We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lauren Thomas a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Lauren, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard.

The term Modern Hippie is a tribute back to a simpler time when people prioritized a slower pace of life, and prioritized sitting together as a family at the dinner table. This cookbook is different from most because, although it offers over 70 delicious recipes, it also aims to take the angst out of having company over by offering tips for the hostess, such as tablescaping and setting the scene for a beautiful evening no matter how big or small the gathering. The key is to plan details like mood lighting, music, decorations and food in advance so that the hostess can concentrate on welcoming and enjoying her guests. There are suggested menus tucked into the pages for various kinds of entertaining, including brunch, game nights and weeknight family meals which make it easier to plan. I really want to help women reinvent their passion in the kitchen by inspiring a fashionable, fresh, fun and relaxed entertaining style.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I grew up in a traditional Jewish family who loved to host and entertain at home. I always paid attention to how I felt as a little girl at these gatherings, no matter how big or small, and I noticed that my grandmother put so much thought into welcoming guests into her home. She would put so much thought into an evening, from sitting with a stationer weeks in advance to plan invitations, to having the bar fully stocked and jokes ready to break the ice. As a woman with my own family and love for entertaining, I still draw upon the way all of my senses were enhanced when people came over, and try to incorporate that same style when I am hosting.

I love telling stories through writing and pictures. While sharing more about my cooking and entertaining lifestyle on social media, I became aware of the draw that a laid-back yet elegant entertaining style created. I noticed a real desire for people to want to re-prioritize and find beauty in domestication and a focus on family life. My educational background in psychology lends itself to realizing the importance of making time for family during mealtimes, and how it nurtures the need for kids – and adults – to be seen and heard, to feel seen.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I’ve always had big ideas but in the pursuit of them I’d usually quit when I started to become successful at it. After years of therapy I realized I was afraid of my own light, my own success. I knew fear of failure was a thing, but I never realized that I was scared at succeeding because I feared that it would compromise my role as a mother and wife. In time, I realized that the only thing worse than risking all of that for success was the comfortable misery that each day brought when I didn’t risk anything. That consistent bore, of not feeling like I was living up to my true creative potential, was my rock bottom. In attempts to never revisit an unfulfilled life, my ability to recover from anything uncomfortably difficult has been fine tuned and welcomed on a daily basis.

We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.

I had no idea how to begin writing a book. I asked around and even reached out to cookbook authors asking for advice and my questions went unanswered. I began to feel drawn to this mysterious process and decided that I wasn’t going to take “nothing” for an answer. So I began. And I did it all backwards. One hundred and ten percent of my efforts were beautifully backwards. What I didn’t know back then would ultimately and singlehandedly become one of the pivoting paths in my process of becoming a published author. Traditionally, an aspiring author writes a book proposal and submits it to publishing houses that fit the genre of their work. This is extremely humbling because if you don’t hire an expensive book agent to connect you to all the right people, chances are you will never even get a response back let alone a “no.” If you do get recognized, you then send over a manuscript. If you sign a contract with this publisher, the process is complicated and tedious. First, you create a vision statement with your editor so that your team can be crystal clear on your focus. Then you go through edits, copy edits, food styling and photography, and that is just the beginning. This process can take from months to years.
Here’s what I did — I imagined this beautiful food and lifestyle shoot of my recipes and the way I love to entertain. I assigned myself the role of my own creative director and went down a rabbit hole of finding the best team of food photographers, food stylists, videographers and hair/makeup artists. We had a meeting at my house and made a plan to shoot over the course of a three week period. I spent my own time and money BEFORE I had ever been picked up by a publisher and BEFORE I had ever written a manuscript. My publisher and I laugh at this now, because had I not done this so backwards, I would have never been discovered by them. Moral of the story – if you don’t know where to start, start anyway.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.themodernhippieway.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/the.modern.hippie.way
• Facebook: the.modern.hippie.way

Image Credits
Photography by Kristy Horst. Food styling by Frankie Chacon