Woodstock Film Festival
Rebranding the Woodstock Film Festival
The first rebrand for the Hudson Valley's Oscar-qualifying celebration of fiercely independent cinema.
Founded in 2000, the Woodstock Film Festival (WFF) is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization that nurtures and supports emerging and established filmmakers, sharing their creative voices through an annual Oscar-qualifying festival and year-round programming.
The Woodstock Film Festival team applied to Madeo In-Kind, our program offering a large-scale rebranding project to a nonprofit donated by Madeo at no cost to the organization. More than 160 organizations applied in the program’s inaugural cycle. After narrowing the field to six finalists working across climate, film, food, and beyond, we selected the Woodstock Film Festival.
Our research and discovery revealed that the Woodstock Film Festival wholeheartedly embraces its ability to be both prestigious and informal at once. That idea developed into a brand built to feel warm, independent, intimate, inspiring, and rooted, expressing an upstate retreat that’s sophisticated, confident yet unconventional.
- Research & Discovery
- Visual Identity Design
- Motion Graphics
- Art Direction
- Brand Guidelines
- Brand Assets & Training
The identity is led by a bold, condensed wordmark that carries the festival’s fiercely independent spirit. The new logo brings the words “Woodstock Film Festival” so closely together, reflective of the inclusive, tight-knit community that the festival has been fostering for 26 years.
The flexible color palette evokes the surrounding nature of the Catskills and its sense of an outdoor retreat, along with the deliberate creative expression the festival offers in that setting. Organic reds, browns, and yellows combine with a vibrant green that signals energy and the festival’s support for emerging talent. The new identity system is flexible yet consistent, whether the festival shows up on an Instagram feed or a street corner in Kingston.
The new identity gives the Woodstock Film Festival a look as independent and self-assured as its programming. The brand commands cultural weight in front of funders and shows up the same way across every screen, street, and venue. “For over 26 years, the Woodstock Film Festival has continued to grow and evolve, but what has never changed has been our commitment to supporting fiercely independent filmmaking, artistic excellence, and community building,” said Meira Blaustein, Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Woodstock Film Festival from 2000-2026. “Our new look honors that spirit while giving us a fresh visual language for the next chapter of the Festival.”
Read more about the Madeo In-Kind Program below.