Lollapalooza Global
As Creative Director of Lollapalooza, I led the definition and rollout of a new global brand system — aligning seven countries and six languages under a single, flexible framework while preserving the distinct energy of each market.
Born in the ’90s, re-established in Chicago in the 2000s, and expanded globally by 2018, Lollapalooza had outgrown its brand. Independent marketing teams across each market led to fragmentation, inconsistent execution, and a system that struggled to adapt across languages and cultures. The opportunity was to create a brand flexible enough to scale globally while still feeling authentic locally.
— THE RESULT —
One brand system. Executed globally by independent teams.
First year after global rebrand launch:
+225%
Global licensing revenue
+42%
International sponsor growth
+38%
International ticket sales
— THE SYSTEM —
Defining the Lolla global brand
Built for distributed teams, global markets, and hundreds of independent operators
Alignment
Seven independent festival organizations. A dozen+ illustrators across multiple countries. Every market with its own operators, its own vendors, its own instincts about what Lolla should be.
Before a single asset was produced, everyone needed to agree on a shared creative brief. The brand pillars and positioning work were the alignment infrastructure — a common operating language that let distributed teams make local decisions without breaking global consistency.
The logo
The original logo was built for print. Removing the inline stroke, increasing color saturation, and establishing format-specific sizing rules for horizontal and stacked configurations meant the mark could perform at 48 pixels and a festival stage without compromise.
Every sizing rule in the system was an engineering specification — not a style preference.
The illustration system
The brief to illustrators was built around a single constraint: deliver everything in black and white.
Working with a dozen+ illustrators across multiple countries, a style guide alone wouldn't produce a coherent brand — the individual voices were too distinct, the markets too different. Building the entire 200-plus illustration library in black and white solved the consistency problem at the source. Color was applied after, using a defined palette, which meant any illustration could carry any market's local energy while remaining unmistakably Lolla.
It also meant the assets could travel. The Lucky Cat started as a digital file. The same asset became a stage backdrop, a 30-foot inflatable, a t-shirt, a bus wrap, a poster — across markets that never coordinated directly with each other. The system handled the consistency. The operators handled the execution.
— EXECUTION —
Applying the system across global markets
Every day of the year, fans experience the Lollapalooza brand
Digital/Social/Video
Out of Home
Brand Collaborations
— EXECUTION —
Extending the brand system into new formats
꩜꩜꩜
In partnership with Snap, brand assets were reimagined as AR overlays, filters, & stickers.
꩜꩜꩜
In 2020, Lolla was a fully virtual, multi-day global event—translating the brand into a new digital broadcast format while maintaining its identity, partner integrations, and audience engagement.
2.4M total views
61M impressions
1.3M unique viewers
꩜꩜꩜
In partnership with MLSE Arcade, Lollapalooza was transformed into an 8-bit mobile game that drove PR buzz leading up to the lineup and on-sale announcements
— EXECUTION —
Translating the brand into physical space
Empowering each country to be distinct while always being distinctly Lolla – no matter the destination.
Lolla Chicago
Main stage at Lolla Berlin
Entrance at Lolla Stockholm
Red Bull Outpost with Ninja, Lolla Chicago
Merch at Lolla Argentina
Yung Gravy @ Lolla Chicago (Matt Torres)
Video still from Paramount’s Lollapalooza 2024 documentary
Lolla Chicago
Photo opp, Lolla Chile
Conan Gray @ Lolla Chicago (Matt Torres)
BK: Creative Direction, Strategy, Content, Copywriting, Design, and Illustration
Closer & Closer: Illustration agency
All day-to-day marketing, video, design, production, etc done through each Lolla home country’s creative team and/or agencies in Chicago, São Paulo, Buenos Aires, Santiago, Berlin, Paris, and Stockholm.