Did you know?
You will have many jobs in your career...
When I interned for the late Elsa Klensch she said “You will have many jobs in your career.” Elsa Klensch was an Australian and American journalist, novelist, and television personality, often working in the world of fashion. She was the producer and host of Style with Elsa Klensch, CNN's weekly fashion and design television program, which ran from 1980 to 2001. I interned for Elsa in 1998. I share more about this experience in my book Embracing The Calm In the Chaos.
When I began my design journey (technically while in my mom’s belly—true story!), I immersed myself in every aspect of the business (more on that in my book). I remember discovering at some point, while building BOY MEETS GIRL®, that Elsa Klensch had started writing mystery novels. I thought, What?! Today, as an author in addition to being a designer and brand founder, I appreciate diving into the works of other authors. Her book Live at 10:00, Dead at 10:15: A Sonya Iverson Novel is now on my must-read list!
Throughout my career, opportunities have come my way to speak at events, teach, and even create and produce a web series for Lockerz, which was later syndicated on MTVu. I eventually launched a hit podcast and wrote my first book during the pandemic. What I’ve learned is that nothing is linear. Opportunities arise when you put in the work. Creativity flows when you’re focused and hustling.
Today, the word for this kind of multi-dimensional career is "hyphenate"—someone active in more than one field. Elsa Klensch embodied this, and I realize I do too.
On that note, here are some episodes from my past series that I’m excited to share with you in case you never saw my series Behind The Seams with Stacy Igel. I loved producing this series.
WOW THIS WAS SHOT 14 YEARS AGO
After this episode aired, Wendy Goodman visited my office to interview me for New York Magazine’s Design Hunting column. You can check it out here.!
Yes, my first solo show featured Natasha Bedingfield. I loved working with her and am so proud of where she is today!
As I was researching Elsa Klensch tonight, I came across an essay featured on Zibby Mag (
)titled Saturday Mornings with CNN Style’s Elsa Klensch by Christine Morrison (link here). While diving into her work, I discovered Christine’s Substack —what a find!It also hit me that Christine had connected with me back in August 2022. She mentioned being a fellow BOY MOM and contributed an essay in the book BOY MOMS (her piece is on page 92, a book I still need to finish reading).
What resonated deeply, especially as I share that the road is not straight, was this line from Christine’s essay:
“She gave me hope. She didn’t launch a fashion career until after age 40, which meant I still had time. To find myself. To turn my dreams into reality. I was in my late 20s and everyone around me was getting married. But I was committed to figuring out what I wanted to be when I grew up.”
As if that wasn’t serendipitous enough, I also found out that Christine and I share something else in common—we’re both Chicago girls!
So whatever you are doing know that there is a whole wide world out there for you. Do not be discouraged. Do no compare yourself to others. Do not stop in your tracks. The road is windy and it is hard. The curves might hurt and the bumps will too but I promise that road and those twists and turns lead you to things you never knew were on the other side.
GN ( for those who have asked that means Good Night ).
XO,
Stacy