Jessica Walsh (born October 30, 1986)Caitlin Dover
“'Awesome, Twisted, and Beautiful': A Q&A with Designer Jessica Walsh,”
Guggenheim Blog, February 7, 2014. is an American designer, art director, illustrator and educator. She was a partner of the design studio ''Sagmeister & Walsh'' (2010–2019), and the founder of the creative agency ''&Walsh'' (2019–present). She has taught at the

School of Visual Arts The School of Visual Arts New York City (SVA NYC) is a private for-profit art school in New York City. It was founded in 1947 and is a member of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design. History This school was started by ...

(SVA).

Early life and education

Walsh was born on October 30, 1986 in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

and raised in

Ridgefield, Connecticut Ridgefield is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. Situated in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains, the 300-year-old community had a population of 25,033 at the 2020 census. The town center, which was formerly a borough ...

. She began coding and designing websites at age 11.Scott Rodd
“Font of Youth: Jessica Walsh, Graphic Design’s ‘It’ Girl,”
''

New York Observer New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator ...

'', April 10, 2014. Walsh went on to study graphic design at the

Rhode Island School of Design The Rhode Island School of Design (RISD , pronounced "Riz-D") is a private art and design school in Providence, Rhode Island. The school was founded as a coeducational institution in 1877 by Helen Adelia Rowe Metcalf, who sought to increase the ...

(RISD), where she received a BFA degree in 2008.Laura C. Mallonee
“Jessica Walsh: Art Director of Sagmeister & Walsh,”
''Scene'' magazine, May 2014.

Career

After earning her Bachelor of Fine Arts from RISD in 2008, Walsh moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

to intern at the notable design firm

Pentagram A pentagram (sometimes known as a pentalpha, pentangle, or star pentagon) is a regular five-pointed star polygon, formed from the diagonal line segments of a convex (or simple, or non-self-intersecting) regular pentagon. Drawing a circle arou ...

. She turned down a job at Apple where she was offered nearly $100,000 annually to accept the internship under

Paula Scher Paula Scher (born October 6, 1948, Washington, D.C.) is an American graphic designer, painter and art educator in design. She also served as the first female principal at Pentagram, which she joined in 1991.Scher, Paula." (n.d.): Oxford University ...

at Pentagram, where she would stay for nearly a year.Ashleigh Allsopp
“Interview: Jessica Walsh discusses play, her favourite designs, future plans & that photo,”
Digital Arts, May 9, 2013. She then worked as an associate art director at '' Print'' magazine and had design work and illustrations featured in various books, magazines and newspapers, including the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' and ''

New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. ...

''.“The Envy Index: 25 Under 25,”
''

The L Magazine ''The L Magazine'' was a free bi-weekly magazine in New York City featuring investigative articles, arts and culture commentary, and event listings. It was available through distribution in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and Hoboken. History ''T ...

'', December 7, 2011.Stefan Gruenwedel
“Hand-crafted photo illustrations of Jessica Walsh,”

adobe.com Adobe Inc. ( ), originally called Adobe Systems Incorporated, is an American multinational computer software company incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in San Jose, California. It has historically specialized in software for the crea ...

, December 2012. In reflections about her time at Print magazine, she identifies it as one of the best things to happen in her career as it was how she found and developed her personal style.

Sagmeister & Walsh

In 2010, Walsh met

Stefan Sagmeister Stefan Sagmeister (born August 6, 1962) is an Austrian graphic designer, storytelling, storyteller, and typographer based in New York City. In 1993, Sagmeister founded his company, Sagmeister Inc., to create designs for the music industry. He has ...

. He looked through her portfolio and offered her a job at his design studio, Sagmeister Inc. In June 2012, after two years at the firm, Walsh was made partner, at age 25.Jim Edwards
“Why This New York Design Agency Makes Its Employees Pose Naked For Staff Photos,”
''

Business Insider ''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German publ ...

'', June 2, 2013. In homage to a nude self-portrait Sagmeister had sent out to announce the formation of his own firm 19 years prior, the new partners released a photo of themselves naked in their office to announce the renaming of the firm to Sagmeister & Walsh. Blending handcraft, photography and painting with digital design, Walsh works primarily on branding, typography, website design and art installations. Her signature style has been described as "bold, emotional and provocative" with the occasional surrealistic flourish, and her art has been said to look "hand-made and at times quite daring." Walsh has worked on projects for clients including

Levi's Levi Strauss & Co. () is an American clothing company known worldwide for its Levi's () brand of denim jeans. It was founded in May 1853 when German-Jewish immigrant Levi Strauss moved from Buttenheim, Bavaria, to San Francisco, California, t ...

, Aizone,

Adobe Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for '' mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of ...

and Colab Eyewear, and rebranding efforts for

The Jewish Museum of New York The Jewish Museum is an art museum and repository of cultural artifacts, housed at 1109 Fifth Avenue, in the former Felix M. Warburg House, along Museum Mile on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, New York City. The first Jewish museum in the Unit ...

and the

Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum is located in Ridgefield, Connecticut. The Aldrich has no permanent collection and is the only museum in Connecticut that is dedicated solely to the exhibition of contemporary art. The museum presents the first ...

in Connecticut. Walsh and Sagmeister collaborated on ''Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh'', an exhibition that opened at the Jewish Museum in March 2013, and ran for five months. For the exhibit, an exploration of happiness, they created a sound-activated sculpture and five short films.

&Walsh

In July 2019, Walsh announced she was going to leave Sagmeister & Walsh and forming her own studio, &Walsh. Walsh has said that the studio is a fulfillment of her dreams as a teen to run her own business and the studio will become one of 36 female-led creative studios in the United States.

''40 Days of Dating''

In 2013, Walsh and fellow designer and friend Tim Goodman decided to date for 40 days to see if they could overcome their relationship issues and fall in love. They documented the social experiment on a blog, ''40 Days of Dating'', launched in July 2013.Michelle Ruiz
“40 Days of Dating Couple Endorse Lizzy Caplan, Paul Bettany for Movie Version,”
''

Cosmopolitan Cosmopolitan may refer to: Food and drink * Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo" History * Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953 Hotels and resorts * Cosmopoli ...

'', September 25, 2013. In support of the blog, which earned more than 5 million unique visitors in less than a year, they appeared in segments on talk shows ''

Today Today (archaically to-day) may refer to: * Day of the present, the time that is perceived directly, often called ''now'' * Current era, present * The current calendar date Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Today'' (1930 film), a 1930 ...

'' and '' The View''. In September 2013,

Warner Brothers Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California, and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. D ...

purchased the film rights, with a screenplay to be written by

Lorene Scafaria Lorene Scafaria (born 1978) is an American filmmaker, playwright, musician, and former actress. She wrote and directed the films '' Seeking a Friend for the End of the World'' (2012), '' The Meddler'' (2015), and '' Hustlers'' (2019), in additio ...

, and

Michael Sucsy Michael Sucsy (born February 14, 1973) is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. He is best known for directing the HBO film ''Grey Gardens'' and ''The Vow''. Early life and education Sucsy was raised in Connecticut and New Y ...

attached to direct.Eric Dodds
“’40 Days’ Online Stars Prepare for Hollywood Ending,”
''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'', September 19, 2013. Walsh and Goodman will serve as consulting writers on the script and also wrote a book for Abrams, ''40 Days of Dating: An Experiment'', out in early 2015.

''12 Kinds of Kindness''

In 2016, Walsh and Goodman began a second project together, which they described as a "12-step experiment designed to open

heir Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Offic ...

hearts, eyes, and minds". They set up twelve tasks in which they displayed kindness to people and recorded the results. The experiment was live from January 13 to March 15, 2016.

Ladies Wine and Design

Walsh started Ladies, Wine & Design, a nonprofit organization to encourage women to work together rather than compete, in 2016. , the organization has 273 local chapters around the world.

Other work

Walsh teaches design and typography at the

in New York.Michael Silverberg
“Some Uncomfortable Thoughts About Sagmeister & Walsh’s New Identity,”
'' Print'', January 23, 2013. She is represented by

Creative Artists Agency Creative Artists Agency LLC (CAA) is an American talent and sports agency based in Los Angeles, California. It is regarded as an influential company in the talent agency business and manages numerous clients. In March 2016, CAA had 1,800 emplo ...

Exhibitions

* ''Sagmeister: Another Show About Advertising and Promotion Materials'', Les Arts Décoratifs,

The Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the '' Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A centra ...

Paris, France Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

, 2011-12 * ''The Happy Show'', Institute of Contemporary Art,

Philadelphia, PA Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Since ...

; Museum of Contemporary Art,

Los Angeles, CA Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

;

Chicago Cultural Center The Chicago Cultural Center, opened in 1897, is a Chicago Landmark building operated by Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events that houses the city's official reception venue where the Mayor of Chicago has welcomed preside ...

Chicago, IL (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

;

Design Exchange The Design Exchange (DX) is a Canadian event venue. It is located in Toronto's financial district in the historical Toronto Stock Exchange building, that was incorporated into a skyscraper in 1991, the Toronto-Dominion Centre (222 Bay Street). Th ...

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

, 2012Kisa Lala
“Moving Against Type: Stefan Sagmeister,”
''

Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

'', June 19, 2013. * ''Six Things: Sagmeister & Walsh'',

The Jewish Museum The Jewish Museum is an art museum and repository of cultural artifacts, housed at 1109 Fifth Avenue, in the former Felix M. Warburg House, along Museum Mile on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, New York City. The first Jewish museum in the Unit ...

New York, NY New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, 2013 *''Sagmeister & Walsh: Beauty'', MAK – Museum of Applied Arts Vienna, 2018/2019

Honors and awards

* New Star of Design, ''Computer Arts'', 2010 * Society of Publication Designers award, 2010 * Young Gun Award,

Art Directors Club The Art Directors Club of New York is an organization for art directors in New York City. It was founded in 1920, and has grown as an industry group, promoting art directors' work through exhibitions and awards, including the annual DESI award for ...

, 2011“People to Watch: Jessica Walsh,”
''GD USA'', January 2013. * New Visual Artist Award, '' Print'' magazine, 2011 * The Envy Index: 25 Under 25, ''

'', 2011 * Type Director’s Club Award, Les Arts Décoratifs poster, 2012 * 25 People Shaping the Future of Design, ''

Complex Complex commonly refers to: * Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe ** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...

'', 2013 * People to Watch, ''GD USA'', 2013 *

Webby Award The Webby Awards are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over two thousand industry experts and technology innovators. Categories include ...

, Best Home/Welcome Page, Sagmeister & Walsh, 2014Abigail Tracy
“Webby Awards Honor the Best of the Internet,”
'' Inc.'', April 28, 2014.

Personal life

Walsh lives in New York City with her husband, cinematographer Zak Mulligan.

References

External links

&Walsh websiteSagmeister & Walsh website

''40 Days of Dating'' blog''12 Kinds of Kindness'' website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Walsh, Jessica 1986 births Living people American women graphic designers Rhode Island School of Design alumni School of Visual Arts faculty Artists from New York City American women academics People from Ridgefield, Connecticut American art directors 21st-century American women