We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Penny Vahka a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Penny, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.
Drag has a lot of moving parts, and it isn’t as simple as say learning how to ride a bike! Makeup, wigs, sewing, performing and so much more! I didn’t Come into the drag scene with a Drag family, I really Started at ground ZERO! My first full face of makeup was all from Walmart, and I would sit and do my makeup every night taking pictures to track my progress, and making adjustments the next night! That is pretty much how I learned Everything that comes with drag, and I am so grateful that’s how it happened!
I think Taking the time to work on what I call The “Big Three” of drag (Wigs, Makeup, and Sewing) one at a time is what really helped me get my bearings as a new queen! Learning the process of drag is just as fun as drag itself!
Penny, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
If you haven’t seen my before my name is Penny Vahka! I am A drag queen based primarily on social media, sharing everything I’ve learned with the world on all things sewing, makeup, wig styling, and DRAG honey! When I got Into drag I never Thought I’d become “Social Media’s drag mom” but it’s a title I wear With pride!
My content primarily focuses on easy to understand, funny, and useful tutorials on all things the have to do with drag, whatever that may be! I learned very early on into my drag career that there are very limited resources and help when it comes to learning about drag. So I took it upon myself to become a platform where young, old, new, or veteran queens could come to learn and share their own tips and tricks to help Others learn about the art of drag!
I take pride in knowing that the videos I am making, don’t just vanish into the gigantic void that is social media! Tutorials or videos that not a lot of people want to make because they think if they give away their secrets that it will create more competition in their industry. However, I believe that the opposite is true! As creative people, especially queer creative people I feel there is a responsibility to uplift one another and share our secrets!
Like I said, I never expected that this style of content would be the type that I was posting! If you asked me a few years ago, I would’ve told you that my platform would be mostly about beauty content and making fun transitions from myself to my drag persona, but the universe had other plans for me! Email not only have the following online that I do, but I have also started my own sewing business for entertainers and queens to come and get custom commissioned pieces so they can be as fabulous as they want!
I think what sets me apart is that I try to remain as accessible and genuine to who I am online as possible! I still to this day try to answer every comment respond to every DM asking me for help on different drag related questions, and I think for lack of a better term I’m just real! I did not get into this industry to be famous necessarily, I just started posting silly little videos that I thought were helpful at a time when I really had no business giving people any tips! I am proud to be a person who built themself up, and taught themself all of the skills simply by trial and error!
On top of all of that I somehow find time to also do a podcast with my best friend! It’s called Reality Check, and we discussed all things reality TV competition shows! (@realitycheckp0dcast)! The reason I mentioned this is because you have to find the thing that makes you want to post and want to create! However, on the flipside of that coin, you also can do things just because they’re fun, which is why we started this podcast! So if you’re ever looking for some content that isn’t drag related, don’t worry I have you covered because we are acting a fool when it comes to reality TV!
The main thing I would like people to take away from this, and all of the videos that I share is really simple. You just have to try! And I know that sounds so cliché and so corny, but it’s so true! You can’t be afraid of messing up because that fear will keep you from ever starting. I always tell people when they are first starting to sell your first five projects are going to look horrendous. It’s just part of the process! But that is also part of the fun at least to me!
Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?
Yes! This is particularly for my sewing peeps! There are so many free websites that offer patterns, video tutorials, and even sometimes very discounted fabrics! Sewing is a very expensive hobby so do the research before you just purchase a pattern because it might already be online somewhere for free!
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
This truly might sound annoying, or honestly lackluster, but it’s the truth! One day, I just decided to start posting! It is as simple as that. I was at a point with my drag, and specifically my make up journey that I finally felt comfortable, putting myself out there online, and That was history!
Overtime, I quickly realize that I was not going to be a beauty influencer like I was originally planning, Because I was not being true to my personality! The second I uploaded a video that I did not care if it only made me laugh was the second that I found my niche, And my audience! I feel like a lot of people in life like to think that they are the only person like themselves when it comes to their sense of humor or their sense of style and things of that nature, but it’s not true! There are people out there who have the same twisted humor, or the same quirky style, and are looking for someone to share it with!
So, my nugget of wisdom for social media is to just be authentic, because it is wildly lacking in every aspect on every app! If you like to make little keychains of bread and you do that! Whatever the case may be, there is an audience for everything. You just have to figure out how to deliver it!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://linktr.ee/Pennyvahkaa?utm_source=linktree_profile_share<sid=80284acd-3e10-49ff-a688-1f98da5f23ef
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepennyvahka?igsh=MW11eXFrMTRsaXU0cg==
- Twitter: https://x.com/thepennyvahka?s=21&t=t6YHSQl0d8Rvn6JN52yO4Q
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@pennyvahka597?si=rUl7hHfm-KoQSpjQ
- Other: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thepennyvahka?_t=ZP-8uYVOj810Nr&_r=1
Business Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pennys_pieces_?igsh=MXdidnc3MzgxeTEx
Podcast YouTube: https://youtube.com/@realitycheckpodcast1?feature=shared