Royal Literary Fund
CLIENT
Situation Interactive
TECHNOLOGIES
WordPress, PHP, JavaScript, Gravity Forms
YEAR
2024
EXTERNAL URL
Rebuilt the digital platform for a UK charity founded in 1790 — one that has supported Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence, and James Joyce — delivering over five million pounds annually in grants and education for professional writers. Custom WordPress theme with a complex fellows data system spanning 750+ placements, grant application workflows, and a design system built to honor 234 years of literary heritage.
Led development at Situation Interactive. The redesign drove a 270% increase in traffic to the homepage and grants pages.
Background
One of the oldest literary charities in the world needed a digital platform worthy of its mission.
The Royal Literary Fund was founded in 1790 by Reverend David Williams — inspired by the death in debtors’ prison of Floyer Sydenham, a translator of Plato — and has operated continuously for over 230 years under a Royal Charter granted in 1842. The Fund supports professional writers facing financial hardship through direct grants and, since 1999, places experienced writers as Fellows at over 100 UK universities to provide free writing support to students and staff. Its beneficiaries have included Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence, James Joyce, and Ivy Compton-Burnett. The existing website had fallen behind the organization’s scope — the fellows directory was difficult to navigate, the grants program was hard to find, and the archival content that represented centuries of literary history lacked a coherent digital home. Situation Interactive was engaged to redesign and rebuild the platform from discovery through launch.
The site needed to serve three distinct audiences — writers seeking financial support, universities hosting Fellows, and the broader literary community engaging with the Fund’s editorial and historical content.
Implementation
A custom data system for 750+ Fellows, a modular design system, and structured pathways for writers in need.
I led development on a custom WordPress theme built around the complexity of the RLF’s operations. The centerpiece was the fellows data system — a structured content architecture managing over 750 current and past Fellows, their university placements across 100+ institutions, appointment terms, writing disciplines, and biographical information. The directory surfaces this data through filterable, searchable views that let students find their nearest Fellow and let institutions verify active placements. The grants program received a dedicated application pathway with Gravity Forms powering structured intake, eligibility guidance, and submission workflows designed to reduce friction for writers already facing difficult circumstances. The design system was one of the most satisfying I have built — a modular component library with typographic scales, spacing tokens, and layout patterns that reflected the literary gravity of a 234-year-old institution without feeling stiff or archival. Every component was built responsive-first and tested against the full range of content scenarios the CMS would produce, from single-paragraph grant descriptions to deep editorial features and historical archives.
The content architecture separated editorial, programmatic, and institutional content into distinct management surfaces — the team could update Fellow placements, publish grant rounds, and manage archival content through purpose-built admin interfaces without cross-contamination.
Results
270% increase in traffic to the pages that matter most.
The redesigned rlf.org.uk drove a 270% increase in visitors to the homepage and grants pages — the two surfaces most critical to the Fund’s mission of connecting writers with financial support. The fellows directory transformed from an opaque institutional listing into a functional discovery tool, giving students and university staff a direct path to finding writing support at their institution. The grants pathway reduced the administrative burden on both applicants and the RLF team, with structured intake forms replacing what had been a fragmented process. The design system gave the Fund’s content team full independence to publish editorial features, update Fellow placements, manage grant cycles, and maintain historical archives directly through the CMS.
This project stands as one of my personal favorites — the rare intersection of complex data architecture, a design system with genuine character, and a client mission that made the work feel meaningful. The platform continues to serve an institution that has supported writers for over two centuries.
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