The Design Of Roads & Kingdoms: Meet Nathan Thornburgh

What happens when a foreign correspondent realizes the institutions he trusted are shrinking — and decides to build something more human instead?

In this season opener of Design Of, I sit down with Nathan Thornburgh, journalist and co-founder of Roads & Kingdoms, to explore the evolution of modern journalism, American identity, and what it means to design a media company around shared humanity instead of scale.

Nathan spent nearly a decade at Time Magazine as a foreign correspondent and editor, reporting from Moscow and across Europe during a period of massive global change. But as traditional newsrooms closed foreign bureaus and chased digital clicks, he began to feel the weight of compassion fatigue—the growing distance between audiences and the people in the story. Roads & Kingdoms was his response.

Built at the intersection of food culture, geopolitics, and immersive storytelling, the company became a creative partner to Anthony Bourdain and a home for long-form journalism that refuses to flatten complex places into headlines.

Today, Roads & Kingdoms has evolved into something even more intentional: a print magazine, a membership community, curated travel experiences, and real-life gatherings designed to reconnect people in an increasingly automated world. This is not just a conversation about journalism. It’s about leadership, humility, brand positioning, and the power of human-centered storytelling.

In This Episode, We Explore:

• How living abroad reshaped Nathan’s understanding of American identity

• Why foreign correspondence requires humility, not certainty

• The myth of journalistic neutrality and what real objectivity looks like

• How food becomes a universal entry point into difficult conversations

• The profound influence of Anthony Bourdain—and navigating Roads & Kingdoms after his passing

• Why compassion fatigue is one of the biggest threats to journalism and marketing today

• The strategic decision to prioritize immersive storytelling over scale

• How high-trust, in-person experiences are becoming a competitive advantage in a digital-first world

• What founders and marketing leaders can learn from building a brand around values instead of volume

For Business Leaders and Founders

If you lead a brand, manage marketing strategy, or shape narrative inside your organization, this episode is a masterclass in positioning. Nathan made a deliberate choice: depth over clicks, loyalty over algorithms, print over purely digital, conversation over noise.

For companies in hospitality, travel, luxury, professional services, architecture, higher education, and cultural institutions, Roads & Kingdoms offers a powerful model:

• Build community.

• Curate experience.

• Stand for something clear.

• And tell stories that demand attention because they matter, not because they trend.

In a world increasingly driven by AI automation and attention metrics, Nathan’s work is a reminder that analog connection is not nostalgic. It’s strategic.

Key Takeaways

• “We have to enter rooms with a unique humility.”

• Compassion fatigue isn’t solved by louder headlines—it’s solved by better storytelling

• Food is not a distraction from serious journalism—it is an entry point to shared humanity

• Strong brands resist the pressure to scale at the cost of depth

• Community is built face-to-face before it is built online

• Immersive storytelling creates loyalty that algorithms cannot

Roads & Kingdoms began as a response to decline. Today, it stands as a case study in resilience, reinvention, and values-driven brand building.

If you care about journalism, culture, storytelling, or the future of human connection in business, this conversation will challenge you to rethink what you’re building, and why.

Listen now and discover what it means to design something that lasts.