About Headwaters

Fly Fishing Film Awards & Institute

The Headwaters Summit sits within a cultural arc that began with Robert Redford’s creation of Sundance Mountain Resort as a home for serious storytelling and continued with A River Runs Through It, which elevated fly fishing into a broader cultural ideal. That shift expanded participation and deepened support for conservation. Since then, fly fishing has grown into a storytelling-driven culture without a central institution to recognize important cultural work.

Created to address that gap, the Summit strengthens the culture of fly fishing by recognizing and elevating the written and filmed work that shapes it.

The Sundance setting is intentional. Premieres and screenings take place in Redford’s private screening room, reinforcing a commitment to serious creative work. The weekend is designed in the spirit that guided his founding of Sundance: that important storytelling requires protected creative space and that cultural influence begins long before it becomes commercial. Sundance was built around the idea that when storytellers and the people capable of supporting them gather in the right environment, important work is recognized and future work is made possible.

A Summit for Story, Conservation, and Culture

The weekend will include a juried film awards program recognizing films that shape how culture is understood and carried forward. Alongside the screenings, an Institute program, comprised of panels and roundtables, runs throughout the weekend, bringing knowledge keepers, filmmakers, producers, editors, conservation leaders, and industry executives together in conversations about storytelling, conservation, and the future of fly-fishing culture.

Redford’s screening room was built to protect independent voices. Those who shape capital and those who shape story sit as equals, recognizing that the future of the sport depends on both. For writers and filmmakers, the weekend provides a credible stage where exceptional work is recognized and where those capable of funding are present and engaged.

For industry leaders, the weekend becomes an intentional moment, through panels and roundtables, to address fragmentation driven by the loss of shared industry touchpoints while also collectively supporting the storytelling that defines the culture of the sport.

The Headwaters Summit establishes a lasting institution that strengthens the relationship between storytelling, conservation, and the cultural future of fly fishing.