Everything that's ever influenced you started with a single curated moment.
On the name change, New York City, and why curation always comes before influence.
A rebrand worth the wait.
Let’s get right to it. We’ve changed names. While I hold the concept of “Before the Coffee Gets Cold” near and dear, this is an evolution — one that goes beyond dissecting campaigns and sharing the inner workings of my marketing-obsessed mind. It’s becoming a space to speak to cultural moments, share deeper personal takes on travel and lifestyle, while continuing to be a voice on what actually makes influence work.
Which leads us here.
The idea behind the name.
In my day-to-day craft of working with beauty brands and reviewing content amongst influencers, a thought kept surfacing: what actually goes into creating the pieces of content that lands? The viral trend, the outfit, the one-liner that takes off — none of it feels accidental from the outside.
And then I remembered.
Before the camera is rolled out, before the Pinterest-planning takes place, there’s a starting point. That starting point is the curation. A brief curated to the goals of the brand or person behind the vision coming to life.
Curation is what takes place before the influence can occur. Curations and curators give ideas legs.
Having an eye — a vision for what could be, and what is, from a different perspective — that is what makes someone a curator.
I’ve always been the friend coined as the resident photographer: “I don’t need to take pics bc I know you got some.” “I’ll just repost whatever you put up.”, and it’s because I, to some degree, have a creative eye and a foresight to what works.
This same natural instinct is what drew me to marketing.
The creative freedom that different aspects of marketing encompasses has always pulled me in, and from a young age when deciding on a career path, it was the idea of having creative freedom in my adult life that cemented it.
And in the ever-evolving space of influencer marketing specifically, the sky often feels like the limit in such grand ways that you truly have to reel it back in — put some strategy, and sense, behind it. Because random placement and whimsy don’t automatically generate sales or make the CFO your best friend.
Whether you’re an influencer, a marketer, a photographer, a storyteller, the outfit planner in your social circle — you too curate some form of influence. Within your immediate circle. To the people who read and view your work. The people who come to you for advice. This happens in an endless multitude of ways.
Which makes you, and me, a curator of influence.
New York, always.
This weekend I found myself on yet another gone-too-soon New York trip — 20,000 steps a day, sacrificing nearly every app just to make room for more photos.
Shots of Central Park through the skyline, that particular angle where the city feels both enormous and intimate all at once. Dimly lit sushi in the West Village, the kind of restaurant where the lighting alone earns a reservation. A small shoe boutique on the UES with more personality than most flagship stores twice its size.
Sitting at a Monkey Bar reservation I couldn’t believe we snagged, looking around and wondering: how did they curate such an iconic place, open since 1936, that leaves everyone scanning the room. A place to see and be seen, monkey bread so good I’ll be thinking about it for the next six months — and realizing that almost every part of New York carries some heavy form of influence that shapes the culture of our weekends, our habits, and our interests.
The city, at its best, is one long act of curation. And it gave me the writing edge back.
Back to the brief.
The beauty and fashion media world has been in an endless buzz, and honestly — I hadn’t known where to begin or what felt worthy of pen to paper. (You most certainly didn’t need another SWAN Beauty x Brigitte Pheloung dissection — and if you’re new here, just know the discourse was very real.) But there is so much to come, and I’m so glad you’re here for it.
What’s next:
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing my spring NYC itinerary for those of you longing for great meals, great company, and a locals-led experience enough to make you seriously consider bicoastal living.
Campaign breakdowns are back in full swing. There’s been no shortage of moments worth dissecting, and we’ll no longer be letting letting the good ones expire in a Google Doc.
More for you, more often.
Meeting adjourned. Let me know what you’re curating this week to bring creativity into your life — it’s needed.
XO,
S♡
P.S. I made us a Substack-dedicated IG.🔗
So that means we’re official, right? Come join the party.
