SwimOutlet
Alex & Gretchen Walsh: Dynamic UVA Duo Launches Swimsuit Collection With Sporti
Alex and Gretchen Walsh are proven champions in the pool. They've won NCAA championships, U.S. national titles, and medals on an international level. They've destroyed facility records at pools around the country and have shattered American records as core pieces of what is quickly becoming a powerhouse women's swimming & diving program at the University of Virginia.
Now, these dynamic sisters are making history again as the first collegiate swim athletes in history to create a co-branded swimsuit collection with a nationally recognized swim brand. In late September, SwimOutlet, the largest online swimwear retailer in the United States, launched the Sporti x Alex + Gretchen Walsh Collection, a series of swim suits designed by Alex and Gretchen Walsh and inspired by their journey in the swimming world as well as their experiences in Nashville and Barcelona.
Gretchen (left) and Alex (right) Walsh modeling their suits as part of the Sporti x Alex + Gretchen Walsh Collection.
SwimOutlet
Sporti, which is a brand owned, operated, and distributed by SwimOutlet, relaunched over the summer with a new mission and new brand pillars. “Part of that relaunch included design collaborations with athletes, influencers, artists, all aligned with a mission to really give back," said Ryan Moakley, senior retention marketing manager at SwimOutlet. Alex and Gretchen Walsh were at the top of the list of athletes SwimOutlet wanted to partner with.
"We committed ourselves to our brand pillars of community, diversity, accessibility, approachability, sustainability, but ultimately, fun - which is, I think, one of the most important things that these two [Alex and Gretchen] bring to the table," Moakley said.
In June 2021, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that student-athletes have the right to profit off of their own name, image, and likeness. That decision spawned a new era of collegiate athletics in which student-athletes are now able to pursue opportunities to take advantage of their hard work and talent. For Alex and Gretchen, who have been swimming together their entire lives, the opportunity to sign with SwimOutlet on a joint NIL deal was too exciting to pass up.
“I think that decision was almost immediate," said Gretchen Walsh, a second-year at UVA. "This has never been done before - making our own swim line - so immediately we both jumped at the idea especially because it’s a unique partnership."
"We started swimming together when we were around four and five years old," said Alex Walsh, who is in her third year at Virginia. "The fact that we were able to pursue this collaboration together, I think that was one of the main reasons that we just knew immediately that we wanted to sign with SwimOutlet."
Their bond as sisters and swimming teammates for life was naturally a strong inspiration for the collection, but the Sporti team also identified some other sources of inspiration from meaningful places in Alex and Gretchen's shared life experiences.
“Of course, there was this overwhelming sense of sisterhood, but there were also these key memories that they kept reflecting on," Moakley said. "For Alex, she is so passionate about her hometown of Nashville and how Nashville really influenced her not only as an individual, but as an athlete."
Alex and Gretchen were born in Nashville. Their family moved to Connecticut for a few years in their childhood, but they returned to the Music City by the time they were teenagers. Nashville means a lot to both of them, but Gretchen chose to look overseas for a source of inspiration for her swimsuit designs.
"And Gretchen, she had this very distinct core memory of being in Barcelona and having her first international swim meet with Alex," said Moakley. "And so as we continued talking, it always went back to these two memories of Nashville and Barcelona. And in between were these other memories of travel that really connected to their sense of wanderlust and their sense of traveling together as sisters.”
The Sporti x Alex + Gretchen Walsh Collection is split into three different sections, with two separate collections designed individually by Alex and Gretchen and a third - the Sister Duo Collection - designed collaboratively by both of them.
“We’re sisters and we have a lot in common, but we are very different," says Alex. "We have very different personalities, so it was special to be able to have our own suits and then also suits that we worked on together. I think that is very really representative of our relationship and our dynamic.”
The process of designing the suits with the Sporti team was not easy and took a lot of intensive work to make sure that the suits would be durable and comfortable through any level of training. But, seeing the finished product was extremely rewarding. Alex and Gretchen flew out to Palm Springs, California to try on the finished suits and model them for promotional photos and videos.
"It was honestly amazing just being able to wear the suits that we had worked on for months, seeing them come to life and then take these amazing pictures... it was really just an unforgettable experience," said Gretchen.
Below you can see some of the swimsuits from the Sister Duo Collection, the suits that Alex and Gretchen designed together.
"Dynasty" - This metallic gold suit shimmers in the sunlight. Inspired by their interest in designer products, the gold also reflects Alex and Gretchen's competitive nature when it comes to winning races.
"Groovy" - This suit screams "happy, fun swimmer." The smiley faces emphasize the positive attitude that Alex and Gretchen bring to the pool during even their most challenging training sessions. Swimming can be hard, but it's also fun and the smiley faces on this suit remind the swimmer to keep a smile on their face.
"XOXO" (left worn by Alex) and "Whimsy" (right worn by Gretchen) - XOXO represents the love that Alex and Gretchen have for each other and for the sport of swimming. It ties back to their desire to give back to the swimming community. The design of Whimsy is meant to resemble water, which is not only the medium in which Alex and Gretchen compete, but it has also been a huge part of their lives going back to when they spent a few formative years of their childhood on the coast of Connecticut.
They also have individual collections - the Alex Walsh Collection and the Gretchen Walsh Collection - with various suits inspired by Nashville and Barcelona. You can see the full collection here.
In the short time since their collection launched, Alex and Gretchen have already seen that their suits are being purchased and worn all over the country.
"It’s already started and it’s so amazing to see all this hard work we put into this collection and seeing it pay off and everyone loves it," Gretchen said. "That was super exciting for the both of us. We have family friends who send pictures of young girls wearing our suits. Other college teams have bought our suits and they’ve been repping them. We have a huge community of friends in the swimming world. And outside of that, our high school friends have bought the suits - they don’t even swim," Gretchen added with a laugh.
From first learning how to swim back in Nashville, to international swimming superstars who hope to lead Virginia to a third-consecutive NCAA national championship this season, this has been an incredible journey for Alex and Gretchen Walsh. And it's just getting started.
But, according to Alex Walsh, the most important purpose of the Sporti x Alex + Gretchen Walsh Collection is to help the next generation of swimmers enjoy and find meaning in the sport of swimming the same way that Alex and Gretchen did.
"It’s very surreal to think about us - you know we have so many memories in the pool from when we were kids, just enjoying the water - and to think about someone coming up to us and telling us, 'Hey, you guys are going to be internationally renowned athletes with a partnership with the largest retailer of swimsuits in the world' - that just seems, it’s crazy really. I feel like that’s another reason why doing the swimsuit collection is so important to us because we want to be able to inspire kids… because we used to be kids, so we just want young girls and boys to have the confidence and the fun that we had when we were kids.”