Out of Hours • Kyoto • 4–6 June 2027

Become the studio that pays for the life you wanted.

You started the studio to pay for a life: time with your family, the trips, the freedom to choose where you live. Then good work brought more work, and because the standard that makes it good has never left your head, every one of those hours has to be yours.

Out of Hours is three days in Kyoto with eight studio founders. Mornings, we learn the mindset, techniques and technology behind the studios of tomorrow. Afternoons, we build together, on your own files, in the same room. We're finished by mid-afternoon, and Kyoto is yours. You fly home with your hours back for the life the studio was meant to pay for, and owning every piece of what you built.

Register interest

Tickets open Thursday 29 October
Eight spots available

Get your ticket

Hold your spot for $200
Early bird until Saturday 31 OctoberEight spots, first in, first served

A Kyoto machiya seen through maple leaves from its private garden

3 days

Fri 4 to Sun 6 June 2027

8 spots

Stay in the house, or join for the days

Kyoto

A renovated 1940s machiya

1 night out

Grand sumo and chanko hot pot

Who this is for

You've built a really good business. And it's taking every hour you've got.

Founders of design, brand, architecture and landscape studios, and anyone else delivering a service, with or without a team.

This is for you if…

  • You want more time with your family, or parental leave, and right now the studio stops when you do
  • When family needs you and you can't work, the money stops too
  • You want a week away, properly offline, and the studio can't spare you
  • The studio only earns what your own hours can get through
  • You repeat the same steps on every job, and none of it is written down
  • You learn best by building, with your own files open

It isn't for you if…

  • You'd rather watch than build
  • You're waiting for AI to settle down before you start
  • You're comfortable with every decision running through you
  • You'd rather have it built for you. That's a different conversation, and I'm happy to have it

What happens

Learn it in the morning. Build it by the afternoon.

Three days, one part of the studio each day. Mornings are for learning: the mindset, techniques, technologies and processes behind it. Afternoons, we build together on your own files, with me assisting as you need. We finish by mid-afternoon, so there's time to explore Kyoto, catch up on work, or head out together. And a call before you fly, so nobody arrives unprepared.

Morning

Learn

One part of the studio, shown on real examples

Midday

Lunch

Together

Afternoon

Build

Your own system, on your own files, with me beside you

Mid-afternoon on

Yours

Explore Kyoto, catch up on work, or head out together

This is the shape of the three days. The detail gets set with the eight of you before we fly, around what each of you most needs built. The builds below are examples.

Before you fly

The call

A call close to your departure date, so you get the absolute most out of the three days. We'll get you set up in Claude Code before you arrive, so the days in Kyoto go on your business.

Friday

Selling

Morning · Learn

How work comes in and gets won, from the marketing that brings it to the enquiry, the proposal and the yes.

Afternoon · Build

One selling system. For example, a content system that turns finished jobs into posts and case studies in your voice, an enquiry filter, or a proposal drafted from discovery.

Saturday

Delivery

Morning · Learn

The repeatable parts of your work, and the standards behind them.

Afternoon · Build

Whatever you put together on every job, made from your standards. For example, a website creative brief, a brand guidelines pack, a planting plan or an interiors fit-out schedule.

Sunday

Operations

Morning · Learn

How selling, delivery and everything around them fit together, and how what we've learnt applies to the whole studio.

Afternoon · Build

Stitch your systems into the way the studio runs. For example, one place where every enquiry, client and job lives. Then a show-and-tell, and what you'll build next.

And a night out for a grand sumo show, with all-you-can-eat chicken chanko hot pot.

"That one and a half hours was just gold. What I've done in the last five days would have taken me well over a month from just the conversation we had, what you showed me, how to implement it."

Amar runs a design consultancy in London. We met at a mastermind in Bali. One evening I sat with him for an hour and a half and set up the knowledge base his business now runs on, the same setup we'd build in Japan. Five days later, this is where he was.

In five days

  • New landing page built and live
  • Two lead magnets live, one updated and one built from scratch
  • Content templates for LinkedIn carousels and single-image posts
  • A promotion running for one of the lead magnets
Amar Gudhka

Amar Gudhka

AG Design and Consultancy

After working together

"I'm also a stay-at-home mum. So my time is very, very, very valuable to me."

Her creative direction brief used to take five to ten hours. Now it takes under an hour.

Coral Blaikie

Coral Blaikie

Coral Design Co.

"This is incredible. It does mean just so much more profit for us."

A deck she puts at five and a half hours, regenerated in just over two minutes.

Rebecca Hannah

Rebecca Hannah

Stir Creative

"I just need to knock off 3 hours, 32 minutes and I'll be on par with your system 😅"

Timed by hand, his Sprint document took over three and a half hours. Now it's done in three minutes.

Alex Buckman

Alex Buckman

Tune Design Office

The details

The dates and the place are set.

Where
Kyoto. A 1940s machiya, renovated in 2025 and booked for the group. Tatami rooms, a 40㎡ private Japanese garden, and a bathtub big enough for a proper soak after a day out. Six minutes' walk to Saiin Station, with direct trains into central Kyoto and the streetcar out to Arashiyama.
When
Friday 4 to Sunday 6 June 2027. If you're staying in the house, check in Thursday 3 June and stay until Monday 7 June.
How many
Eight spots available, working side by side. I sit with each of you while you build on your own files, and everyone is building the whole time. Laptops open all day. Something running by dinner, not a notebook of ideas.
How long
Three days, finishing by mid-afternoon, plus one night out at a grand sumo show with all-you-can-eat chicken chanko hot pot and all you can drink.
Cost
$495 for the three days, or from $795 to stay in the house as well, depending on the room. Early-bird pricing until Saturday 31 October, 11:59pm London. After that, $615 for the three days, or from $990 with a room.
$615 for the three days, or from $990 to stay in the house as well, depending on the room.
Paying
Pay in full, or pay a $200 deposit to hold your spot. The balance goes on the same card on 28 February 2027, and the deposit is fully refundable until then. After that, if you can't make it, you can pass your ticket to someone else.

Where this started

It started as a post at 12:16am.

I'd bought the flights the day before. This is the post, as it went up.

Dillon McIntosh

7 October 2026

I bought flights to Japan yesterday. And I'm considering something pretty audacious. It's 12:16am, I should be asleep but I've just had a wild idea... let's host an event while I'm there. I'm starting to picture what that might look like. My trip is from the end of May to early June 2027. I'll be there for fifteen days, landing in Osaka, maybe up to Tokyo, I haven't worked out the details yet. I'm thinking one day, a small group, with plenty of time to work together. We'd work on: - Finding where your money is leaking - Writing down the rules you already follow - Building the first fix before you leave It'd be completely free to attend. You'd simply pay for your own flights and accommodation. That's as far as the idea has got. If you'd be interested in coming, leave me a comment to wake up to. 🇯🇵

Dillon in front of Mount Fuji

Before we fly

The road to Out of Hours 2027.

Between now and June I'll run a workshop on each part of how I run Dreams Dept, live. No dates yet. Tick the ones you'd join and you'll hear first when they're set.

01

Studio Brain™

The setup everything else runs on. Your business, your standards and your files, in one place the AI reads before every job. The 33-minute replay is on sale now.

Get the replay

02

Outreach

How I find the right people and open a conversation worth having.

03

Leads & Pipeline

How enquiries get triaged, tracked and followed up, and what happens to the ones that go quiet.

04

Delivery

One repeated process, taken from hours to minutes and built from your own standards.

05

Content

How content gets produced from thinking and work you've already done.

Out of Hours · Kyoto · 4–6 June 2027

Tick a workshop and your choices come with you to the registration form.

Dillon McIntosh

Who's running it

I'll be in Japan for my wife's birthday.

That's why Out of Hours is in Kyoto. I'm in Japan for fifteen days next June, and I wanted to spend three of them in a room with founders like you, building the studios that pay for the lives they want.

I'm on a mission to create a billion dollars for the studios the world is writing off. I've spent over a decade across design, agencies and software. Hundreds of clients, time inside startups and product teams, freelancing, and businesses of my own. That mix means I know what it feels like when the work is good, clients are buying, and your week is still the limit on what you earn.

The whole industry is being told the machines are coming for the work. I see it differently. The studios that know their own standards, run the business as well as they run the craft, and own what they build are the ones best placed to use them. That bet is my business.

Every studio runs on standards the founder has never written down. The decisions made so often they've stopped feeling like decisions. Written down, they become something a system can run to, and the repeatable production stops needing your hands while the judgement stays with you. I've been doing this with one studio at a time. In Kyoto it's a room of eight, and everyone flies home with theirs built.

Dillon McIntosh

Tickets

Get your ticket.

Eight spots, first in, first served. Early-bird pricing until Saturday 31 October, 11:59pm London.

Hold your spot for $200

Pay a $200 deposit today and the rest on 28 February 2027. It's fully refundable until then. Or pay in full now.

The three daysJoin for the days, stay where you like$495$615$615
The three days + a bed in Room 1The traditional Japanese room, futons on tatami, shared by three · four nights in the house$795$990$990
The three days + Room 2A private tatami room with a futon · four nights in the house$995$1,240$1,240
The three days + Room 3A private room with a Western-style bed · four nights in the house$1,095$1,365$1,365

After 28 February, if you can't make it, you can pass your ticket to someone else.

The house: check in Thursday 3 June, check out Monday 7 June.

Step 1 of 3 · Your details

Register interest

Put your name down.

Nothing to pay, and nothing to commit to yet.

  • Get the ticket link the moment tickets open
  • Hear about early-bird pricing first
  • Get the workshop dates first

Step 1 of 2