X Uetli

X Uetli is a community project built around a simple idea: meeting at the same place, running the same climb, and seeing how far each person wants to go.

X Uetli is an ongoing project dedicated to community running events on Zurich’s local mountain, the Uetliberg. What began as a simple idea – running the same hill multiple times together – has grown into a small but vibrant movement of runners who share a taste for long efforts, elevation and shared experiences.

We created the visual identity, website, social media presence and event communications, building a clear and minimal platform that supports everything from casual group runs to record-breaking challenges.

From the outside, running the same mountain over and over can look like madness. In reality, X Uetli is less about extreme performance and more about community – meeting in the same place, sharing the same trail and letting everyone decide how far they want to go.

The Uetliberg, Zurich’s house mountain, became the natural stage. With its steep sections, technical terrain and easy access from the city, it offered the perfect setting for repeat climbs, Everesting attempts and experimental formats like Backyard-style events.

X Uetli is not a club, not a brand in the traditional sense, and not an official organisation. It’s an open platform – a pretext to meet, run and explore personal limits together.

The main challenge was to give structure and clarity to something intentionally informal. Events like 10× Uetliberg, Everesting or Backyard loops can sound extreme, so the communication needed to make them feel inviting rather than intimidating. The tone remained minimal and human, with a lightweight communication style that activates around events and stays quiet in between. The goal was a platform that feels open and inclusive, even when the numbers involved suggest the opposite.

The X Uetli identity is intentionally reduced to a single symbol.

There is no wordmark and no explicit reference to the letter “X” – a conscious decision to avoid visual clichés and keep the project open and informal rather than brand-driven. The symbol acts as a subtle anchor across all touchpoints, from digital platforms to event communication, always prioritising clarity and restraint.

A bilingual website serves as the central hub, featuring an event calendar, key route data, selected visual recaps and references to registration, Strava and social channels. The design is intentionally minimal and easy to navigate.

The project lives where runners are: primarily on Strava and Instagram. The Strava club keeps the community connected and visible beyond individual events, while Instagram is used to share announcements, visuals and recaps – only when there is something meaningful to communicate. All event graphics, social assets and newsletters are designed in-house, following the same minimal visual language.

The communication remains intentionally lightweight and focused: no constant posting, no pressure to generate content, just clear updates when new events are planned.

Over time, X Uetli has taken many forms: warm-ups, long efforts, community challenges and collaborative events in different settings. What matters is not the format, but the people who come together around it.

The project has also become the backdrop for memorable stories – from record-breaking performances that turned the Uetliberg into a meeting point for friends and supporters, to collective initiatives that united hundreds of runners in support of someone facing a life-changing challenge.

These moments highlight what X Uetli truly represents: not numbers or achievements, but connection, solidarity and shared effort.

Today, X Uetli functions as a small but well-defined ecosystem: a clear visual identity, a bilingual website as the central information hub, a Strava club and a social presence that activate around key moments, and a set of reusable design elements that support event communication. Around all of this, a community has grown – one that extends beyond Zurich and beyond any single format.

The platform remains intentionally flexible: able to support anything from a simple group run to more demanding challenges, always with the same understated and honest communication.

X Uetli is a project that sits somewhere between community initiative and design experiment. It shows how minimal design can support informal structures without turning them into rigid brands, and how communication can stay quiet, focused and human without losing clarity.

More than anything, the project reinforces an idea that runs through many of our internal initiatives: design doesn’t need to dominate to be effective. Sometimes, its role is simply to create a clear and supportive frame – so that people, stories and shared experiences can take centre stage.

Identity, web, social media, event communication, photography