Come celebrate SPELL Magazine’s printed release, at this open mic!

When: February 27th

Where: Ross Commons (229 N. 34th St.), Second Floor

Come ready to hear some of their published authors read their pieces aloud!

Light bites will be provided!

Join Blue Stoop for an in-person Creative Coworking session at Writers Room, this Wednesday, 2/25, from 6-8 pm. We'll open with a quick round of goal-setting and close with another quick check-in — expect about 90 minutes of actual writing time.

Creative Coworking is an opportunity for writers and readers of all experience levels to spend time together while working toward their personal goals. Bring a work in progress, start something new, read a book, or just do some daydreaming!

We will have free snacks, wifi, KN-95 masks (optional, but encouraged), and COVID tests available on site. There will be pens and paper but you can bring a notebook or laptop if desired. Headphones or earplugs may also be useful. This is a free event for adults 18+, but if you'd like to support Blue Stoop you can pitch in a few bucks here.

For anyone who wants to study, hang, or chat between classes or work!

229 N. 34th St, 3rd Floor

For anyone who wants to study, hang, or chat between classes or work!

229 N. 34th St, 3rd Floor

Housing Journeys II: You and I, Living, Together
Do property lines decide who we live with—or merely who we live next to?
Does Home begin and end at an imaginary line drawn at the edge of a driveway, a party wall, a fence? Or is Home something wider, messier, more human?

What if Home was less about ownership and more about closeness—about who knocks on your door, who you check in on, who fills the space with memory, laughter, tension, care? Could Home be mapped not with streets and parcels, but in relationships, shared time, and proximity?

At this Creative Kickback session, we will gently question the boundaries that shape how we live together. Architecture student and Second Story Collective Homesharer, Jackson Tignor, will guide participants through a reflective workshop that blends art, writing, and conversation. Together, we will probe the question: how do manufactured divisions—property lines, party walls, blocks—support and diminish our sense of Home?

We will take these ideas about home and living together and imagine them in the context of Philadelphia blocks and streets. Using blank maps, we will write, draw, and color to better consider how closeness—physical and emotional—forms quiet constellations of care and experience.

This session invites you to reminisce, to map memory, and to sit in community as we expand our understanding of how large Home can be. Join us for the second Creative Kickback in the Housing Journeys series—a space to reflect, create, and live together, if only for a little while.

For anyone who wants to study, hang, or chat between classes or work!

229 N. 34th St, 3rd Floor

For anyone who wants to study, hang, or chat between classes or work!

229 N. 34th St, 3rd Floor

A Conversation with a Civil Rights Activist and Workshop Connecting Past & Present Movements

Norman Cain was in college when the Civil Rights Movement hit its stride—and he was right there with it. Join the Lindy Center and Writers Room for this exciting event featuring Mr. Norman telling stories about his Civil Rights Activism, including meeting MLK and hearing him speak in Philadelphia alongside local Civil Rights leader Cecil B. Moore, and an interactive workshop that invites participants to connect the lessons of the Civil Rights Movement to our current moment.

12 pm - 2 pm at the Lindy Center for Civic Engagement, 3210 Cherry St.

Housing Journeys I: Did Space Create You?
Which rooms have held you most gently? Your early childhood bedroom? A friend’s kitchen? Select school classrooms? Grandma’s back porch?
At this Creative Kickback session, we will explore home as collage. Home is not confined to four walls and a front door but can sprawl counties and coastlines.

Together, we will look back at the Rooms and Places that taught us how community and meaning populate a space. We will think of home as a layout of memorable spaces and imagine what transitions or thresholds exist between them.

Come ready to learn about how and why architects draw the way they do!
Come reminisce about home through conversation and collage making and be in community at this first Creative Kickback session in the Housing Journeys Series!

Join us on Friday, January 9th, in Ross Commons (229 N 34th Street), 3rd floor, from 5:30 PM -7:00 PM

For the second run of our open mic series, On the Right Track!

Expect a lively evening of poetry reading. With ample room to enjoy others’ work, and opportunity to share your own—Whether it’s your first or tenth open mic, we welcome you to come cultivate community, experience imagination, and inspire one another, at On the Right Track.

Ross Commons, where the Writers Room resides in Powelton Village, was once owned by the comptroller of the Pennsylvania Railroad before being acquired by Drexel in 1928. In the early 2000s, it was reborn as the George and Lyn Ross Commons: a new community space for students. From a symbol of power and industry to a community hub of creation and collaboration. Ross Commons’ history— in relation to railroads and community collaboration inspired the name of the series, On the Right Track, to symbolize the directions we chart forward, together.

We hope you’ll join us for this fun evening. Don’t forget to bring something to read, and/or ears to listen. Come enjoy some open mic and connection with the Writers Room community!