A Toolkit for Gathering

By Rachel Berger, with Meg Bisineer, Sara Dean, and Janette Kim Every profession gathers. From conferences to convenings, residencies to retreats, we each have discipline-driven concepts of what it means to get together. These default formats (conferences, retreats, meetings, critiques, residencies)—often shaped by habit more than intention—can limit what's possible. Defaults might seem efficient, but they rarely take full advantage of the value of getting together. There are simple ways to make professional gatherings more meaningful, productive, and joyful. This book presents a kit of tools on a spectrum from practical to poetic, alongside concrete, replicable tactics and provocations for new tools. Originally conceived as the authors planned and participated in a two-day gathering at the residency program This Will Take Time in Point Arena, California in summer 2019, this book was written and designed over the subsequent year of COVID—a year of deferrals and uncertainty and impossible working conditions. This new edition shares knowledge and insights gleaned from experience, and shares pathways forward for sharing ideas and building space and time for dialogue. Created to help others plan more fulfilling and less generic gatherings, all readers are invited to enjoy the shared curiosity, spontaneous invention, and surprising insights made possible by getting together—in whatever mode possible! Includes a short list of further reading, and a new foreword by Christopher Sleboda and Kathleen Sleboda of Draw Down Books Designed by Rachel Berger Published by Draw Down Books, 2025 Softcover, 144 pages, 2-color offset, 5.6 × 8.45 inches ISBN: 978-1-73-347445-0