Emily Reviews Her First Professionally Shot Apartment From 2010 (Lots Of Feelings!)

Fifteen years ago (when I was 30) this whole thing began – both DesignStar and the blog launched in early 2010. Y’all, we barely had smartphones, the OG Facebook had just reached the non-college population, and Pinterest was just an idea without an office (thus me having boxes of magazines and an actual pin board). It was before blogs destroyed magazines, Pinterest destroyed blogs, Instagram took over almost all blogs/Pinterest/Twitter/FB, and now TikTok and YouTube are continuing to threaten literally all of media. I find it all endlessly fascinating and truly grateful to still be here (and with enough different revenue sources to hopefully continue to run this until I’m 80). I love writing about digital media and content creation culture, because the evolution of it all is just so wild to not just witness but be so deeply affected by it every. single. day. (…And will be writing even more soon, stay tuned). Being on the inside makes my specific scoop pretty deep and nuanced – talk about seeing every side. For instance, I just finished the first episode of the Meghan Markle show and I’m having so many conflicting thoughts and feelings!! More to come. ANYWAY, we recently found these photos of my apartment tour from that first year, 2010, via Apartment Therapy, shot by Teri Lyn Fisher and thought it would be fun to repost (and react). Part of me wants to shout “cringe”, but that would only be my shadow self trying to convince myself and you all that I somehow deserve to be here, now, despite this being the apartment of a literal DesignStar then. But the more generous part of me knows that this girl had zero money or training and scraped together a lot of vintage stuff and DIYs to create an apartment that had some semblance of unique style. I’m actually really proud of this girl for putting this out there despite it not being great, not just because of it. I suppose that’s where the fanbase started – lots of vintage stuff on a budget with more confidence and bravery than expected. My budget has changed, but she is still there Read More