In Wild Air

Your Weekly Dose
of Enlightenment

2016 — 2018

In Wild Air logo

Photo: Ona Janzen

In Wild Air is a free, guest edited weekly newsletter. Founded, curated, designed, and published by Heath Killen, this project provides a regular broadcast of knowledge and good vibes to its readers from 9am every Monday. Both the open and click rate for each edition is more than double the industry average, with a 99% audience retention rate. This tells us one thing for sure: people love starting their week with a new edition of In Wild Air.

In Wild Air logotype

Category Names & Icons

Name & Icon for Guest’s self promotion

The purpose of In Wild Air is to expand the minds and horizons of its readers, introducing them to new ideas and stories that they can seek out during the week and beyond. The concept is simple, but invites many exciting possibilities — selected guests are invited to share six things that interest them based on six different categories. These are Culture, People, Places, Things, Thoughts and Wildism (an open category).

The project began with an exclusively Australian focus but now welcomes guests from all over the world, from backgrounds as varied as astronomy, art, agriculture, music, design, skincare, and ecology. This broad focus aims to foster diverse voices and encourage a cross-pollination of ideas between disciplines.

Reading an edition ● Photo: Ona Janzen

Volume Number Set

Edition Number Set

The look and feel of the newsletter has gradually evolved over time—a constant process of analysis and revision—giving each volume (12 editions) its own character and flavour. What has been consistent from the first edition is the use of a colour palette in which each colour corresponds to one of the six categories. This palette was inspired by a traditional system from Thailand, which assigns a colour to each day of the week using an astrological and mythical guide. The colours were initially rich and vibrant, but have slowly begun fading out as the project approaches its 6th and final volume.

In Wild Air’s evolving colour palette

Pre-launch promotional posters

Guest Handbook

Archive of Editions

Edition example

Weekly social media posts

Guest themed social media banners

The format for In Wild Air, an email newsletter, offers the ability to reach people directly, intimately, and in a way that enables them to read at their leisure. There’s also an element of wanting to reclaim the inbox, a place that too often is full of anxiety inducing junk. In Wild Air is a remedy, a mentally nourishing way to begin the week that can be enjoyed on the train in the morning, over a coffee in the afternoon, or in bed just before sleep. Regardless of the way that it is consumed, based on the tiny sample of feedback below alone, the gesture and the contents of In Wild Air are both being very warmly embraced.

Selected feedback from guests on Twitter

Selected subscriber feedback from Twitter

Selected subscriber feedback from Twitter

Selected subscriber feedback from Twitter

The diversity of previous In Wild Air guests ranges from artists to academics, environmentalists to distillers, farmers to publishers, and writers to puppeteers. Almost all guests to date have agreed to be part of In Wild Air without having encountered the newsletter or the studio previously which we take as a testament to the power of the idea and the quality of the execution. A small selection of previous guests are featured below.

Upon the conclusion of the project in April, the contents of In Wild Air will be moved to a beautiful new and permanent home.