Ten years ago this month my book on creative research methods was launched. It came about in a classic way. The backstory is that 20 years ago, when I was finishing my PhD, I decided I wanted to write a book on research methods. I knew I couldn’t just write another book on qualitative methods or interviewing or something; I needed a hook. I didn’t come up with one till early 2011 when I was short of work due to the austerity measures imposed by the new UK coalition government. Research and Evaluation for Busy Students and Practitionerswas published by Policy Press in September 2012, and I thought good, that’s one ambition ticked off the bucket list. Then in 2013 I wanted to read a book on creative research methods so I went looking for one online. And I looked, and looked, and eventually realised, with a sinking heart, that if I wanted to read that book I would have to write it first.

A lot has changed in the last ten years: globally of course, but also in the field of creative research methods, and for me professionally and personally. I don’t think my book contributed to any global changes but I do think it has made a difference to the field and I’m absolutely sure it has made a big difference for me. Perhaps also for my publisher, Policy Press, who are publishing a lot on creative methods now – but I’ll let them reflect on that on their own blog if they so choose.

By the time the book was published I had already started teaching at universities. I ran my first creative academic writing retreat in the UK in spring 2015, and my first creative research methods workshop in Canada in the autumn of that year. I haven’t stopped running those types of events, and they now provide most of my income. If I hadn’t written the book I don’t think that would have happened. Also it launched me firmly into scholarly writing: I have written and edited a number of books now, and I co-edit one book series and edit another. Scholarly writing pays pennies per hour but fortunately it enables the teaching I do which is much better paid.

Talking of money, another change for me is that I am not skint any more. When Creative Research Methods first came out in 2015 I was very short of money. Things were improving a bit – 2011-2013 were the worst years; I had to get a part-time office job to pay the bills – but by 2015 I was still only able to pay myself £1,000/month, which was just enough to pay the mortgage and bills, cover my car costs and buy food. This was partly because in those days universities mostly asked me to work for nothing, a hangover from the time when everyone who came to run a workshop in a university was already employed by another university elsewhere. I published a post about saying no to this in 2015, and it was my most popular post in that year by a long way which suggests it struck a chord.

In terms of the field, I think the book has helped, and is helping, to make creative research methods more understandable and acceptable. My book and my work are far from the only factors in this shift; there are many other people doing amazing work on creative methods. In fact my own scholarly work is largely a collation job, pulling together a lot of people’s work into one place, though it is also built on years of my own experience of using creative methods in commissioned research. This also applies for later publications I have had a hand in, such as The Bloomsbury Handbook of Creative Research Methods and the Handbook of Creative Data Analysis, as well as the Creative Research Methods in Practice book series. Also there are now a range of single-discipline books on creative research methods: I was involved in the one on education, but not in the ones on geography, economics, music, and I’m sure there are others too.

The good thing about people who are interested in creative methods is that they have formed a very kind and supportive community. I can think of only two creative methods people, in the whole of the last 10 years, who have not been kind and supportive. As well as our community, we also now have a conference (the International Creative Research Methods Conference) and a journal (the Journal of Creative Research Methods – first issue due in September 2025). I founded both of those, which took a massive amount of work, though I couldn’t have done it without the support of too many individuals and organisations to name. I am particularly grateful to Policy Press, who have sponsored the conference every year so far and whose Journals Director, Julia Mortimer, helped us set up the journal (published by Bristol University Press of which Policy Press is an imprint). I am also particularly grateful to the journal’s editors-in-chief, Sophie Woodward of the University of Manchester and the National Centre for Research Methods, Harriet Shortt of Bath Spa University, and Su-ming Khoo of the National University of Ireland, who are carrying most of the load. I am Consulting Editor which means I don’t have to do very much work now it’s all up and running, thank goodness!

As yet I haven’t made any money from either of these initiatives, though I live in hope. But again, fortunately, my teaching work and a few other bits and pieces keep me afloat financially. I am, in one sense, my own patron – though I do have a handful of real patrons on Patreon and they are an enormous support for my work.

I am now being asked to keynote research methods conferences in various enticing places (and one or two less enticing ones) around the world. It seems I have become something of a figurehead for creative research methods – but creative research methods do not, in any sense, belong to me. They belong to all of us, and any of us can expand the field. Also, creative research methods are not new or some kind of fad: they have been used by Indigenous researchers for tens of thousands of years. I am happy and proud to be doing this work, and I like the thought that I am, in a very small way, building on ancient traditions and helping to keep them alive for the generations to come.