Since 2016, I’ve been sharing my work, writing and drawing about making things, yourself and the future. You can find my most recent work in my newsletter, Illuminating Letters


These are a few of my favourite posts from the last little while, but feel free to rummage through the archive too.

On making things with your own two hands
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

On making things with your own two hands

I want to try to articulate that love of making and create something of a manifesto for making to try and get more people relearning how to use their hands with me.

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A pup’s pep talk
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

A pup’s pep talk

Here’s a little story about a dog, inspired by Blair Braverman’s storytimes that are sometimes the distractions that get me through the day. Plus who doesn’t love a pup and a pep talk?

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Lessons I’ve learned from Barbara Hepworth
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

Lessons I’ve learned from Barbara Hepworth

Barbara Hepworth is one of my favourite artists of all time. I’ve visited her sculptures up and down the country and there’s always something so present and grounding about them, that they make me feel better no matter how discombobulated I might feel.

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Designing and building my first chatbot
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

Designing and building my first chatbot

I’ve always been a bit suspicious of chatbots and conversational interfaces. There’s something about them I find unsettling, particularly those that learn as they are exposed to more conversation. So when I saw UAL’s Creative Computing Institute was offering an online course inspired by their Feminist Chatbot work through Future Learn, I leapt on the chance to learn more.

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Everything I learned as a member of a shadow board
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

Everything I learned as a member of a shadow board

For the last year and a little bit I’ve been a member of ENGINE UK’s shadow board. ENGINE is a full stack agency which covers creative, communications, media and transformation, essentially it’s like a creative marketing and comms powerhouse that works hand in hand with data and consultancy know how. The shadow board was an opportunity for 9 of us from across the business to come together and shape the future of where we work, support our executive team and ultimately see what it means to be a leader in a different context.

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5 mindset shifting maps
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

5 mindset shifting maps

I’ve tried to draw some of the mindset shifts I want to make as a new way of tackling them and hopefully helping you tackle them too. I loved trying to come up with ways to make the intangible clear and easy to see on the page.

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Knowing your value with Dolly Parton
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

Knowing your value with Dolly Parton

This story is all about Dolly as a businesswoman. It’s about using your art to tell your story and being proud of your truth, about knowing your value and saying no when you have to, and it’s about recognising the talents of other women along the way.

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3 of my favourite creative warm ups
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

3 of my favourite creative warm ups

Here are three drawing exercises I love and I thought would be a fun lunch time break. They’re all exercises you can do on your own or together with others. You can use them to warm up for your day, to get you feeling good before tackling a creative challenge, as a silly ice breaker before a workshop, or whenever and however you want. 

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An illustrated tour of King’s Cross
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

An illustrated tour of King’s Cross

As London, very slowly, reopens I wanted to give a virtual tour of one of my favourite areas to share a glimpse with those who can’t visit and a few fun facts to make a visit more fun for those who can.

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Inclusive design myth busting
Natalie Harney Natalie Harney

Inclusive design myth busting

Doing research for and designing services that are inclusive is a big part of my work, so it’s something I think about a whole lot. But I know it’s not at the top of everyone’s mind. That’s why, along with some of my brilliant colleagues, I run inclusive design workshops for anyone involved in services that have some or all of their interactions online. We’ve run these workshops with designers, researchers, coders, and people working in communications internally and externally with participants across government and financial sectors so far.

Through those workshops we’ve busted a lot of myths about inclusive design and I wanted to share some of those with you here. 

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