Creative wintering

A season of soft ambition, thresholds + a cosy winter playlist

When I reach this point in the year, the merry dance of life and work can jolt with my longing for a lighter pace. Choosing peace can feel like a deliberate (maybe even radical) act.

With the new moon, the winter solstice and the ending of a ‘nine’ year upon us, I’ve been thinking about thresholds. In numerology, 2025 is associated with the end of a life cycle — a time of closure — so the next week or two may feel a little charged.

None of these events or markers demands belief, of course, but together they feel like a wink from the universe. We’re seeing endings as well as doorways to beginnings.

The last eighteen months have been about incubation for me — a period where ideas have collided, dissolved and reformed in unpredictable ways. This is the part of the creative process we don’t talk about enough: the trying, the playing, the failing. There have been fruitful times and fallow times.

We’re used to seeing “overnight” success stories or tales of people getting lucky. But luck rarely has anything to do with it. What you don’t see are the long days, the hard months and the years of invisible activity that pass by in a blink. Because of this, it feels potent to give language to what comes next.

I recently finished Enchantment by Katherine May and was reminded of what we gain when we seek magic in the world around us. It led me back to her book Wintering, a meditation on rest, repair and recalibration. As I turned the dog-eared pages, lingering on passages I knew I’d return to, I wondered what might change if we extended this way of thinking into our creative practices.

Creative wintering, in my mind, is about permitting ourselves to go to ground, embracing solitude for a while, allowing the work to unfold without fanfare. It might also mean making room for our ideas, especially the ones we’ve tucked away, and gathering the many strands into something more coherent, more connected.

It’s a rebalancing of inputs and outputs, a season of soft ambition, still purposeful but no longer driven by urgency or visibility. Having been in a wintering phase of work before (during the pandemic and before starting my branding studio), I recognise this as a familiar way of being.

“Rest is not the absence of work; it is the condition for it.”

— David Whyte

Entering my creative winter

Yesterday I turned my out-of-office on for three weeks, marking the beginning of an inner slumber. The first thing I returned to was a love of mine, independent film, renewing my MUBI subscription as nourishment rather than a distraction.

With my kids away with their dad for a few days, I also found my way back to the reading pile. It’s been the year of (mostly) audiobooks in my world — a steady companion through busy days and tiring nights — but now I’m craving the pleasure of book in hand…the weight of the pages, the smell of the paper.

Retreats and residencies are another important part of the coming season, so I’m choosing to create and protect space for thinking and tinkering without the pressure to produce. This involves collaborating with a genealogist on a particular aspect of my memoir, and also with Lindsay Johnstone as part of her programme, Writing from the Archives.

In practical terms, I’ll be continuing with strategy, styling and storytelling clients from January, and alongside this would love to find some harmony between branding and writing and allow time for healing and movement. I have an interesting season of mothering ahead after separation, so need all the fuel I can get.

And this is what creative wintering means to me right now: fewer demands and more of what actually supports and strengthens my body and mind. My attention is so often pulled away from what feels good, so this is my way of tethering myself.

Honouring my energy + capacity

Of course, prioritising our creative endeavours is never easy, and I’m thinking carefully about how my days and weeks will look and feel between now and the spring.

I’ve always believed in modelling different ways of working. That belief deepened after living with chronic fatigue, and again, more recently, while navigating a new diagnosis. When I set up my branding studio, it was with the intention of making room for rest alongside work, though those principles have been continually tested because of how my mind works.

This is why I’m choosing to listen closely to where my creativity is pulling me. Writing, in particular, has been absorbing more of my resources, with my memoir now taking priority. I’ll be submitting it to agents in February (which feels exhilarating and terrifying), but I also have this deep sense that it’s about time. And so I’m choosing to give it my focus.

In February, I’ll attend my first Arvon retreat to begin weaving together the loose threads of this work, guided by nonfiction authors. I’m also awaiting responses to a residency application that I poured a great deal of care into during a challenging season. We all know rejection is uncomfortable, that it’s a necessary, if disheartening, part of the process, but that doesn’t make the suspense any easier.

Travel is also on the cards, initially to the Western Isles for research, alongside plans to be a local tourist here in the Scottish Borders as part of my writing practice. Having applied for funding and placements, it feels good to be taking this aspect of my life and work seriously, and to be choosing it rather than casting it to the sidelines as I have in the past.

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Finding what feels good

As I ease into hibernation mode over the holidays, these are some of the books, films and podcasts I’m planning to dive into:

• A book: If Women Rose Rooted by Dr Sharon Blackie has been sitting patiently on my TBR pile for a while, but after a conversation with my writing mentor this week, it’s leapt to the top. A book about belonging, land, myth and remembering…it feels especially right for this winter.

• A film: The Chronology of Water, directed by Kristen Stewart. Based on Lidia Yuknavitch’s memoir, it’s described as “a raw and unflinching portrait of survival, sexuality and self-invention.” It lands on 6th January, but having recognised myself in parts of the book, I’m looking forward to it.

• A podcast: ill-advised by Bill Nighy seems funny and thoughtful. I’ve only listened to a few clips, but it’s definitely one for the holidays. I liked him in the Ffern Summer 25 campaign and could listen to him talk all day. The perfect winter pal.

None of this is a recommendation as such…just a brief glimpse into what will be keeping me company as the days begin to lengthen here in the northern hemisphere.

Planning your creative winter

If you’re curious about planning your own creative winter and about choosing the things that will support your energy in this season of life, I’ll leave you with a few questions.

• What might “enough” look like for you right now?

• Is there something you can pause, just for this season?

• What are you ready to compost, so it can feed what comes next?

• If you removed the pressure to publish or perform, what would you choose to create (for yourself or others)?

• What does a soft version of success feel like?

You might enjoy listening to this wintery playlist while you think or write on these prompts. I’ve updated it with a folky, friendly feel. Something calm to accompany you this festive season.

With that, I’ll be letting this space rest for the season.

I considered pausing paid subscriptions, but instead chose to make and share a small-press zine with clients and patrons. If you’re in the UK, your copy of The Turning should arrive next week. If you’re in the US, Canada or Australia, it should land sometime over the holidays. EU subscribers will receive a digital version of the publication (I was conscious of avoiding customs charges).

Brand Seasons will return in the spring, when the ground feels a bit steadier again. Until then, thanks for being here, and sending you the warmest of winter wishes.