Together, you become creators.

Join or create clubs for regular show-and-tells:

  • set a challenge and a deadline
  • help each other finish
  • everyone puts their work and what they learned into a scrollable magazine

Repeat = portfolio.

Join waitlist
Join as a group Read a real zine Open the demo

The people you keep meaning to make things with.

cut here
make and keep friends+work

See a show-and-tell.

A few photographers who became friends, and a blank page that became a zine. Photo Phloor. Four weeks.

  1. Jul15
    01

    The challenge goes up

    Someone sets it, and puts a date on it. That date is the whole trick.

    Photo Phloor’s circle in Drex: a live circle-time bar across the top, the editor @144mb, and the challenge “Chinatown Story — make a story out of the Chinatown photo walk” with two pinned resources and two people already submitted.
    snap a Chinatown story
  2. every Wed
    02

    Circle time comes round

    Not a one-off. A standing hour in everyone’s calendar — online or in person — where the work actually happens.

    Photo Phloor on the Chinatown photo walk: five of them talking and shooting among the racks of red qipao in the shop they pinned to the circle.
    in person, this week
  3. Aug10
    03

    Make the scrollable magazine — together

    Everyone’s work, and what they learned, in one issue.

    A submission in the issue: a photograph captioned “friend (the apprentice) shows qipao” of a woman in a red qipao in a bridal shop, and under it the maker’s written answer about the master and the apprentice of a Chinatown bridal shop who have made qipaos for forty years.
    “Chinatown Story”, so far
  4. Aug12due
    04

    It ships: submissions close

    The deadline is a circle time. You all show up, it goes out to the world — and into your portfolio.

    The published issue [ 3 A M, 2 0 0 1 ] from Photo Phloor: two night photographs pinned to the page — an empty lit stairwell and a glass-block window — one captioned “Wow”.
    “[ 3 A M, 2 0 0 1 ]”
  5. then

    …and the next challenge goes up.

your portfolio

It all ends up on a wall.

Yours, and the club’s. Both of these are real — go and look.

1.44 MB's wall on Drex: their pick photo pinned under a handwritten caption, the clubs they edit, and the zines they made. 1.44 MB’s wall →

A maker’s wall. Their pick, their roll, every zine they were in.

Photo Phloor's wall on Drex: the table, a corkboard of night photographs pinned up by the club's makers. Photo Phloor’s wall →

The club’s wall. The table — everything the club has pinned up.

Why not a group chat?

Nobody quits. The date just stops being the date.

the group chat
4,000 messages. Nothing made.
a club
the challenge

Shoot a roll you'd normally be scared to.

due friday
one issue, everyone's name in it
A challenge, a date, a finished thing.
who’s using Drex

Baristas, models, photographers, letterers.

Drawing at the Cafe: a bright collage, Claire holding her drawing. Cafe
Zine · read

Drawing at the Cafe

Drex Zine · 4 makers · by hand

“It helps me relax and focus when I draw at the cafe!”— Claire

View zine →

Silk Road 001: a dark editorial, a model mid-stride on a red-lit runway. Silk Road
Club + zine

Silk Road 001

XChange Models · 11 makers

“You believe in yourself.”— Wei-Sean, and ten others

View zine →Instagram →

The interactive dress-up zine: a clip-art figure with cut-out clothes taped beside him. Play Dress-up
Play it

The dress-up game

Drexzine · 4 makers

Play zine →

Photo Phloor: an old wooden chair alone on a city sidewalk at night. Phloor
Club

Photo Phloor

San Francisco · a photography collective

Instagram →

SF Penmans: a hand-lettered drop-cap and cursive verse in blue ink on cream paper. Penmans
Club + zine

SF Penmans

San Francisco · a penmanship club

View zine →

Beans: a barista at a San Francisco cafe holding a mint-green cup of mocha, latte art poured into the foam under a dusting of cocoa. Beans
Club + zine

Our Favorite Drinks

San Francisco · a cafe crew · 4 makers

“I’m addicted to chocolate.”— Michaela

View zine →

A real Drex club zine, “Drawing at the Cafe” — a taped photo of a maker holding her sketch, with the creative challenge highlighted. read “Drawing at the Cafe” → A maker at a cafe table, phone in hand, placing pages in the zine editor watch it get made →
Silk Road 001 cover. Silk Road 001 Photo Phloor: a chair alone on a night sidewalk. Photo Phloor SF Penmans: hand-lettered verse in blue ink. SF Penmans Our Favorite Drinks: cocoa dusted over a latte at the cafe counter. Beans

…and whatever yours is.

why it works

The magic is the hour.

  1. 01

    Challenge

    FRI

    your Host sets one, with a deadline

  2. 02

    The hour

    practice observe ask be seen

    the recurring hour you've got people

  3. 03

    Your own time

    to work on the challenge

  4. 04

    Show & tell

    ZINE

    the zine goes out — portfolio

your club

The same people. Issue after issue.

The same few faces for a year — beginners next to old hands — who watch you get good.

issue 001
you're the newest one here issue 012
somebody's asking you

Ship three issues and you earn hosting a club of your own!

what if i don't have a group

Find your club by flipping through zines.

already run something?

You don’t need new people. You need yours to show up.

Bring the same people back →

whatever your club needs, we bring

Club kit.

As we learn what helps your club make things, we get it to you — a guest, a bigger shelf, a venue — so the same people keep showing up.

people

The hard part isn't making. It's showing up.

  • The houryour standing time, together
  • Who's missingso somebody waves first
  • Broadcastsblast a message to your whole club
virtual

Everything that isn't the craft — handled.

  • Your portfolioa wall with all your work
  • Club portfolioa wall with the club's work
  • Hand-made zineslaid out by hand
  • Bot-laid zinesa portfolio item, auto-laid
  • Other clubs' zinesjoin or get inspired by what other clubs make
material

The stuff you can't download. (coming soon)

  • A printed issuein your actual hands
  • Studio timea wheel, a darkroom, a press
XChange Models club did a challenge…

Come as Your Heritage. Come As Yourself.

“What changed once you stepped off the runway?”

I didn't know what was possible until I saw someone else do it.@tergel
Not every place you feel like you belong. Here, I feel right at home.@falcon
Since I'm capable of doing something like that, I feel like I could do anything.@shanara
They treat you as a person, not as a model.@chiamakabrowneyes
Seeing them go before me relieved a lot of my stress.@angela
I had a plan. I did none of it. It was all instinct.@miguel
read the ledger →
who's behind it

Led by a researcher and two designers.

why we built it

I researched how people pick up a craft: next to someone who’s on the same journey. Nothing online works that way.

Chielo

Chielo Mbaezue · CEO & Co-founder

Chielo Mbaezue, CEO and co-founder of Drex
↑ that’s me
Uko, designer at Drex
Uko
Lucero, designer at Drex
Lucero
not a mockup — the actual app

Look inside the app.

Real screens — what a club actually touches.

three ways in

Pick a door.

Instagram

Watch clubs form — the people, the zines in progress.

Follow along → @drexclubs

The Demo

Published zines, the walls, a club’s room. Latched pre-launch — knock for a key.

Knock on the demo →