ENERGY · No. 10soon
How a Nuclear Power Plant Works
12 minOpens after Power grid
Open a nuclear power plant and see how splitting atoms boils water to make electricity.
Hands-on lessons for curious adults
Take it apart. Put it back. Understand it.
Short, playful lessons on how things work: cut a flashlight open, make a heart beat, drill into the Earth, fly a rocket to orbit. The drawing answers like the real thing. In your browser, on any phone.
Free at launch · English · made for phones
How a lesson goes
A plan of small moves, done with your hands
Look inside, do something to it, guess, then build it back. The moves below are pieces of real lessons, and the plan ticks itself off as you go.
Cut and look
Cut it open, tap inside
Draw across the case: it opens where you stop. Then tap the dots.
Drag
Slide the key in
Push it all the way and watch every pin line up.
Zoom
Zoom into a pencil
Drag the loupe down, step by step, until one atom fills the lens.
Predict, then check
Which way to orbit?
Pick an answer, then swing the engine's bell and watch the rocket lean over.
Build
Rebuild the engine
Stick the four parts from under the engine back on, then crank it to start it.
Lesson decks
A deck for every branch of the map
50 lessons in six branches: 10 ready to play, the rest being drawn. Finish a lesson and its card is yours. Pick a branch to deal its deck, then point at the edge of a card, or tap it, to pull it out.
ENERGY · No. 09soon
How a Wind Turbine Works
9 minOpens after Power grid
Climb inside a wind turbine and see how the wind's push becomes electricity.
ENERGY · No. 08soon
How an Electric Car Works
12 minOpens after Motor + Battery
Lift the floor of an electric car and follow the power from the battery to the wheels.
ENERGY · No. 07soon
How Solar Panels Work
8 minOpens after Battery
Shine light on a solar cell and see how it pushes electrons round a circuit.
ENERGY · No. 06soon
How Electricity Gets to Your Home
9 minOpens after Motor
Follow electricity from the power station, along the lines, down to your plug.
ENERGY · No. 05soon
How Fridges & Heat Pumps Move Heat
10 minOpens after Motor
Follow the refrigerant round a fridge and see how it carries heat from inside to out.
ENERGY · No. 04soon
How a Lithium-Ion Battery Works
9 minOpens after Circuit
Open a lithium-ion cell and follow the ions as it charges and runs down.
ENERGY · No. 03new
How an Electric Motor Works
10 minOpens after Circuit
Saw a toy motor open, push a wire with a magnet, and find out why a motor keeps spinning instead of getting stuck.
ENERGY · No. 02new
How Electricity Works: Build a Circuit
6 minOpens after Flashlight
Wire a battery to a bulb, see why one wire isn't enough, and build a working circuit yourself.
ENERGY · No. 01new
How a Flashlight Works
7 minOpen from the start
Open up a classic flashlight, close the loop, and rebuild it yourself to see why a tiny switch makes light.
The home screen
Where every visit starts
A map of every lesson, and tabs for everything you've collected so far.
Six branches, each a family tree of lessons. Finish one and the next ones open.
The look
Drawn like a curious person's notebook
We call the style Field Notes: ink on warm paper, coloured in afterwards. Simple enough to read on a phone, true to the real thing: proportions and the order of the parts stay as they are. Point at a tile, or tap it, to see how it's done.
Ink that breathes
Every outline is redrawn twelve times a second with a slight wobble, a trick from hand-drawn animation. The drawing feels alive even when nothing in it moves.
Hatching, never grey
Shade is drawn the way a pen would draw it: fine ink lines at 45°, about four pixels apart. No grey gradients and no darker paint, so the colours stay clean on any screen.
Names on the drawing
Tap a part and a thin leader line draws itself out of it, with the part’s name written at the end in capitals. No legend to look up, no numbers to match.
The cut that stays
Drag across a machine and its case opens along your line, like paper under scissors. Stop anywhere: the cut stays open, so you can look inside for as long as you like.
Torn paper and tape
Each step is a torn sheet of dot-grid paper, taped down. The lesson plan is a handwritten list: what you’ve done gets a wavy line through it and a tick.
Stickers to peel
In a challenge the parts come back as die-cut stickers on a tray. Drag each one to its dashed spot, then test what you built. Finish a lesson, and its badge goes up in your trophy hall.
A colour per branch
Energy is clay, Mechanics sky blue, Life rose, Robots & AI lavender, Earth & Space dusk blue and Matter sage. Wheat yellow is kept for whatever flows: current, heat and light.
Pip, your guide
Pip learns next to you: asks the question before a step, points at what to look at, frowns when a part is in the wrong place and cheers when it works. Six moods, no lectures.
The sticker book
A sticker for every lesson
Finish a lesson and its sticker goes up in your trophy hall. There are 50 to collect, one for every lesson on the map, each drawn by hand like everything here. Point at one to see which lesson it's from.
The waitlist
Be the first to take it apart
Leave your email and we'll write when the first lessons open. Tell us what to take apart first, and we'll put it near the top of the list.
Early explorer
Join, and this card is yours.
Early explorer
First in line when the lessons open.
Questions
Good questions
Who is it for?
Curious grown-ups who want to know how things really work: the engine in a car, the lock on the door, the planet under your feet. No school, no exams, no maths you didn't ask for.
What will it cost?
The first lessons will be free. Later there may be a paid plan for the whole library, and you'll be able to cancel it in one click.
When does it open?
We're drawing the first lessons now. Join the waitlist and you'll be the first to hear.
How do you know it's right?
Before a lesson is published, every fact in it is checked against a source we've read ourselves, and the drawings keep the real proportions. Where a lesson has to simplify, it says so.
Does it work on my phone?
Yes. Every lesson is made for a phone first: you cut, drag, turn and tap with your thumb.