New York Day 21

Today felt relaxing because I only had one shoot instead of two. I shot a hair story this morning with an amazing team. Always good to work with people you enjoy. I am getting sad because I only have 1 more shooting day in this amazing loft space. I will never forget it!

The rest of the day was rather chill. Sleep and I have not been on the same page since I got here. I have been running on 4 and 5 hours a night. I am super tired every night and I go to sleep and then I wake up at 3AM and 4AM here which is like hours before my alarm is supposed to go off. Not sure if it's nerves or excitement or the overwhelming desire and need to make sure I make the most of my time here. But today after eating some takeout pizza from Sallugi's, again, I was able to fall asleep on the couch for about 2 hours. I woke up feeling like I'd been hit by a truck but hopefully my body is not going to fail on me the last week I'm here! I am about 7 jobs behind retouching so every second I'm not shooting I am trying to turn around images.

A couple behind the scenes from the shoot today and our beautiful sunset -

New York Day 20

Two shoots today! I love working with beautiful, amazing people. I met this makeup artist who I totally click with and this morning my hair guy canceled last minute and my makeup artist created this amazing hair on her first try ever doing big hair in 30 minutes. The talent here is just insane. And I am so excited to be getting great hair work for my book.

Also, as promised we had to go back to Black Tap to try the killer milkshakes. We were in line for about 2 hours for these bad boys but we heard from others in line that is a relatively short wait. We split a burger first which was again amazing. We got the Texan this time as well, you just can't go wrong with a BBQ burger. For milkshakes we got the cookie and the sweet and salty (second time around for me I probably would have gotten the cotton candy or sour one because I don't like peanut butter THAT much to drink an entire shake). It was such a fun experience though and really fun to have gotten to try a few places on our list. We just got lucky this one was so close!

New York Day 19

Today was busy as usual, but that is getting very boring to write and very boring to read I'm sure. So these are a few photo highlights from the day!

Sunsets in the city are so different and pretty in their own way. I can't get nearly enough city pictures. Even walking the same streets everyday I notice different buildings and restaurants. So much to absorb and learn.

I am getting increasingly excited to start an indoor herb garden when I get back home (providing I can find the space). I have been obsessing over them on pinterest for months but tonight I walked by the outside of a restaurant that had one of the biggest and prettiest ones I've seen. I was dying to go in and see but we were starving. So this is some inspiration for my future kitchen and not my new garden endeavor but still just so great.

And lastly, we stumbled upon a hole in the wall burger joint that has burgers and tacos and is technically Vietnamese (I think) but they have great food and they have movies on a big screen TV. And it's oddly comforting because I haven't watched TV in like in month. But they have a really amazing cilantro mint lemonade that is so good. I am seriously going to have to make it for a party sometime. It's refreshing and has a lot of flavor depth vs the typical lemonade. So again I had to take a photo for inspiration because I never would have thought to make something like that. And I have fresh cilantro and mint in my garden!

New York Day 18

Very long day of shooting today! I had 3 separate shoots today. Started with beauty then an agency test and a fun night shoot in the evening. I am dead tired and felt like napping all day today after the first one. I am getting great portfolio work though.

We were super bummed to miss game 7 tonight and I'm even more bummed that Cleveland won.

New York Day 17

I think I have officially past the difficult hump of this trip and I am onto the really enjoyable really fun side. All of the effort of marketing and networking is finally coming back to me and the next 10 days are going to be packed and amazing. I worked again with amazing models today. One from New York and one visiting from home. I am just so content with how everything is turning out. Everything from the faces I'm working with and the teams are aligning just really perfectly and I am doing great work.

We ordered in dinner from Sallugi's again which is just right down the street and we enjoyed a beautiful sunset to finish off the day.

New York Day 16

Today was my first day shooting in our new space. I know this is a personal blog but it's hard to talk about my days recently without talking about work. It's also increasingly hard to separate work and personal life so I'll just write about whatever I feel like and stop worrying about it!

I think shooting in this loft has changed how I shoot forever. In one day this space has taught me more about light than any schooling could have taught me. This space has the most incredible light and there are so many way to use it. I did a shoot in the morning and one in the evening and got to watch how the light changes from sunrise to sunset. I am also so impressed at how easygoing and drama-free all of the models and creative talent are here. Everyone is so easygoing. My first model this morning has been modeling for only 6 month and walked in NY Fashion week for Balenciaga and her first big job was DNKY and she is so easygoing and fun to be around. Same with the second model today and the makeup artist. I expected to be a little intimidated and I'm not at all because there are such sweet, normal people behind all of these huge campaigns and productions.

I don't have many pictures from the stay and sadly none from this morning but this is what I have. Check out this amazing wet stuck hair look. The makeup artist had never done it before and it took her 10 minutes to do it this flawlessly. I'm so impressed. New York has captured part of my work heart for sure, I love working here.

New York Day 15

Today was a whirlwind. We moved into our new loft and it is stunning. We are right in the heart of Soho on Greene Street. The only downside to this place is that we are on the 6th floor and there is no elevator. Chris earned his plane ticket today for sure by carrying all those bags up 6 stories of stairs!

We went to Black Tap for lunch and got burgers, they were so amazing that I ate half of it before thinking to take a photo. I got the Texan Burger! We got standard milkshakes but are going to go back for the specialty shakes another day.

We got some yummy Italian takeout from Sallugi's which is like 300 feet from our apartment (minus the 6 stories of stairs of course). I have been dying for pasta since we got here, I need to carb load to get up the stairs multiple times each day!