Creative Writing Masterclass: How to Write a City
January 26, 2026 | 10:30 am – 3:00 pm
Join writer Elena Medel for a creative writing masterclass focused on cities and the built environment.
About the workshop:
A city is made up of avenues and squares, parks and buildings. Cities are inhabited by people: some live all their lives in the same neighbourhood, others pass through them every day. And a city is also built by the memory of those streets, those buildings, those people.
Over the course of the day, Elena will guide you through writing prompts and group feedback sessions to develop your creative writing practice, drawing on her own research and writing processes. Together you’ll think about the place you live and the lives of the people around you to inspire your poems, stories or novels.
This masterclass is led by award-winning author Elena Medel. Elena was shortlisted for the 2025 Eccles Institute and Hay Festival Global Writers Award. Her book The Wonders was published by Pushkin Press in 2022 and translated by Thomas Bunstead and Lizzie Davis.
Suitable for beginners. The workshop will be delivered in English. Each participant will receive a copy of Elena’s book, The Wonders, at the start of the workshop. Please email adultlearning@bl.uk with your accessibility requirements.
A vegetarian sandwich lunch is provided. Please email adultlearning@bl.uk with your dietary requirements.
Elena Medel
Elena Medel (1985) is a writer based in Madrid.
She was the first woman ever to win the prestigious Francisco Umbral Prize for her debut novel, The Wonders (2020), which was also longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award 2023 and has been translated into fifteen languages. She was shortlisted for The Eccles Institute and the Hay Festival Global Writer’s Award 2025, and writer-in-residence at MALBA, Arvo Pärt Centre and Passa Porta. Her essays on culture and politics have been published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and The New York Times, among others.