Eleven Indulgences: August 23

My list of Lake Como hotels, a hot new NYC hotel opening, how I plan repeat vacations, fall foliage hotels, Amalfi Coast & Capri hotels available to book now for Summer '24 and six other indulgences.

A bit about my career

I made one TikTok, a while ago, about the very beginning of my career. People asked for a part two, but it just never felt right. But, I figured it might be nice to get to know me a bit, from a professional POV at least.

I started babysitting and working retail in high school, like everyone. Then, at the end of my sophmore year of college at UCLA, on a whim I decided to apply for a focus group at Nasty Gal. I was selected, and attended. Maybe it was fate, but the founder, Sophia Amoruso and I happened to be wearing a rainbow manicure with each of our fingers painted the exact same random rainbow color. I was also the only one who seemed to know anything about fashion. Reminder, I am not humble. So, I emailed after asking for Sophia’s email to thank her. They shocked my socks off and extended an internship to me. I worked first as an intern to Sophia, and to the Creative Director at the time. After 9 months, I was hired. I was still in college, but I worked 3 days a week, commuting from Westwood to headquarters at DTLA. I was the Content Assistant, who was given a whole lot of creative license. It’s something I will never take for granted. The amount of mentorship I received was unmatched. I wrote for the blog, edited the magazine Super Nasty, did influencer sourcing in the very beginning of the Instagram days, ran the Tumblr, pitched/produced/styled/casted my own editorial photoshoots for the blog, and worked with Sophia on Girlboss, the book. It changed my life.

One day, towards the end of my senior year, Sophia posted about me on her Instagram. Girlboss had just come out, and she was all over the media. This was before Instagram had DMs, but I was blown away by the amount of influential people commenting on my posts asking me to email them.

Sophia said that she saw one from Jens Grede, and that if I take any meeting, it should be with him. I did exactly that. You may now know Jens Grede as Emma Grede’s husband, but he’s also a founder of Frame, Skims, Good American, the now defunct Wednesday agency and INDUSTRIE magazine. I worked at the latter two.

After an amazing first interview with the President at Wednesday (who ended up being from Marin, where I’m from), he wanted to create a job for me, but didn’t know when or what. In the interim, I interned at Vogue Italia under Giovanna Battaglia. Luckily, my parents gave me a month to find a paying job, and within a month I got the call from Wednesday extending an offer to become a Creative Strategist. I accepted - I’m a fashion girly but I am far too heady to be a stylist. PHEW.

At Wednesday, I was given tremendous trust. I was taught everything you’d ever need to know about brand strategy, creative strategy, copywriting, etc. I worked with incredible talent there for 3 years. First as a Creative Strategist, then as a Strategist, then as a Copywriter & Strategist. I came up singlehandedly with global campaign ideas for the likes of Tiffany and UGG and Forever 21, to name a few. It’s pretty cool to see words you wrote as a 24 year old on a billboard in SoHo. I was so, so incredibly lucky. Mostly because I’ve always struggled with my health, and my bosses and mentors and coworkers and everyone never underestimated me because of the number of sick days I took.

For 2 of the 3 years at Wednesday, I also worked on INDUSTRIE magazine. The founders, Jens Grede and Erik Torstensson along with the Editor in Chief, Yale Breslin, trusted me way more than they should have. I did the Instagram strategy, pitched ideas, and even got to speak on the phone with Iris Apfel, once. Oh, and interviewed Hailey Bieber when she was a Baldwin.

After 3 years, I decided to move on. See also: I burned out. For a month or two, I freelanced on the creative team at MAC Cosmetics. Then, for a project at RoAndCo studio, where my former Wednesday boss had recently landed. Then, they offered me a job as the studio’s only Strategist and Copywriter, and I happily accepted. I ran strategy and copy across all clients - from global brands to then start ups (like Kin Euphorics, no Bella Hadid was not involved from the start). I presented big ideas to big names. I am so lucky. I worked so hard. I burned out.

So then, I went freelance. I have Crohn’s Disease, and freelance makes my life a lot easier and healthier. For the past 5 years, I’ve been a freelance Strategist and Copywriter, working with many agencies, individual brands, and founders. I work my tush off on every project. I make sure I’m always really, really proud of my work. Freelance can be stressful, but health is wealth and it works best for me.

Then, in 2021 I shared on Instagram that I wanted to somehow make my lifelong love of hotels into something. In May 2022, I posted my first hotel video on TikTok. I grew a trusted following quickly, and the world, quite literally, opened up.

After 8 or so months of people asking if I was a travel agent, I decided to become a travel agent. I applied to Fora, went through certification, made it to Pro level within 2 months, and have proudly made almost 100 bookings since the end of January this year, 2023.

Now, I’m doing all of the above, plus working on another passion project that has to do with my knack of naming brands. I work long hours, but I take pride in every minute of it. Quite frankly, it’s a lot, but I’m grateful and I got it. I worked so hard to get here.

Forgive me for the unashamed name dropping and the fact that this all seems a little too good to be true…it’s just my story. Again, I am so lucky. I’ve worked so hard, I’m proud of myself. And I’m forever grateful for every single individual I’ve ever worked with, in any capacity.

Mostly, I wrote this to share how I’m not just “the hotel girl on TikTok.”

My top Lake Como hotel choices

Everyone either wants to go to Lake Como or loves Lake Como. I’m picky about my hotels there. These are the ones I love, that I would send clients to or recommend to friends or family.