Expertise: Design, art, where the two overlap; tidying up
Location: New York City and Istanbul
Product: Bosske Sky Planter

Interests: Color, texture, great ordinary “authorless” design objects (like everthing at Kiosk in Soho), art that I don’t have to “get” to get, stray animals, the sea.

Background: I moved from Northern California to New York at 17. Served as editor at Frame, Dwell and Surface magazines. Moved to a loft with a view in South Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Now I write for a variety of magazines including T, Wallpaper, Case da Abitare, Et Al and book publisher, Gestalten. I also dabble in design-oriented travel consulting.

Favorite meal: Sushi or cereal, inci profiteroles on Istiklal Caddesi, fish stew at Yildiz Saray in Assos, cheeseburger and fries at Broadway Diner in Williamsburg.

Recent purchase: Used shalvar pants in rural Turkey. Each woman sews these beautiful droopy leggings for herself in a patterned fabric of her choosing. The end result is functional, comfortable, expressive, all in one.

Hidden talent: Putting things in a safe place where I will never find them again. Color-coding closets: my closet, your closet, any closet. Packing lightly.

Book/film recommendation: Mediterraneo, The Decalogue, Babette’s Feast, Gosford Park, The Thin Man, What's New Pussycat? and Memoirs of Hadrian.

Restaurant recommendation: Eminönü Balikci in Kilitbahir, Turkey. Their grilled fish sandwich on a picnic bench by the water: $3. Followed by apricots freshly picked from the owner's tree: priceless.

If I had $20… It would mean that someone I work for had paid me in a timely fashion and I wouldn't know quite what to do with it.

Transformative travel experience: All of it, but going back and forth between New York and Turkey for the past year has been especially enlightening.

Favorite neighborhood: Sultantepe in Usküdar, the hill above the ferry landing.

Dream holiday: Beaches, books and ancient ruins, by motorcycle and by boat, in a world where mosquitoes had lost out in the survival of the fittest.

If I could solve one problem, it would be: Two problems: Rescuing stray animals. Rescuing domesticated animals.

I wish people cared more about: Making more time to care about things.

Recent big aha!: What they always meant when they said: “It is what it is.”

The world would be a better place if: More empathy, more compassion.