The longstanding cultural news website and events organizer Brightest Young Things has announced it will effectively shut down on January 20.

The organization has covered local arts and culture news for nearly 15 years. It also produces popular festivals and events in D.C., New York, and Chicago.

Founder Svetlana Legetic says she and remaining staff will transition to focusing on the organization’s creative marketing arm, Exactly Agency, which has curated events for the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, among others.

“The way we work and the way we tell stories has evolved,” she tells DCist/WAMU. “This is what we feel very passionate about, and it allows us to be a little more focused and intentional.”

Like many cultural organizations focused on live events, Brightest Young Things’ staff and revenue have been decimated by the pandemic. Since March, the company’s payroll has dropped from 15 full-time staffers to five, including Legetic. All remaining full-time staff will continue to work with Exactly.

Legetic told DCist in March that the pandemic was posing a potentially insurmountable hurdle for the organization. “I have spent 14 years trying to diversify us enough that we are never at the risk of one thing going south,” she said at the time. “And in two weeks, it’s like a switch has been flipped and we don’t exist anymore as a business.”

Brightest Young Things canceled nearly all events on its typically packed spring and summer calendar, leading to an abrupt drop in revenue from advertising, ticket sales and event sponsorships. It received a PPP loan, but it wasn’t enough to fill the budget gap. At the time the organization had 12 full-time staffers and 15 contributors who received stipends for their work. The contributor payments went first, and Legetic stopped receiving a salary for a time.

Legetic founded Brightest Young Things after moving to D.C. and struggling to create a network and get involved in the less mainstream side of the city’s cultural life. She was turned off by the “snippy and sarcastic tone” popular with many local bloggers at the time, and dreamed of creating a more positive space where fellow creative types could learn about upcoming events and meet one another.

She and her friends started posting photos of concerts and other events they attended on a blog. They soon added a community events calendar and started producing “small, weird parties and comedy events,” as Legetic puts it.

“It was all about celebrating the way to live your life the best way possible. It was very welcoming,” she says, noting that Brightest Young Things has promoted and produced LGBTQ+ events since its early days.

In 2009, Brightest Young Things launched what would become one of its signature annual events: The Bentzen Ball comedy festival, an event curated by comedian Tig Notaro that continued for 10 years. It was followed by a true crime festival, Death Becomes Us, which attracted big-name guests including Amanda Knox.

Legetic says she’s not closing the door on the possibility of reviving the ball or other Brightest Young Things signature events in the post-pandemic future. She also plans to leave up the website so it can serve as something of a time capsule of the city’s cultural life.

“It definitely feels like the end of an era, but we are still so excited,” she says. “This isn’t a goodbye, this is an evolution.”