A wooden dining table decorated with lit candles, set with plates and glasses, surrounded by dark green foliage.

Design Gatherings That Matter

This audio series distills what we’ve learned from designing and facilitating large-scale events, leadership meetings, and trainings where the stakes were real and every voice in the room matters.

Each short briefing walks through a simple three-phase way of designing gatherings. Before, during, and after. Because what happens in the room is only part of the story.  

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It’s not logistics that sink gatherings. It’s leaving connection to chance. Make yours different.

If you’ve ever left a gathering with the sense that something never quite took hold, you’re not alone. This series is for people who bring others together. Team leaders, community builders, facilitators, and anyone responsible for shaping the room. It offers a clearer way to think about how gatherings move from transactional to meaningful, and human brains and hearts synthesize meaning together.

The Work, in Three Parts

People sitting at a dining table, laughing and smiling during a meal, with plates of food and drinks in front of them.
A woman in a denim jacket shaking hands with another woman with two other women nearby, in a cozy interior with plants and a table, during a social or professional meeting.
People raising glasses in a toast during a gathering around a decorated table with candles and food. Title: Part III: The Three Invisible Levers of Meaningful Gatherings.
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A woman lighting a candle on a table with flowers and candles during dusk in an outdoor park.

The Voice of the Briefings

I'm Lia James, &Human Founder and creator of The Traveling Table.

For years, I’ve been designing spaces where conversation does more than fill time. Rooms where teams, communities, and people in transition can move past surface-level exchange and into something more honest and generative.

This framework grew out of that work.

Let’s build spaces where connection is intentional, and where everyone is part of a bigger conversation.

A long wooden dining table set for a meal, with plates, glasses, silverware, and candles, surrounded by greenery.

Take the DNA of Gathering With You

Your first briefing will arrive shortly, with insights from years of designing gatherings where what people say, hear, and carry forward actually matters.