GUT, which are intended for expressive and playful moments across different applications such as countdowns, anniversaries, customised stationery and environmental spaces.

These characters are an extension of the brand's spiral gut intestines logo and are made up of a combination of the New Spirit typeface and the 3D GUT signature spiral.

The creative direction of the project was led by Jessica Walsh, strategy by Lauren Walsh and production by Chanel Harper and Adriano Ellert. The design leads were Jessica Gracia, Sofia Noronha and Fabrizio Morra; 3D design was by Yuxin Zhou and Kaan Iscan, and animation design was by Yuxin Zhou, Sofia Noronha, Zitong Zhao and Albert Merino.