Grace Bonney on Design, Evolution and Serendipity

Growing up, Grace Bonney, was all about culture and music, with a strong connection with jam bands that landed her on the business side of music and media in New York City. Along the way, she launched a side project blog called Design Sponge, to share insights about growing passion for accessible home design. The blog exploded and, eventually, she left her full-time job to build Design Sponge into a full-blown media company of her own with a massive, global audience, a book, travel and an increasingly public profile. But, along the way, Grace’s interests evolved, creating a gap between what she was creating, what she genuinely cared about and how she wanted to live. That all came to a head about 5 years ago when pretty much every part of her life, her marriage, her health and work-life were profoundly disrupted, setting in motion an awakening to a new direction in all three domains. Grace was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, her marriage ended, she came out, fell in love with her now wife, Julia, wrote a new book called In the Company of Women not about design, but about powerful creative women in business, launched a print magazine called Good Company, moved out of New York City, her home of 15 years, to live in a country hamlet with 400 people and rediscover true community, purpose and presence. We dive into this transformational journey in today’s powerful, revealing and inspiring conversation. ------------- Have you discovered your Sparketype yet? Take the Sparketype Assessment™ now. IT’S FREE (https://sparketype.com/) and takes about 7-minutes to complete. At a minimum, it’ll open your eyes in a big way. It also just might change your life. If you enjoyed the show, please share it with a friend. Thank you to our super cool brand partners. If you like the show, please support them - they help make the podcast possible.