Wrinkles: The AI Audio Tour Guide That Turns Every Walk Into a Story

How It Works: Hands-Free Audio Discovery

Wrinkles detects nearby landmarks, streets, monuments, and culturally significant locations as you walk, drive, or commute, then plays AI-generated audio narrations about them . The app runs in the background, so you never need to pull out your phone. You can also have live Q&A conversations with the AI to go deeper on any topic .

Key Features

• 1.3 million points of interest across 177 countries — a globally indexed database covering everything from famous landmarks to obscure neighborhood spots .
• Historian and creator contributions — museums, historians, and local creators can add their own stories, tours, and experiences directly to the map .
• Interactive Q&A — ask the AI follow-up questions about anything you hear, turning a passive listen into an active conversation .
• Social features — follow friends, organizations, or creators to see what they've explored .
• Custom maps and collections — save your own maps and collections of favorite spots .
• Personalization with family memories — add your own photos or voice notes to specific locations, layering personal history on top of public history .

Origin Story: Frustration at the British Museum

The idea was sparked by co-founder David Stemler's frustrating experience at the British Museum. Standing in front of a centuries-old artifact with only a small plaque to explain it, he realized how much context and story was being lost — and that a smartphone already knows where you are and could fill that gap automatically . He wanted to let people move through the world "without constantly looking at their phone" yet still absorb rich information .

Founders' Background

David Stemler is a longtime advertising executive and former Chief Brand Officer of the Ad Council . Ryan Hansan previously founded ScratchDC, a meal delivery service, and TasteLab, a shared commercial kitchen for independent food businesses. The two have known each other since middle school and say travel has always been a defining part of their friendship .

Business Model: Freemium

Wrinkles is free to download and use. Revenue comes from institutional partners :

• Museums pay to add their own audio tours and stories to the platform.
• Tourism boards and local businesses pay for visibility, sponsored content, or custom storytelling.

This keeps the core experience free for everyday users while monetizing through organizations that want to reach them .

Long-Term Vision: Beyond Travel

The founders explicitly do not want Wrinkles to be seen as "just a travel app." Their stated goal is for Wrinkles to become a normal part of how people navigate and learn about places in their everyday lives — whether that's a walk to the grocery store, a commute through a historic neighborhood, or exploring a new city .

What People Are Saying

Early coverage highlights the app's potential: "Wrinkles wants to make everyday walks feel more like guided tours" . The app "combined location tracking, conversational AI and audio narration to function like a digital guide that travels alongside the user" . A review noted it "lets users ask follow-up questions in a live conversation" and described it as a way to explore "without constantly looking at their phone" .

Wrinkles is available now on iOS and Android, offering a new way to discover the hidden stories in the places you pass every day.