Your work brings people together. We’ve got the scene to grow it in.

You might not call yourself a relational founder or relational artist yet. You just know you’re driven to help people connect in ways the market keeps overlooking: a practice for becoming yourself, a couples ritual, a neighbor toolkit, a cooperative campus, or a pop-up village.

Relational is a studio and incubator for founders and artists building the next era of culture together.

Join the Relational Scene →
Six noodle-limbed characters sit in a loose circle on soft cushions around a lime circle: one talks earnestly with its hands, one listens with a hand on its chest, one sits with arms crossed, one slumps tired but listening, one laughs into its hands, one writes in a tiny notebook.

Your work doesn’t fit the old boxes.

If your medium is the oldest technology on earth, people being human together, the market can barely see its value. So the usual paths to support break down:

  • Squeeze a living community into a venture pitch deck and you end up inventing fake ROI.
  • Run it like a starved charity and you spend all your creative juice begging for scraps.
  • Lone-wolf it and you end up holding space for everyone else with nobody holding space for you.

The problem isn’t you. For 300 years we’ve optimized for machine-like efficiency, and people aren’t efficient. Relationship got cut out of the picture in exchange for scale and optimization. Now we’re isolated and out of practice being together. Your work is the practice.

We operate on a different set of physics: relational-first, efficiency-second.

The world needs your relational sensitivity: the way you read a room, notice who and what’s missing, and bring people back to each other. Right now, it’s the scarcest thing we have.

Like anything alive, relational work needs the right conditions to grow: slack to play and experiment without burning out, real resources behind it, and a crew to do it with.

The Founding Cohort

Our founding cohort gathers in 2027 for three months: 6 to 10 founders and artists, hand-selected from the scene, each ready to turn a project they can feel into something real.

  • 01

    Four noodle-limbed characters around a small table with a candle: a wizard tells a story with arms up, one gasps, one thinks with chin on hand, one sips, deadpan.

    Weekly gatherings

    Your creative pulse

    Every week, the cohort gets in the room together. No networking fluff and no red-pen critique. We show rough work early, witness what feels most alive, untangle where you’re stuck, and push each other to consistently ship meaningful pieces of the work.

  • 02

    One noodle-limbed character holds up a big tangled red scribble, looking overwhelmed; a calm one in a mushroom cap pulls one end out into a clean arch and points to where it goes.

    Hands-on producing

    Someone in your corner

    Kristen and Dave work with you one-on-one to get clear on your story and make the thing your project needs to exist in the world: the site, the show, the zine. Then we write your Support Menu, an honest list of what you need to thrive, and help you find the people and help you rally the support to make it real.

  • 03

    A host opens the red door of a soft purple house and waves two arriving guests in; one carries a pot. Inside is a warm glow and floor cushions.

    The retreat

    A dash of IRL magic

    Midway through the incubator, we gather in person for a multi-day retreat. Long dinners, unhurried riffs, live testing of each other’s methods, and the kind of high-trust bonds that only happen when you break bread and conspire in the same house.

Six noodle-limbed characters walk forward in a row arm in arm under an orange sun: one cheering with a raised fist, one nervous, one proud, one tired, one calm, and one waving a lime flag.

For founders and artists of the relational era

Whether you’re an artist crafting a participatory experience or a founder turning a practice into something that can spread, you’ll feel right at home if:

  • You’re pioneering a method, tour, or gathering and you’re ready to take it from a scrappy experiment to an undeniable body of work.
  • You’re done protesting what the old market doesn’t value and ready to stand in your agency, name what you need, and claim it.
  • You’re ready to let people show up for you the way you’ve always shown up for them.
Kristen and Dave sit side by side on the steps of a white wooden porch, smiling at the camera.

Your Hosts

Kristen is a convener. She gathers people around value that starts out invisible, and helps make it known, from community-based health care to relational tech. Read her story →

Dave is an artist and technologist. He builds software for sharing creative work, and he’ll help yours find its language and form.

Already in the Scene

  • Neighborhood Computer
  • Field Notes on Unlearning

  • NewKid

    Mathilde Baillet

    Mathilde, a mom of two and a startup veteran, started NewKid to talk about raising kids in the age of AI. The podcast and newsletter grew into NewKid Days, gatherings for families and builders in Paris and San Francisco. Along the way she found a healthier distance from the work, passionate but not entangled.

    Visit NewKid →

  • TAG the Magazine

    Anthony Deptula

    Anthony spent seven years afraid to start a magazine. Six weeks into working together, TAG mailboxes were going up in a taekwondo dojo and an ice rink. Now TAG is a quarterly print magazine where kids draw, write, and get published, spread by word of mouth. The biggest thing he learned was to ask for help.

    Visit TAG the Magazine →

  • Greenbelt Journals

    J. Kyle Fagan

    Kyle makes custom printed journals for couples, each filled with a year of prompts written around their own story. It’s a made-to-order business built to help two people notice what they love about each other. He came looking for a community that treats a project as a living thing, not a profit line.

    Visit Greenbelt Journals →

  • Neighborhood Computer

    Jon Borichevskiy

    Jon is building a communal computer that brings neighbors together. His turn was realizing he doesn’t have to figure it all out in advance. He can put it in front of people, hear what they say, and course correct.

  • Field Notes on Unlearning

    Lindsey Lerner

    Lindsey is an unlearning practitioner in the Bronx. She photographs people and records the invisible labor beneath their lives, then brings them into rooms to set down what they’ve been carrying. Her sessions are booked for ninety minutes, and people stay for three hours.

    Visit Field Notes →

Come on in.

If your work brings people together, you belong here. Tell us what you’re building and we’ll be in touch about gatherings, the cohort, and what’s next.

Join now →
A long line of noodle-limbed characters walks in from both sides toward a glowing lime doorway, carrying a pot, a cloud, a plant, a guitar and a lantern; one holds the door open and waves them in.