The Red Room Company

The Red Room Company is a non-profit organisation based in Sydney, Australia that creates, publishes and promotes poetry in unusual ways. It was established by Johanna Featherstone in 2002, emerging from The Red Room Radio Show, which broadcast on 89.7FM Eastside Radio from 2001.

The Red Room Company concentrates on three core programs: Papercuts, a poetry education program that sees contemporary Australian poets visit students in primary and secondary schools; Unlocked, a workshop series designed to promote literacy, rehabilitation and self-expression in correctional centres across NSW; and public projects, that aim to promote the status of poetry in the wider community.

Papercuts is The Red Room Company's poetry education program. It sends contemporary Australian poets into primary and secondary schools all across Australia. It was launched in 2007 with support from the Keir Foundation and the Ian Potter Foundation, initially piloting in four NSW high schools. In 2008 it expanded into Victoria and in 2009-2010 moved further interstate to Norfolk Island and Queensland schools. Papercuts is now a national program, servicing schools everywhere in Australia.

In November 2010, KPMG hosted a Papercuts 'poetic excursion' to promote the program, during which small anthology was printed.

Papercuts claims to be the only national poetry program available to high school students across Australia. The importance and potential of poetry has been endorsed by students, teachers, poets, and education professionals, as well as by benefactors of the organisation. Migrant and refugee students benefit from the opportunity to positively express their story through poetry.

Papercuts organises the Poetry Object, a free writing project for students in Years 3-10 attending NSW Public Schools in the Sydney Region.

In November 2012, an exhibition featuring posters of poems and photographs of special objects was held at the State Library of New South Wales.

As part of The Poetry Object, six Australian poets have been commissioned to write new poems about their own talismanic objects.

Unlocked is an educational arts program developed and run by The Red Room Company in collaboration with educational staff from NSW Correctional Centres, which 'unlocks' the potential of inmates through poetry. The initiative's goal is to encourage self-expression and reflection while improving inmates' literacy. Introduced in Sydney in 2010, the project has entered its third year.

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