independent publishing, nights out and Theatre: This Is Paul Hewitt's Creative Life

When I’m not pretending to be a grown up adult person in the corporate zoo, I roam about in the jungle (the real world) looking for a good time. I spend most of my days looking at a computer, phone screen, television screen – the last thing I wanna do when I get home is stare at anything digital. If I have one wish for AI, it’s that it will do all of emails and messages, so I can be as analogue as possible. My creative life is all in the analogue.  

Queer nightlife  
Getting lost on a dance floor at 3am on a Sunday morning. That’s the creative hit I crave. People go to get lost. Break free from the boundaries of our day to day lives. The they, he, she and everything in-between. Sounds, bit of music or familiar notes through the heavy beat, the body against body, eyes closed, flashes of faces, fragments of conversations heard, misheard, muffled, laughter, arms up, moving on-beat, off-beat, non-verbal communication, mistakes, failures, loves found, had and lost. Exposed and hidden at the same time. So much raw humanity. Community. A beating heart. A messy gathering. All the stories of life are here in a warehouse somewhere in the Docklands.  

Theatre 
My favourite medium. I have a big history with theatre as a playwright, my last play was in the West End in 2017. The idea that two different strangers from different walks of life could sit next to each other and cry at the same thing is a powerful thought – the connection made, the feeling that you are no longer alone. It’s communal. That’s real community, even for a single night. Stephen Fry eloquently talks about the Hearth in ancient Greek mythology, the primal act of sitting around the fire, listening to stories together. Plays are our modern-day hearths. You could be sat in a grand old velvety red opulent auditorium or on a picnic bench in an attic room above a pub and you disappear all the same into the story – completely present. A lot of my experience with theatre is one of the reasons I find such power in creatives being together to create in the same space. Communities of people co-create the greatest stories together. Sorry office haters.  

magCulture store in Islington 
In the most unsuspecting place nestled between Angel and Farringdon is my favourite store in London – filled with independent magazines. As independent voices on social get eaten up by algorithms, independent magazines are where real cultural thinkers are born. It’s the ultimate act of rebellion against our cultural digital prison. Spend an hour in here, cleanse your eyeballs with stunning editorial design, come out a hundred pounds poorer but a million dollars richer in proper culture. And an idea of how to make the digital world a better place.  

Paul Hewitt is executive creative director at That Lot, part of The Weber Shandwick Collective.