Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon Co-Designs Festival Guide for Eaux Claires Music Festival

Eaux Claires Music & Arts Festival, the festival curated by Bon Iver‘s Justin Vernon and the National‘s Aaron Dessner, takes place in Eau Claire, Wisconsin July 17-18. Bon Iver, the National, Low, Spoon, Sufjan Stevens, Low, and the Tallest Man on Earth are some of the confirmed acts.

Today, the festival released a digital edition of a festival guide that Vernon helped design by hand, as you can see in the photo above. He designed all of the logos for every band included in the guide. Check it out here.

It contains band bios (Sufjan: “If you had something in mind, change it. Nothing certain, nothing sacrosanct. Beauty in your ears. Discontinuation forever”), descriptions of the festival grounds, a hand-drawn map of the festival grounds, a pronunciation guide, (Bon Iver: “No idea”), and more. 

In a blog post on the festival’s website, creative director Michael Brown explained how the festival guide came about. He writes:

Months ago, as we were conceptualizing and brainstorming the different aspects of this festival, Justin would scribble his thoughts and ideas in a series of Field Notes. (If you’re not familiar with Field Notes, they’re small, pocket-sized journals, intended to be always at hand in the event you need to “notate” in the moment. Their distinctive appearance is the work of Draplin Design—who, by the way, worked with Justin and I to create the Eaux Claires logo. (Thanks, Draplin!)

After scribbling his way through several of these mighty little notebooks over the course of those incubation sessions, Justin felt compelled—then INSISTED—that everyone coming to this festival should have something similar. Something tangible that acts as a keepsake, guide, portal, and record of their experience at the festival. And so began an attempt to fashion a simple journal to make sure every festival attendee could walk away with something to remember the summer. 

A physical copy will be distributed to everyone who attends Eaux Claires:

Watch a trailer for the festival: