Most founder events put you in a room built for a panel. rows facing forward, a stage at the front, a name tag that tells you who to be for the next two hours. i’ve sat through a lot of them. i’ve also left a lot of them more tired than when i walked in, like i’d performed being a founder instead of actually talking to anyone.
AFTR HOUSE CLUB started because I wanted a different room. not after hours, after house, the version that happens once the formal structure of an event dissolves and it’s just people in a space together, building something, actually talking. that can happen in the middle of the day just as easily as at night. the time isn’t the point. the shape of the room is.
it’s for female founders. it’s for creatives. it’s for builders and designers and anyone making something, whether or not they’d call themselves a founder yet. i didn’t want to gatekeep it by title or funding stage or how official your thing sounds when you say it out loud. some of the most interesting people i know are building something they haven’t named yet, and most rooms aren’t built for them. this one is.
I’m starting it city by city on purpose, not as one big global thing from day one. i don’t think community works when it’s designed to scale before it’s tested. i want the first room to actually be good, small enough that everyone in it has talked to everyone else by the end, before i even think about the second city. if it’s real in one room, it’ll travel. if it’s not, no amount of cities fixes that.
I don’t have a polished thesis for what this becomes yet. i know what it’s not, another networking event where everyone’s holding a drink and half-listening for someone more useful to walk in. i know what i want it to feel like, a room where the structure gets out of the way and the actual thing, the building, the making, the talking, gets to be the whole point.
Following along at @aftr.house.club, first city coming soon.