Hi! Our names are Susanna Davies-Crook and Matt Maude.
We're the founders and hosts of Write Club.
Within this webpage, you'll find information about Write Club and the spaces we run.
Thank you for taking the time to read it!
Please let us know though if we can answer any more questions beyond what is included here.
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C R E A T I N G C O M M U N I T Y :
For the last three years we've partnered with Soho House to run the writer's development programme for Soho Works. In the beginning of 2025, we partnered with both The House of Koko and The Royal Academy of Arts to do the same for their membership schemes. In June 2025, we launched our residency at Grouchos. In October 2025, we begin our partnership with the Barbican to run their writing program for their winter and spring season.
Every session, we invite an award-winning, industry recognised guest speaker to lead a four-hour-long writing event held for up to forty participants.
Gathered around a table, we invite the guest speaker to talk about their careers, their origin stories, and what lessons they've learnt along the way. Passing on their learnings to our participants.
At the end of the informal Q&A, the guest speaker then sets a writing exercise that our participants respond to that evening - having around an hour to write. After a buffet dinner is served, the last hour is dedicated to participants readings of the texts they've created over the course of the event. All occurring live in the company of the guest speaker creating a unique collaborative environment. At the end of the session, each written piece is collected. Stored in our library for future publishing.
Twice a year we run Writer's Retreats in locations within nature. Run over the course of a week, we create space for writers to switch off from everyday life and provide the setting for writers to devote their energies towards their long term texts.
For more information about the retreats we run, please find them within the Retreats page
R E F E R E N C E :
We asked Emma Clarke, Head of Digital Membership at Soho House to provide a reference about the Residency we had at Soho House:
“We have been lucky enough to have Susanna and Matt host Write Club here at Soho for the past three years. The events they host here are truly beautiful - they’ve created an authentic community where participants collaborate and communicate with one another all the time - something that is priceless to me as Head of Digital Membership at Soho House.
In addition to membership retention, we’ve recorded the following data from the Write Club partnership:
- Oscar, Bafta, Emmy and Olivier award winning guest speakers invited every month
- 350+ Soho members attending Write Club events over the last 36 months
- 900+ new pieces of writing created
- Participants retaining Soho membership in order to attend Write Club
- Monthly event sells out within 24 hours
- Write Club event capacity increased year-on-year as a result of popularity”
- Emma Clarke, Head of Digital Membership at Soho House
F I L M :
We're aware of the marketing value of bringing high-profile speakers into new spaces, but we believe the most important commodity we create is community - increasing member interaction and retention, building brand loyalty, and fostering greater sense of connection and collaboration within a community.
To illustrate the partnership we've built at Soho over the last three years, we created the following film:
T I M I N G S :
Here are the usual timings for our evening events:
17:00 - Access to the room to set up music & glassware
17:45 - Participants begin arriving
18:00 - Event begins, 15 minutes mingling
18:15 - Event and participant introductions
18:30 - Guest speaker talk begins
19:15 - Exercise set
19:20 - Writing time
20:15 - Dinner service (buffet / tear & share food)
20:45 - Readings
21:45 - Event ends, 15 minutes mingling / exiting
22:00 - Room cleared
A S S E T S :
At every Write Club session we host, we record the talk as an audio file to be transcribed. After the session, we identity key quotes that form a library of guest speaker testimonies - some of which can be shared for Social Media purposes. In addition we records parts of each session on a 8K film camera. The quality of footage is such that we are able to pull off screenshots to send to participants as high resolution photos for their archives or social media sharing.
The day after every session, we send out these photos to all the participants who have attended, creating constant engagement online and over time, a huge archive of images and videos that can be used for wider marketing and social media campaigns.
Our event fee includes full license and image rights to these photos and the footage can be made available to in-house marketing teams to use for whatever purpose they deem beneficial.
Included below are images taken from a number of our previous events at Soho House, The Groucho Club, The House of Koko and the Royal Academy of Arts featuring sessions with some of following guest speakers:
Laurie Nunn - Emmy Award Winning Creator & Showrunner of 'Sex Education'
Irvine Welsh - Bafta Award Winning Screenwriter and Author of 'Trainspotting', 'Filth', 'The Acid House'
Polly Bennett - Oscar Winning Movement Coach of the Films: 'Elvis', 'Bohemia Rhapsody', 'The Crown', 'Saltburn'
Mike Figgis - Oscar Nominated Director & Screenwriter 'Leaving Las Vegas', 'Timecode', 'Internal Affairs'
Jon Brittain - Olivier Winning Playwright & Screenwriter 'Baby Reindeer' 'Rotterdam', 'The Crown'
Vinay Patel - Award Winning Screenwriter & Playwright, 'Murdered by My Father', 'Doctor Who'
Selina Lim - Bafta Nominated & Emmy Award Winning Screenwriter 'Sex Education', 'Hanna'
Siddarth Shrikanth - Climate Author, Activist and Journalist: 'A Case for Nature'
Isis Davis - Award Winning Writer & Actor - 'Killing Eve', 'Fast Girls'
Laurie Nunn
Emmy Award Winning Creator and Showrunner of
'Sex Education'
Simon Armitage
Poet Laureate
'Dwell', 'The Not Dead', 'Stanza Stones'
Andrew Davies
BAFTA Award Winning Screenwriter
'War and Peace', 'House of Cards', 'Bridget Jones Diary'
Selina Lim
Emmy Award Winning Screenwriter
'Sex Education', 'Hanna'
Waleed Akhtar
Oliver Award Winning Playwright and Screenwriter
'The P Word', 'The Roadtrip'
Daisy Goodwin
Author, Screenwriter and Show-runner
'ITV's Victoria', 'My Last Duchess'
Isis Davis
Actor and Writer
'Killing Eve', 'Fast Girls'
Temi Wilkey
Writer, Actor & Director
'Sex Education', 'The High Table'
Jennifer Higgie
Author, Screenwriter and Arts Editor
'The Mirror and the Palette', Former Frieze Magazine Editor
Leon Mayne
Screenwriter and Producer
'End of the F*cking World, 'Brothers With No Game'
Jon Brittain
Olivier Winning Playwright & Screenwriter
' Baby Reindeer' 'Rotterdam', 'The Crown'
Polly Bennett
Oscar Winning Movement Director & Choreographer
'Elvis', 'Saltburn', 'Bohemian Rhapsody'
Maimuna Memom
Olivier Winning Writer & Actor
'The Grapes of Wrath', 'Standing at the Sky’s Edge'
Irvine Welsh
Author and Screenwriter
'Trainspotting', 'Filth', 'The Acid House'
Esther Freud
Author
'I Couldn't Love You More', 'Hideous Kinky', 'The Sea House'
Mike Figgis
Oscar Nominated Director and Screenwriter
'Leaving Las Vegas', 'Timecode', 'Internal Affairs'
Luke Jennings
Screenwriter and Show Creator
'Killing Eve'
Travis Alabanza
Author, Writer & Performer
'None of the Above', Burgerz', 'Overflow'
Anthony Anaxagorou
Poet, Author and Royal Society of Literature Fellow
'Heritage Aesthetics', 'The Blink That Killed The Eye'
Vinay Patel
Screenwriter & Playwright
'Murdered by My Father', 'Doctor Who'
Daniel Bailey
Artistic Director at the Bush Theatre
'Wolves on Road', 'August in England'
Katherine Angel
Author
'Sex Will Be Good Again', 'Daddy Issues'
Henry Mance
Chief Features Writer, Financial Times
'How to Love Animals and Protect our Planet'
Emily Hayward-Whitlock
Screenwriters Agent and Head of Book to Film
at The Artists Partnership
Naomi Sheldon
Actor, Producer & Screenwriter
'The Girlfriend', 'The Good Girl'
Siddarth Shrikanth
Climate Author, Activist and Journalist
'A Case for Nature'
P R E V I O U S G U E S T S P E A K E R S :
T E S T I M O N I A L S F R O M P A R T I C P A N T S :
“I sit on the Inclusivity Board at Soho House and the Committee at Soho Works. I go to a lot of the events here and the Houses, and I don’t feel like I’ve got the sense of community from other workshops I’ve attended. We have a lot of people that come in and create space, which is great, but all of the connections I have in Soho are a result of the people I met at Write Club. It feels like family rather than just a community”.
- Melissa Sinclair
"As a new writer, Write Club has been transformative for me. It’s given me a sense of community, access to inspiration, and, most importantly, the confidence to believe I can pursue writing seriously. It’s not just an event—it’s a safe haven where I feel seen and supported, a space where I’ve been able to truly hone my ‘voice’ and explore my creativity without judgement.
- Adwoa Akoto
"The Write Club team run fantastic sessions which I’d recommend to anyone with an interest in writing. Their guest speakers - often impressively big names! - talk about their careers and use their experience to offer a mix of advice and encouragement that usefully straddles the border between ‘inspiring’ and ‘realistic’. Plus, there are always ingenious exercises to get everyone in the room writing there and then, often in ways they might not have done so before - and it’s a treat to hear the results of these read aloud. I’ve really enjoyed getting involved with their sessions - and I can see that any organisation which has an interest in driving creativity could do well to book Write Club, too."
- Toby Smith
"Matt and Susanna have done an incredible job of curating guest speakers each month that span industries, genders, races, sexual orientations, social classes and life experiences. And it’s this effort that attracts an equally diverse community to Write Club that makes for one of the richest, most welcoming, caring and inspiring communities I’ve been a part of.”
- Jamie Tomkins
