First I mastered the old way. Then I lost it, and spent a decade learning a better one.
This is the work that came after—and where it came from.
The House of AïA, Playa del Carmen
I repositioned a vegan beach resort as a wellness sanctuary built on the sacred feminine; named it, branded it, and gave it a face before construction had finished. We shot more than a thousand images and ran paid social straight through COVID, growing organic search tenfold in seven months and paid social at 600% ROAS. Then I handed the foundation to the in-house team, and they took it and ran: to two Michelin Keys, a Departures Legend Award, Condé Nast Traveler Best of Category and more.
The Bee Token, San Francisco
A launch so good the raise closed in ten minutes. $15M.
Vabene, Italy
A heritage marque watch company, rebuilt as a rebel—and carried into Asia.
The mastery I walked away from.
Before all of this, I was a master of the thing I now help properties escape. For eight years at Genivs-Loci I built the image for the best properties on earth—Cipriani, Le Meurice, Bvlgari, Villa d'Este, The Gstaad Palace, 21, and dozens more—the same exacting, beautiful work that now makes them hard to tell apart.
I could make any place look extraordinary. It took losing all of that, and a decade away, to learn the harder thing: that beauty and service are only the price of entry—what a property really needs is an idea worth remembering. Palmaïa was the project where everything I’d learned finally came together.
What followed was a decade that taught me to see.
I spent over ten years learning from the best brand and advertising minds available and started to build brands in every vertical I could. No plan—just the education the hotel world never offered. IDEO, human-centered design at the source. Publicis, advertising at its best. Volvo, Kawasaki, Comcast, Auberge Hotel Esperanza, Color of Change, Highway1, and dozens more. Two self-published books, one collected by Harvard and MIT. Burning Man, as a core member of Distrikt.
What I do now
Every other premium category learned long ago that when the products are similar, the brand is the only thing that sets them apart—it's why Apple and Nike win. Hotels never had to learn it; location and beauty carried them. They don't anymore. So I give a property what beauty can't: a concept with depth, imagery that's unexpected yet true to it’s soul, and a guest journey where every touchpoint does the work. That's the method.
