The Monday Media Diet with Jenni Dawes

Jenni Dawes (JD) is a friend of WITI and a Paris based writer and strategist. We’re delighted to have her on the page with us today. She’s also narrated an audio version of the MMD, if you prefer to consume it that way. -Colin (CJN)

Tell us about yourself.

I’m a writer, strategist and coach with an incurable case of the explorer bug: I’m Aussie but have spent the past decade-plus on the far side of the world; nomading, notching five years in New York, and finally succumbing to Paris’s immortal allure.

My career has been decidedly non-linear but my sweet spot is the intersection of sustainability, wellness and travel, usually bridging the creative and corporate camps. My main focus now is building the switched-on communities I seek, which I do via The Paris Chapter, a weekly curation of the city’s intellectual and artistic delights, and Creative Monastery, producing soirées, salons and such.

My latest joy: creating custom question decks - for dinner parties, conferences, restaurants et al - as shortcuts to deep connection. I’ve started a related experiment where people book a 15min call & I ask them really deep questions (come play if you like).

Describe your media diet.

I try to focus less on the what / when, and more on the why and how. I’ll still skim the headlines each day, but am most interested in macro or micro perspectives.

I’ve found taking an international view essential for my work and my frame of mind. I read the news from Australian (the ABC), French (Le Monde, L’Express), UK (The Guardian, Financial Times) and US (NYT) sources, and have become quite a fan of El Pais’s English edition. 

When I’m travelling, I love diving into that country’s news (using Google Translate as needed) to get a sense of what issues they’re currently facing. I spent a good portion of last year in Spain, and reading Diario del Ibiza each day was initially for language practice, but also helped me feel more connected to the Ibecencan community.

My guilty pleasure is the business of entertainment: if I’m procrastinating, I’m on Hollywood Reporter and Variety (I may have chosen coach over talent manager, but the intrigue remains).

Magazines

My favourite part of my media diet is magazines - I came up in that industry, and my obsession with them continues. I’ll buy a magazine just because of the typography, or a particular image. The best are the “coffee table variety” from independent publishers that I keep around for inspiration: Design Anthology, Ark Journal, Openhouse, The New Era, Nomas, Electra. 

Other regulars: The New Yorker (still the ultimate for any journey: so much packed into such little space), Society or L’Obs for a deeper dive into French current affairs, Architectural Digest (US and FR), Architectura y Diseno, Dezeen, Milk Decoration and Artravel for my interiors fix, 

Les Others (a fab outdoor adventure journal), La Revue (great for deep diving into a singular topic), along with Wallpaper and Konfekt.

I’m constantly looking for references and inspiration from further afield - Scandinavian Mind was a great discovery. I made a custom map with the best international magazine sellers across Paris, so I always have somewhere to drop in while wandering.

Newsletters

I’m yet to find an email tool that lets me segment my inbox how I’d like, so I set up a separate “newsletters only” gmail that I browse while on the metro or travelling. The few that make it into my standard inbox: Airmail, Farnam Street, The Profile, James Clear, Garance Doré, Every, Madeleine Dore. The Browser consistently delivers great pieces I wouldn’t otherwise have found, or necessarily considered.

Podcasts

Mainly a driving companion, but still focused on being in the company of smart people. The Knowledge Project is my all-star favourite, followed by Huberman Lab, Les Deviations (a French podcast interviewing people who’ve made drastic life changes), How I Built This, Language Transfer (the best language-learning hack), Tim Ferriss.

Those are the mainstays, and then I’ll go rampant depending on my current obsession; my archive of downloaded episodes is like a time machine. I recently fell in love with No One Here Gets Out Alive; there’s a lot to be said for contemplating our finitude.

What’s the last great book you read?

Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman is the book I’ve recommended most over the past year. It fuses several of my favourite things - philosophy, productivity, mindful practices - and spits out an entirely new perspective. Key takeaways: a fulfilled life and ‘filled full’ life are not one and the same; perfectionism is more about reality’s limitations than your own; your life is the sum of the things you pay attention to.

What are you reading now?

I read 99% non-fiction and always have several books on the go. Currently in my bag: 

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Curating, by Hans Ulrich Obrist. I bought it from a tiny bookstore in Brooklyn, after a Pioneer Works adventure seven years ago. You ever have the feeling of something being so made for you, you can’t quite sit with it? That book toured the world with me and was never touched; cut to June this year, when an urgent desire to read it popped up. Two weeks later, I saw him speak at an event in Paris. It was a magical evening, my long-suffering copy is now signed, and my love of endless questions, obscure references and creative collaboration has a ‘certified laudable career’ beacon.

What’s your reading strategy when you pick up a print copy of your favorite publication? 

Newspapers are the standard front to back; I try to read at least the first few paragraphs of every article, but if it doesn’t grab me I’ll keep moving.

Magazines typically get three passes: the first is haphazard, flicking around, the second is a cover to cover skim, diving in as desired, and the third - if it’s not joining the coffee table collection - is with a pair of scissors at hand, reviewing every image and headline as moodboard fodder.

Who should everyone be reading that they’re not? 

My focus is less ‘who’ and more ‘where’, the ideal being anything beyond the usual. I’ve long-sought a tool that actively helps us widen our lenses, delivering content from categories, regions or perspectives beyond your standard fare (with a lovely pie-chart breakdown to boot). 

Imagine: at the start of the month you enter your “best-self media breakdown”, aka 30% world news, 10% tech, 20% across the divide… You’d then get periodic alerts on how you’re tracking - “sooo it’s actually been 70% sports to date” - with content to steer you back on course. In essence, a tool to actively push back against the “same again?” algorithms; the goal should be expansion, not enclosure.

What is the best non-famous app you love on your phone? 

I use Widgetsmith to make my home screen into a mini exhibition space, of images and quotes that inspire me. I’m a bit obsessed with making my phone work for me - I went through this very long guide on that - and made it difficult to access apps I want to engage with less.

I love their built-in widget tracking the trajectory of the sun; it’s a great measure of the passing of time and reminds me to be outside more.

Plane or train?

Train, certainly in Europe. That said, being Aussie means long flights are par for the course. I do think there’s immense value in disconnecting for such an extended period (crossing so many time zones in the process). I always exit the void with a fresh perspective. 

What is one place everyone should visit?

The wildest, most rugged patch of nature they can access (leaving no trace of their visit). There’s a great quote - of course I can’t find it now - about the necessity of feeling small in the world. I believe it’s essential for us to reconnect with our wild selves, and be humbled by the power and ferocity of nature in the process.

Tell us the story of a rabbit hole you fell deep into. 

I’m in the depths of a gargantuan rabbithole concerning perhaps my grandest idea yet: revitalising dying country villages, meeting the needs of both locals and city-dwelling creatives.

It combines pretty much every one of my personal and professional passions: when I had the ‘aha’ moment earlier this year, it was essentially hundreds of previous rabbitholes smushing together*. Of course, that spawned a rabbithole of its own: how best to catalogue the far-flung references (everything from foldable houses to EU funding options to best-in-show data visualisations) and neatly weave them together? Cue an hours-long foray into the pros and cons of various personal knowledge management systems (Obsidian emerged the winner).

*I feel like there’s a comic book term for when everything in the universe collides, but I’m going to call it a day.

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Thanks for reading,

Noah (NRB) & Colin (CJN) & Jenni (JD)

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