Niche ID with Laura Markwardt

"If you haven't seen the humour in something, you haven't seen the truth." That's Sussex-based author, John Higgs, known for his non-fiction books on counterculture, history, and biography. You might know him from The KLF: Chaos, Magic and the Band who Burned a Million Pounds (2012) or his follow-up, Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the 20th Century. He’s also written books on Timothy Leary, Watling Street, William Blake, Bond and The Beatles, Doctor Who, and most recently David Lynch in Lynchian (2025).John’s also worked in video games design. At one point here, he compares writing to programming, and I kinda regret not digging in more to ask him about game theory and the commonalities between world building and the creative process. We got everything else covered though. Order, chaos and the future of counterculture. Rest assured. Much of what we cover (the creative process, quitting jobs, proof that book reviews don’t count and that the “metric-led online world is bollocks”) align with the Niche ID ethos, but also work as compelling frameworks for the “random and extraordinary” world that we forever exist (and continue to resist) in. Enjoying Niche ID? Thank you for following the show and sharing with your friends <3Niche ID newsletter: https://lauramarkwardt.substack.com/

In conversation with Alison Williams, the creative polymath behind the Guardian-recommended podcast, War Hall: Theatre of the Mind, starring 96-year-old cinema legend Angela Allen. The first series of War Hall is grounded in the rich social audio history of Walthamstow’s assembly Hall and the words from a 1930/40s brochure of that time via Alison, sum it up: "The bombs were falling all around but the music was divine"Alison has also held roles at Film London, working from Pinewood Studios. She master-minded Moomins: The Woman Who Fell In Love With An Island exhibition at Walthamstow Wetlands that ran from 2021 to 2022, and she’s currently at PRS Foundation, which is the UK's leading charitable funder of new music and talent development.This conversation goes everywhere. It’s packed with art (Robert Henri, Delia Derbyshire, Disney, Lynch), creativity against all odds and (of course!) some magical thinking. It's really worth checking out the the accompanying Niche ID newsletter on this one for more links, visuals and rabbit holes. Don’t miss Alison's The War Hall bonus episode being released on 8th May 2026 for VE Day. Enjoying Niche ID? Thank you for following the show and sharing with your friends <3War Hall: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/war-hall/id1861527488Niche ID newsletter: https://lauramarkwardt.substack.com/

Photographer and director, Ben Rayner started his music zine as a teenager in the halcyon days of 90s Essex/London. He tells me that whole point of the thing wasn’t to make a profit. It was to open up a world that would eventually lead to his “obsession” with taking photos constantly.It was an era that built life-long friendships, and a rich archive of ‘becoming’ that Ben would eventually take Stateside, where he's now based in New York. The days when you could make friends over a band T-shirt were something special, and Ben’s work continues to put that real, kindred energy on permanent record. Get Ben's latest publications: I’m a million different people from one day to the next and Mud, Sweat & Tears. @Benrayner and Benrayner.comEnjoying Niche ID? Please follow the show and share with your friends. Subscribe to the Niche ID newsletter for episode updates.

My latest guest is Oriana Leckert, Head of Publishing at Kickstarter.Alongside helping creators bring their dream literary projects to life, Oriana’s also written and edited for Vice, MTV News Slate and many more. Her first book, Brooklyn Spaces: 50 Hubs of Culture and Creativity , grew out of a multi-year project capturing the rise and fall of under-the-radar creative spaces across New York City.My favourite parts of our conversation land on definitions of publishing success, cultivating your audience (note, these two things are correlated), books as identity signals, and the evolving self-publishing landscape as an influence on more traditional publishing models.Provided you have the reach, the ceiling for niche publishing is “endlessly high,” which is where you can calibrate the level of your ambitions.Lastly, don’t guess. Ask. Nurturing an empathetic relationship with your audience and “asking your people what they want” is sometimes overlooked, but it’s one of the most practical strategies any creator can adopt. As Oriana tells me, “they just might surprise you.”Episode image photo credit: Kirsten Nicolaisen Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow the show and share with your friends. Subscribe to the ⁠Niche ID newsletter⁠ for episode updates.

London-based Laura Bryan is Insight Director at Spring Studios. With a background in design and luxury fashion communications, she has worked across various research and cultural strategy roles from Jump Innovation to Discover AI.Laura’s essay on the theme of ‘quiet disobedience’ and ‘small acts of rebellion’ for the School of Critical Design was published last year. Those ideas feel like they gain momentum the more we explore what it means to question society’s status quo.We discuss strategic creative processes, and IRL brand-adjacent experiences (print, events, live reads). Laura explains case studies from fine jewellery to no-alcohol, using macro/micro trend signalling, in-field work and identifying intersections of culture and category to uncover truths that resonate with audiences.My favourite idea here is that no research is wasted. A past rabbit hole (trust me, I have many) can that bring depth to new projects. More broadly, Laura’s ideas around ‘interconnectedness’ frame strategy as divergent thinking and pattern-matching, with nuance and human connection at its core. There are no binaries here. Laura blends commercial acumen, with experience-honed instinct and real-world research. Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow the show and share with your friends. Subscribe to the ⁠Niche ID with Laura Markwardt ⁠newsletter for episode updates.

New Niche ID incoming! We’re kicking off Season Two by looking at how print and analogue media anchors us.My first guest is Kaye Symington, CMO at ⁠Newspaper Club⁠, an on-demand printing service for creatives and brands to build their own newspapers, zines, and print projects, plus design support to get their work out there, in a tactile, tangible format.Kaye understands her audience, and sees print as a tool for memory-making, connection and celebration. She talks print-first, global brand collaborations as well as print-as-play projects.Kaye is also the co-founder and co-organiser of the ⁠⁠Glasgow Print Fair⁠⁠, an annual IRL celebration of print that attracts creatives from around the globe, and reflects a growing appetite for offline storytelling. "It’s such a funny project and it's a total labour of love," she says.Dive into this one and explore the future of connection as tactile, sensory, and made of paper. Beyond the page too, it’s about the people who bring it together.Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow the show and share with your friends. Subscribe to the ⁠Niche ID with Laura Markwardt⁠ newsletter for episode updates.

G. Klasek’s journey jumps from Dunning-Kruger to Sisyphus, Hunter S. Thompson to Adam Curtis. Cultish beginnings led to leaving school in 8th grade and a lifetime of exploration. Not your standard desk-based creative – after reinventing herself through “hundreds of jobs,” G found her niche as a global field researcher, consultant and strategist. This conversation spans both the challenges of sustaining a true ethnography practice in a scale-obsessed world, and G’s one-of-a-kind creation story.N.B: G is also a musician and phonographer – or, in her words, “a collector of sounds.” This episode includes an extract from one of her tracks, plus an endearingly off-beat collection from her archive , including a subway accordion in Berlin, the bag carousel at JFK and an energetic sermon at the 16th St Baptist church, Alabama.G’s consulting, brand strategy and in-field research at Yours in panic. You can also find G on Linkedin here.Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow us and share with your friends. Subscribe to the ⁠Niche ID with Laura Markwardt⁠ newsletter for episode updates.

Roya Shariet pitched to Emily Weiss, founder of Glossier, on the streets of New York, back in 2018. It changed her world. “I got a job offer for a job that didn’t exist, with no job description, to lead social impact at Glossier.” Don’t you just love it when that happens? She stayed for almost seven years – through the wildly successful launch of the You fragrance and the inception of Glossier’s partnership with the WNBA. Heads up, beauty x sport fans – that partnership’s still going strong, five years later. Today, an Iranian-American cookbook and a hundred thousand followers on TikTok later, Roya's still building out spaces that intersect her passions – beauty, sport, fragrance, and food. We chat about leveraging fandoms through Glossier x WNBA, the importance of storytelling in fragrance, and the (frankly, wild) amount of work that goes into nailing that ‘undone’ look. But we also explore the art of making your own luck – which, as Roya explains, tends to strike big when you’re brave enough to ask.Roya’s links: Consumed⁠ Substack, Maman and Me: Recipes from our Iranian American Family⁠, Roya’s Insta⁠, Roya’s Cooking Insta⁠Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow us and share with your friends. Subscribe to the Niche ID with Laura Markwardt newsletter for episode updates.

In conversation with Devin Kelly, poet, author, and teacher. Devin joins me fresh from a hard track session with his New York run club. He’s sitting in his grandmother’s tiny old chair, the exact chair he sat down in every night to pen his latest novel, Pilgrims, a tale of two brothers, one monk, and one racing runaway. The story explores a sibling dynamic, but also a journey “to explore the multitudes of personalities that can exist inside a person.”Devin’s got a devoted literary fanbase, born of the personal essays he’s written over the years for LongReads. See: Stumbling can be lovely, newly featured in the 2025’s anthology of This Year’s Best Sports Writing – the second time he’s made the cut. Our conversation covers everything from profound themes of suffering to pedestrian themes of learning to drive. The value of play, laughter, his creative process, and making friends with poets at grad school, “always my favourite people.” There’s so much wisdom here, all delivered with Devin’s signature grace and eloquence. Thank you, Devin, for your art and your words.PILGRIMS is out on Great Place Books on 18th November, 2025Devin’s Substack, Ordinary PlotsRecommends/mentions: In the Driver’s Seat and Through the Children’s Gate by Adam Gopnik, Zen Motoring, the poet Larry Leavitt, author Max Porter, Denis Johnson (Jesus’ Son), Raymond Carver, James Baldwin, Marilyn Robertson, Ali Smith, William Finnegan (Barbarian Days), Bill Buford, Carl Phillips (My Trade is a Mystery: Seven Meditations from a Life in Writing)Enjoying Niche ID? Please follow us and share with your friends. Subscribe to the Niche ID with Laura Markwardt newsletter for episode updates.

In conversation with Jozef White, founder of Tabula Rasa Records, a writer and philosopher. Jozef was born and raised in San Francisco and has landed, for now, in New Zealand.Jozef’s creative output thrives in spaces where people move together – whether that's collating collective works that capture a specific time signature, or curating events in person in Tokyo, Amsterdam, and San Diego. The episode kicks off with an attempt to bridge the cultural chasm that splits California and New Zealand. Then we explore ideas from Tabula Rasa's Substack, Inscripta – specifically, three of Jozef’s essays; I can only think when I run, Release schematics (essays #1 and #2), and You are not owed a creative career. N.B At about 15.40mins in, Jozef mentions a 5, 4, 2, and 12-beat framework and a Taylor Swift song that mirrors a similar time signature. We don’t mention the name of the Swift song, but it’s likely closure from the album, evermore. Recommends/mentions: Inscripta Substack, Tabula Rasa Catalogue – and the everynoise.com playlist, which currently tracks one song from every genre. Related reading:Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture by Kyle ChaykaMusic discovery is broken. Can it be fixed? [DrownedinSound.org]The rise of fan-driven discovery [Emwhitenoise.Substack.com]Enjoying the show? Please follow us and share with your friends. Subscribe to the Niche ID newsletter for latest episode updates and bonus content.

In conversation with Lucinda Bounsall, Strategy Director and founder of Sibling Studio. Lucinda joins me to talk about her specialism in modern subcultures, her thoughts on A.I., anti-mentors, and the power of a good quad graph. She says of her craft, “It’s not like maths, where there’s only one right answer, with strategy there can be many different answers.” Phew. What’s more, Lucinda’s exceptional face recognition skills put her in the top three percent of the general population as a super recogniser. So yeah, she’s probably seen you around. Recommends: Podcasts: Nymphete alumni, Polyester, Afterwork drinks Reads: New York Magazine, The Financial Times, The Economist, [book] Culture is bad for you by Mark Taylor, Orian Brook and Dave O'BrienSibling Studio Sibling Studio’s Substack, Post-Culture Enjoying the show? Please give us a follow and share with your friends. Subscribe to the Niche ID newsletter for latest episode updates.

In conversation with Morgane Bigault, French photographer, videographer, and director. Her visual language is imbued with a documentary aesthetic – raw, considered, and human. She brings a sense of play and restraint to her craft, "limitation can actually open yourself to being more creative." From documenting athletics clubs to Olympians, Morgane both shows and tells, "there's a form of grace in training."Morgane's creative inspirations: Serge Gainsbourg, Jacques Brel, Barbara, Paco Ibanez, Michel Polnareff, Johnny Hallyday, Ana Cuba, Madeleine Penfold , Pauline Ballet, Florence Pernet, Linda Brownlee, Pia Riverola.MorganeBigault.comSubscribe to the Niche ID newsletter for latest episode updates.

In conversation with Leila Jones, Co-Director of Indie Production Company, Show Ponies. We talk about her annual Glastonbury-on-Sea production – now in its fifth year this June. Also, her role in the legend of Lost Vagueness, creative risk-taking, and her formative (and funny) years of 'wild abandon.' See Leila in The Lost in Vagueness documentary. See Show Ponies.Subscribe to the ⁠Niche ID⁠ newsletter for latest episode updates.