The workshop began with six people around a table. Now there are emails from four cities asking when it will travel. You could say yes to all of them. You could also ask what made the first gathering worth repeating: the time to listen, the small room, the conversation that continued after the formal ending.

Growth is not always a matter of making the same thing larger. A small practice can become a network of local hosts. A monthly event can become a seasonal one with deeper preparation. A designer can release fewer pieces and keep a closer relationship with the makers who produce them. Scale has more than one direction.

Write down what must remain true for the work to be itself. Which qualities are essential, and which were accidents of the first version? Then look honestly at cost. More reach may require staff, money and a different form of leadership. Less frequency may give the work more depth. There is no virtue in either choice by itself; there is only a choice to make with open eyes.

The market tends to measure growth in the numbers easiest to count. Bodies in a room, units sold, posts published. These figures can be useful. They cannot tell you whether a participant felt able to speak, whether a garment was made under decent conditions or whether the person directing the work still has time to think.

The Capacity realm asks how you will care for what succeeds. What If It Works? makes room for a question that does not fit neatly on a growth chart: what form of success keeps the work alive from the inside? Sometimes, as receiving help reminds us, the right scale is the one that lets more people contribute.

Answer the cities. Perhaps one invitation is right for this year. Perhaps the others deserve a different format. A good refusal can be an act of care for what people came to you for in the first place.