Studio

Hi, welcome. Most of what I make is free — the essays, the letters, the podcasts, the guides, the Commonplace Book.

Studio is the deeper room: the monthly Department of Interesting Things edition, the full Idea to Value Practitioner's Handbook, and the work that doesn't fit in a public newsletter or on the site — the workshop behind the public work, so to speak.

It's five pounds a month, or fifty pounds a year. And, as you'll see, it's also the thing that keeps the free work free.

What you actually get

The Department of Interesting Things — a new edition every month.

This is the heart of it. Once a month I take one ordinary object – a mini-whiteboard, a broadsheet newspaper, an index card, the London Tube map – and explore it until it becomes something genuinely useful: a practitioner's guide, simply laid out, that you can put to work on the Monday.

Many editions come with a tool or two to take away – a canvas, a template, a checklist, sometimes a whole workshop design. It's less a newsletter and more a small, well-made workshop landing in your inbox each month. The back catalogue comes with your membership, so you start with a shelf of them, not a blank page.

The Idea to Value Practitioner's Handbook — yours the moment you join.

The complete guide to moving an idea from first flicker of thought all the way through to something real, shipped and useful in work — investment, creative action, making, shipping, tending to the climate — the lot. It's the map underneath everything else in Cultivated. Twenty years of practice, distilled into a book that's built to be used, not just read. On its own it's worth more than a year in Studio.

Members' essays and field notes.

The longer explorations, the ones where there's an idea, but it needs working out together, the practical frameworks and the occasional rabbit hole – the writing that doesn't quite belong in the public library, just yet, kept for the people in the room.

Seminars, videos and audio.

Deeper teaching and conversation around the things I'm working on – communication, creativity, learning, thinking, making — to watch, join or listen to whenever suits.

A direct line to me.

Questions, ideas, the thing you're wrestling with, the thing you need help with. The Studio isn't a content warehouse with a login. There's a person at the other end of it, and I write back.

And there's more added as the work develops – you get it as it lands, at the price you joined at.

The slightly unusual bit

I don't want to build the kind of business where every useful idea is locked behind a login. So most of what I make stays out in the open, for everyone — Meeting Notes, Word at Work, the Commonplace Book, the essays, and the Field Guides I decide belong in the world. Publishing in public is the whole point.

So Studio isn't really a paywall. It's the workshop behind the shop — and it's what pays for the time to research, write, film, think, follow strange ideas down rabbit holes, and keep publishing the useful stuff for everyone else.

Which means when you join, you're not just buying access — you're joining the room. You get the private work, and you help make the public work possible. I rather like that arrangement, and I suspect you might too.

Who's in here

No particular job title required. Studio members lead teams, build businesses, teach, consult, coach, design, write, collect, curate and make things — and some just stay stubbornly interested in how things work. The common thread is curiosity, and the wish to do something useful with it, and the desire to see more ideas make it out to value.

You might be trying to become a better leader, or building something of your own, or working to make your working life less corporate and more human — not by escaping it, but by seeing it differently. Any of those, and you'll find something here worth the fiver.

Five pounds a month

That's it. Less than a coffee, and I hope considerably more useful over the course of a year. Join, explore everything inside, and cancel any time you like — or take it at £50 for the year if you'd rather not think about it monthly.

No tiers. No lock-in. No premium-platinum-founder-executive-empty-PDF nonsense. 😀 Just Studio, the deeper work, and a way to help keep the public work coming.

Join Studio — £5/month →

Everything that's included is laid out below — have a wander. If you like what I'm making and want more of it, I'd love to have you in the room.

Navigating the studio

Department of Interesting Things

The Department of Interesting Things, other than being a fun name, is a monthly practitioner guide to seeing, thinking and communicating better.

Each edition begins with one ordinary thing and follows the idea wherever it leads, always giving you practical and tactical advice you can directly apply to your work.

Future Editions of Department of Interesting Things:

The Analogue Practitioner | The Circles of Contribution | Choosing what's in the frame | The Artefact Manual | The Attention Office | The Good Meeting | The Commonplace Book | The Lion | and more

The Idea to Value Handbook

Seminars

Seminars, board meetings and community events are announced via email to Studio Members. We aim for at least two per year, sometimes more.

A Direct Line to Rob

All studio members will receive a welcome email with details on how to get in touch directly with me via email. I always respond, so if you're stuck, need an ear or have a question about your Studio membership, get in touch.

FAQ