Cursed Objects

Christmas - It’s For The Kids, ft. Mr Beatnick

18 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Luke Skywalker, shut up and eat your jelly! As everyone knows, Christmas is like Cursed Objects Christmas, and so sure enough: it’s the long-awaited...

Lit up like a Christmas tree

11 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What would Christmas be without a tour of London’s lights? For the first of our free xmas podcasts, Kasia and Dan go UP TOWN for an outside (!!) wal...

The Princess Diana Memorial Beanie Baby

27 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Not the Queen of Hearts! Greetings, England's roses - this week, it's the original parasocial relationship: ROYALTY. Welcome back to the People's Podc...

Art, Swings and Industry - King's Cross Magical History Tour

11 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Escape to the King's Cross Riviera," said the sign on the construction hoardings - so we did! And it forced us to ask questions like: 'What if you th...

Belfast Pubs, Punk and Gentrification ft. Fearghus Roulston

23 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We are back with another brand new episode, another very special guest, the brilliant Fearghus Roulston, and another fascinating assembly of some very...

So Scandilous - Fermenting Revolution in the Kitchen

09 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, Dan and Kasia forage for meaning in the fertile terrain of culinary "movements", globalisation, multiculturalism and identity, megabucks fi...

Baby on Board! Ft. Charlotte Lydia Riley

25 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“I have been objectified as a vehicle”. We are delighted to welcome back our most-returning guest, as the brilliant historian and author Charlotte...

The Rollneck of Contrition

11 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sit down please. We have something very serious to tell you. We have made a severe and continuous lapse in our judgement. We are sorry if you feel off...

War, Memory and Tat, LIVE - with Dr Charlotte Lydia Riley, Luke Turner and Kate Clements

23 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Coming to you LIVE from the Cursed Objects in Museum Shops exhibition, with three very special guests: Dr Charlotte Lydia Riley, Luke Turner and Kat...

Millennium Tat: New Labour and the Neoliberal Gift-Shop

11 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Coming to you LIVE... we are joined by two very special friends of the pod – artist Darren Cullen (aka Spelling Mistakes Cost Lives) and journali...

Live show #2: Exhibitionary complex

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Back by popular demand, our second-ever live show!! Dr Kasia Tee and Dan Hancox take you behind the scenes of their recently opened exhibition ‘Curs...

Cursed Objects in Museum Shops - live exhibition extravaganza

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

To celebrate the launch of our first ever IRL exhibition, Cursed Objects in Museum Shops (2 May-26 June), we have several events coming in May and Jun...

Big in Japan

10 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Simpsons are going to (have just been to) Japan! And they’re here to tell you about what they did on their holidays – to discuss sustainable J...

YESisode - Yoko Ono fridge magnet

21 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

YES you can! SI se puede! Say YES to adventures. Say YES to life. Say YES to your boss (however dumb and awful their suggestion!). This week, Kasia an...

Straight off the Dome ft. Imogen West-Knights

23 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Roll-up, roll-up for the biggest tent of all! We’re launching into 2025 with a very special guest, Imogen West-Knights, and an absolutely vast curse...

Cursed Objects on Location! At a Haunted Seaside Hotel

27 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's a Spooky Christmas special! This week's Cursed Objects is a little bit less Stuart Hall, and a little bit more Derek Acorah, with an episode reco...

Happy Trad-mas ft. Mr Beatnick and Archie Bashford

17 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Back by popular demand, it's our annual Christmas party! And this year we’re wrestling with TRADITION. Are you making a list, and checking it twice ...

UNLOCKED - Magna Darta dart board

29 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

From Patreon to main feed: Welcome all free-born Englishmen, sovereign citizens, rebel barons and new patrons! We're talking about myths of Englishnes...

Subversive Coffee

14 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This week, it's a deep dive into a steaming mug of cawfee. Hot java. A cup of Joe. Black gold. This is an episode about "the abominable, heathen-ish l...

Multitudes - Live From the Crowd! Ft. Hettie O’Brien

31 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

As a Cursed Objects bonus, without an actual cursed object, we present a live recording of Dan in conversation about his brand new book Multitudes: Ho...

Every Breath You Take ft. Dr Alice Bell

17 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Air isn't an object, right? Wrong. This week, climate comms expert and historian Dr Alice Bell makes Dan and Kasia think hard about ephemerality via a...

Kill the Boss in Your Head

03 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Is there actually any moral value to hard work? From the Dignity of Labour to CEO Mindset, Girlbossing and Instagram Hustle propaganda, our entire cul...

Crap Towns and Caffs (not Cafes) ft. Isaac Rangaswami

19 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The early 2000s were a fever dream: why was pop culture so mean? Specifically, why was it acceptable to write off entire cities - and the people withi...

Airbnb: Prints of Thieves

04 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

They are marketed as democratised holiday rentals, where you get an ‘authentic’ experience by literally living in someone's home - so why are Airb...

Racist Mugs and Legitimate Concerns with Labour

25 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

If smart, humane, pro-migration Ed Miliband really hated Labour’s infamous ‘Controls On Immigration’ coffee mug – both of his parents were Jew...

The Museum of Neoliberalism ft. Darren Cullen

10 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How do you start collecting objects for a cursed museum? Kasia and Dan spend all of their money in the gift shop of the Museum of Neoliberalism (well,...

Cursed Objects, Live! #1 Notes from the museum shop

28 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Troubling war merch, Van Gogh bucket hats, Soviet space dogs and the scourge of ‘world’ history - Kasia and Dan stage their first-ever live show t...

Bone music, Soviet outlaws and X-ray rock ‘n’ roll ft. Stephen Coates

13 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A record etched onto an x-ray of a (probably, now) dead Soviet citizen’s head. That is the uniquely cursed object Stephen Coates came across in a Ru...

The Unstoppable Many vs. The Immovable Few (Emergy P for the Snappy G)

30 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Oh god, not another one! When BREAKING NEWS bursts through the wall, we spring, gently and apologetically, into action, with a (cough) emergency p for...

Black Frankenstein and White Corporate Diversity ft. Anamik Saha

16 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

What if there was an object so cursed that it was never even made? This week we are joined by culture studies don Prof Anamik Saha to discuss anti-rac...

Hipster Analysis

02 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Were you into Cursed Objects before it was cool? Like Grandpa Simpson remembering the war, this week Dan and Kasia are holding a seance for tho...

Walk the (thin blue) line ft. Melayna Lamb

18 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The police just follow the law, right!? Our guest Melayna Lamb thinks we need to flip this thinking around - and see the police as a law unto themselv...

A Sack of Wet Eggs

04 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How do you like your eggs in the morning? Hopefully not wet?? It’s Easter, so in the spirit of bringing you some seasonal #content, Kasia and Dan ex...

Against Landlords ft. Nick Bano

21 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Forget everything you thought you knew about the housing crisis! This week we have a very special guest, housing lawyer Nick Bano, with a hugely enlig...

Hey QT!

07 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Kasia and Dan are earning their lunch. And it’s a big, steaming bowl of cuteness! They go to the Somerset House ‘Cute’ exhibition to unravel how...

Major Jugs and Starmer Flip-Flops

22 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This week, Dan and Kasia are getting into a submersible and heading into the dark blue depths, poking around the extremely cursed domain of Britain's ...

You're Beautiful (no matter what they say)

09 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We're baaaack! And we're feeling FIT, while also reassuring you that it's what's inside that counts. Kasia and Dan return with a new series, where tod...

Haunted Dickensian Christmas ft. Mr. Beatnick and Archie Bashford

12 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It's a classic Haunted Dickensian Cursed Objects Office Christmas Party! If you think Halloween is the spookiest time of year - you’re dead wrong. W...

Abolish Restaurants!

28 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Service! This week, we are hovering around ‘the pass’, checking our plating is okay, and asking how a simple labour-saving device, a coffee shop p...

Bed, bugs, and hedgehogs

20 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Mice, lice, moths…and prehistoric-looking ‘weta’ grasshoppers. We are in the grips of a pest control moral panic. Could the humble hedgehog be t...

Detectorists vs Time Team

30 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Recorded on a hungover rainy Sunday, it's a history-on-TV episode, and it's an episode about HISTORY IN THE FIELD. Literally in the field, or rather i...

Beans Clock - 50th Episode Extravaganza

16 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It's our 50th episode! Sort of. There's an asterisk. But it's sort of our 50th episode! To mark the occasion, Dan and Kasia are tackling their own log...

Pyramid Schemes and Revolutions ft. Jack Shenker

18 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when a revolution dies? Jack Shenker witnessed firsthand the phenomenal Egyptian strike waves of the late 2000s that led to the toppling ...

Rainy Empire Island ft. Charlotte Lydia Riley

05 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Welcome to a new series of Cursed Objects! For the first episode back, very special guest historian Charlotte Lydia Riley brings in a souvenir mug com...

Cursed Summer Sessions: The Revolutionary Potential of Antiques Roadshow

25 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For the next Patreon-only Cursed Summer Session, Dan and Kasia get stuck into a decades-old British institution, with a TV review of Antiques Roadshow...

Still Trippin’ on These Shrooms

31 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Sit up straight, hippies! Kasia and Dan have some questions for you, and it's high time you answered. Where did all this magic mushroom merch come fro...

Jamie’s Cursed Cookin’ - ft. Jonathan Nunn and Biz

10 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Pukka! We’re dancing in the moonlight with the king of the English culinary world, Jamie Oliver. How did someone so cringe achieve such dizzying lev...

The Work Of Toblerone In The Age Of Mechanical Reproduction

26 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Come fly away with us and Alain de Botton (sorry but he's coming too), and take a trip on Venga Airways - but we're not leaving the ground: you're tra...

Milking It

13 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It's a source of strength, life, sickness, disgust, delight and deep nausea. It's fraught with climate controversy and tensions over rights, care, sta...

Death to False Metal! H&M Guns ’n’ Roses baby grow

23 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Oh so you're 6 months old and you say you're a true Guns 'n' Roses fan? Name their top 3 albums then! Coming to you live from the furious and cathart...

Elf Bars For Days

09 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Smoking is almost too on-the-nose a subject for Cursed Objects. But vapes - candy-coloured, daftly-named, targeted at children, making wads of $$$ for...

Where were you when.. (ROYAL EDITION)

05 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The desire to feel like you are 'part of history' can turn even the most ardent republican into a flag-waving monarchist shill. So why are we all so d...

Chairman Meow

19 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Kasia and Dan address their toughest question yet: are cats left wing? Springing from a shared love of feline friends, they trace the history of cat-o...

BONUS episode - In the Guantánamo Bay Gift Shop

05 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

There is a gift shop in Guantánamo Bay. That’s it. That’s the episode. From ‘mindfulness’ mugs to lip balms, Kasia and Dan explore the extre...

Making a Meal of It - ft. Lucy Dearlove

21 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A plain ham sandwich, a bottle of still water and a pack of ready salted crisps – it's a meal (deal) fit for a King, and a Cursed Objects x Lecker c...

BONUS episode - The One With The Long 90s

09 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Could we BE any more cursed? This week, Dan and Kasia talk about the strange, mutant afterlife of Friends, the world's least cool situation comedy. On...

Swear Down!

21 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Kasia and Dan explore the crisis in British swearing through Robert Peston’s very cursed book ‘WTF’. What does it say about our society that a l...

BONUS episode - Herbal Tea Advent Calendar

30 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What happens to the space-time continuum if you open an advent calendar in April? What are the healing properties of "different flavours of damp twig"...

Me and USSR and Everyone We Know

17 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Go east! Kasia and Dan tackle a satirical boardgame about queuing in Cold War-era Poland and go deep into 'Ostalgie' -- how do people remember the Sov...

Cursed and Blessed Ghosts of Christmas Past - ft. Archie Bashford and Mr Beatnick

15 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

IT'S CUUUUUURSEDMAAAAAAAS! We're having a work Christmas party and you're all invited -- we've got some festive VKs and gingerbread milk stout, and we...

Abject Pumpkinism

21 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It's spooky season, it's harvest season, it's pumpkin season, it's nesting season, it's hygge season, it's cuffing season, it's christian girl autumn ...

*UNLOCKED* The Walter Benjamin Escape Town

09 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

FROM PATREON TO MAIN FEED: it's a Hot Geist Summer episode where Kasia and Dan take a cursed journey into the darkest parts of the experience economy....

*PREVIEW* - Marmalade Sandwiches and National Mourning

17 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

We've done our duties Paddington, now take us to straight to hell (boy). Two weeks of pent-up angst, hilarity and bewilderment comes out in a wild rid...

There Goes The Neighbourhood ft. Les Back

05 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Postcode paraphernalia – check! Neighbourhood nationalism – check! Commodified cities? All here. We are very excited to be joined by iconic sociol...

Lost in the Supermarket - Bags for Life and Loyalty Fobs

12 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Nectar selectors and club card members: where do your loyalty cards lie? This week, Dan and Kasia are discussing how supermarkets became so all-powerf...

*PREVIEW* - The Cybergoth International: day-glo ties, Gen Z and youth subcultures

01 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we're asking what Gen Z kids mean when they say "My aesthetic is looking like a terrible 90s market stall in Camden Town!"? (NB this may no...

*UNLOCKED* Summer of strikes / when the lights go out

17 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

FROM PATREON TO MAIN FEED: Are we heading for a 'summer of discontent'? Are we going 'back to the 1970s'? Three day week and a four-day bender? What ...

*PREVIEW* - The Walter Benjamin Escape Town

01 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Celebrating Walter Benjamin's 130th birthday with a truly cursed journey into the darkest end of the experience economy... from yuppie ballpit bars in...

Bulldog Power Energy Drink

18 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Health warning!!! Kasia and Dan are cracking through the radioactive, ever-expanding global energy drinks market LIVE ON AIR... From patriotic energy ...

*PREVIEW* Summer of strikes / when the lights go out

06 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Are we heading for a 'summer of discontent'? Are we going 'back to the 1970s'? Three day week and a four-day bender? What really happened when the li...

A Jubilee Catastrophe

15 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

We’re BACK following two Patreon-only episodes – and we are celebrating! Bunting? Check. Tables? Check. Unelected head of state who costs the Brit...

*PREVIEW* - The secular church of the NHS

23 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Crayons out for universal health care! Stay home, protect the NHS, make a sign to put in your window, clap for your doctors and nurses, give them all ...

*PREVIEW* - Magna Carta dart board aka Mythic Albion

03 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Welcome all free-born Englishmen, sovereign citizens, rebel barons and new patrons! On this first of what will now be regular Patreon-only episodes -...

Gay Flags and Lavender Scares ft. Huw Lemmey

11 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Series 2 ends with a bang, and some serious vexillology: talking homonationalism, gay villages, the commercialisation of Pride, the history of crimina...

Alien Eggs, UFOs and Conspiracy Theories for the End of History

04 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

U-F-Whoa! It's the penultimate episode of Series 2, and this week Dan and Kasia consider the Wyrd 1990s, bedding down in Area 51 with Mulder and Scull...

Canary Wharf, grime and the docks

28 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

'Wall Street's Guantanamo' or 'our Statue of Liberty'? This week Dan and Kasia grapple with a series of very large cursed objects, the sky-scraping gl...

Manly Gifts for the Man In Your Life

21 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It's the end of another busy day running the patriarchy. You drop your designer briefcase in the hall, put on your football-shaped slippers, and place...

Brand Collabs (Travis Scott x McDonalds x Peppa Pig x Colgate x BAE Systems exclusive)

14 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Cursed Objects sells out!! (Not really.) This week, Dan and Kasia investigate why every sinister corporation in the world has started obsessively purs...

Abigail’s Aspic Asparagus Steamer (and other 70s dinner parties)

07 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Class. Gender. Nuclear families. Savoury jelly. Fish paste. National identity. The 1970s. Innovation in post-war capitalist production. AND! Highly sp...

Van Gogh ”Earaser” - ft. Alice Procter

03 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Art and commerce, haunted ears, starving artists and the way galleries fetishise madness to make £££. Welcome back, and welcome to our first ever g...

SUPPORT THE UCU STRIKE

21 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This week's episode of Cursed Objects has been postponed - because we are supporting the University and College Union (UCU) digital strike. Please con...

Mystical algorithms

14 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

When did our star signs start running our lives? According to horoscope app Co-Star, it has been downloaded by a quarter of all young women aged 18–...

Celeb CASH-IN!! Unofficial Fearne Cotton biography

07 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Celebrity gloss, celebrity GOSS! How do you write a 260-page biography of a young TV presenter who you've never met and never interviewed, and hasn't ...

Sexy Putin Calendar

31 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

If this is indeed a new Cold War, then when did it get so hot in here? Dan and Kasia are back with a bang, launching Series 2 of Cursed Objects with a...

Cursed Objects - Series 2 Trailer

24 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A sexy Putin calendar. An unauthorised Fearne Cotton biography. A Van Gogh eraser shaped like his dismembered ear. Adorno takes on his horoscope, Stua...

Cursed Snacks - Omi-Christmas Special

20 Dec 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Deck the halls with mince pie-flavoured Wensleydale, Dan and Kasia have both been shopping, opened some disgusting cans of seasonal beer, and are back...

Inspire A Generation

02 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Series 1 closes with an Olympian nightmare. Kasia and Dan de-mythologise London 2012: surface-to-air missiles on east London rooftops, cops arresting ...

Holy Toast!

26 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It's Episode 9, and this week Dan and Kasia are looking at the transcendental appeal of cheap religious tat, and the mass reproduction of images. Ther...

Rainbow Rhythms and Neoliberal Blues

19 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Kasia and Dan are struggling to feel ‘mindful’ despite using their fresh-off-Amazon colouring-in wallcharts, puzzles and self-help books. Interrog...

We Are Your Friends

12 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Kasia and Dan dig into the cursed experience of being 'on the apps' - dating apps - and discuss 'tweevertising', why companies are more interested in ...

Why Is The Left So Sad?

05 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Dan and Kasia are having a kickabout and looking into the role of the Spanish Civil War in left-wing mythology. What connects lower league English foo...

Dystopian Soft Play

28 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It's episode 5, and this week Kasia and Dan are worrying about 'Agamben Toys': dystopian play-things for kids like Playmobil prisons and riot cops wit...

Curry-Flavour Instant Ramen From Gdansk

21 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Join Kasia and Dan as they take a walk down the 'world food aisle' of the Big Sainsburys - delving into the politics of flavour, globalisation, multic...

The Case of the DVD Box Set

14 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Dan and Kasia explore a distant memory – the DVD box set – through the nostalgic, dream-like world of the hit murder mystery Poirot. Get ready for...

Be Sad and Shut Up

07 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This week Kasia and Dan delve into the concept of 'Austerity Nostalgia'. Why is the Second World War still so important to British culture, over 80 ye...

Houseplants or Revolution?

06 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It's Episode 1! Kasia and Dan explore the muddy world of houseplants – from their colonial histories, to their role as inhibitors of social change. ...

Welcome to Cursed Objects!

09 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Introducing a new podcast about big ideas, weird history, and pop culture - and tat. Come and meet hosts Dr Kasia Tee and Dan Hancox in the gift shop ...