Festival of Trees
Two years, two worlds, one recurring holiday brief.
Year
2025 - 2026
Discipline
Campaign Design
Scope
Two annual editions
The Brief
Festival of Trees is a Dearborn holiday fundraiser, now in its fourth decade, raising money for pediatric research at Children's Hospital of Michigan through the Children's Foundation. Each year runs on a theme, and the venue is decorated to it end to end. I was brought on to design the promotional artwork: the poster that carries the year's theme to the public, output for both large-format display and the event program, while holding a dense run-of-show.
The organization sets the direction. They provide a theme, a lead color, and a friendship ornament they use as the seed for each year's visual world. My job was to take that single seed and build the public-facing pieces from it, introducing the concept, staying warm and family-facing, and keeping a full nine-day schedule legible underneath.
The Approach
I treated each year as its own world, because the event is built that way. For "Sweet Dreams," the brief was a candy theme with pink leading, so I built a soft pastel field of cotton-candy pinks and blues under a rounded, bedtime-gentle script. For "Reaching for the Stars," it meant a deep cosmic violet, a child silhouetted against the curve of the earth reaching toward a single bright star, and a high-contrast serif that gives the aspiration weight.
Underneath both, the information architecture held constant. Theme up top, a scannable multi-column schedule below, special events and contact anchored at the base. A parent should read the concept from across the room and find a specific Tuesday's hours up close.
The System
The two editions share nothing on the surface and everything underneath: the same schedule grid, the same hierarchy of theme over information, the same warmth pitched to families. Each ships at two sizes, for display and for the program. One recurring brief, answered without repeating itself.