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

Alright, Stella thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

In 2022, I was feeling the burnout of the seemingly never-ending pandemic, and carrying all of the weight of the past two and a half years on my shoulders. I was feeling empty inside while working in the hospitality field, being a barista and had already poured out all I had to give in the medical field working in a nursing home right when it all broke loose in January of 2020. After these two endeavors I knew that I needed to give myself a change and needed to find out what that change consisted of quickly. I looked around at a few different options and found myself standing in the admissions office of The Academy of Beauty Professionals, a college designated to cosmetology, barbering, esthetics, and nail classes. At the time there was no finite decision on what the game plan was, but I was exploring my options. Personally, I never thought that college was in the cards for me due to finances and an overwhelming feeling of self doubt. Once I was in the admissions office I had already pictured myself working on the performance floor with all of the other students creating what I had envisioned to be works of art on the medium of peoples hair, skin, and nails. The admissions councilor gave my the confidence I needed to at least apply for the program and apply for financial aid to see if what I qualified for would provide my the assistance that I needed in order to make a dream of mine a reality. Once I walked out of the office and came home I couldn’t get to my office soon enough to put all of my applications in. In a sense I felt like I was signing my life away to a commitment of training, and financial strain but I have kept telling myself that if I can make it through the cosmetology program that the risk would all be worth the reward. Here I am, 5 months into my program and more in love with what I will be making a career out of than I have ever been with any occupation. I still find it hard to balance being a dedicated student, employee, part of my family, and a good friend to those I have but I have made it work so far. I feel I spread myself thin at times but am able to try to make an effort into keeping every part of my life nourished with the care and compassion needed. My risk is still in the making but I am confident that I can follow through in order to make the rest of my days as a working class citizen feel a little bit less work like, and a little bit more like I am doing everything that I love every day when I clock in. Before, I never realized that is what it takes to make you feel more hopeful every morning. It simply takes finding what you love and pushing for it, even if it takes a while to pinpoint what that is. I was doing hair for myself and my friends for a decade in home before I realized that it is what I am passionate about. I’m 26 now and finally feeling relief when I wake every morning to pursue what makes me happy.

Stella, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am a hardworking, goal oriented creative mind who finds myself diving deeper and deeper into her passions as each day goes in. I am a student at The Academy of Beauty Professionals in the Cosmetology program and have been attending for 5 months. Every day I realize more and more that this is the career path for me, it feels effortless to do what I love. I was coloring hair for 10+ years without realizing that was something that I might actually have talent in. Being in college has showed me that I may have more passion when it comes to all things cosmetology than I realize. I have a passion for hair color (specifically vivids or fashion colors), hair cutting, giving the ultimate blowout, and all things nail and skin care. I recently was hired to be trained more extensively at a Spa local to me and feel passionate about waxing, and skin care. I hope that one day I can rent a chair somewhere that allows me to working mostly in what I love but I have a feeling that I will be able to do what I love in every aspect by finding the right clientele. I am a bit of a perfectionist to a fault and have a hard time accepting that sometimes you can only do so much depending on what you begin with. I find that in my day to day live I am a bit meticulous with routine and habits and it seems to really pay off in the field that I have found myself in. I pride myself in taking the utmost care of each individual that I have the joy of working on and always want to do whatever I can in order to make them shine. It never ceases to amaze me what you can do for someone by making sure that they feel as confident as they can, even if they don’t see their own beauty until you really reflect it to them. Each smile from a client makes me feel that I have found exactly where I need to be.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative to me personally is that I can change the trajectory and outcome of someone’s day by simply helping them to see exactly what I can see in them, A lot of people have a hard time in noticing their own unique beautiful qualities that set them apart from everyone else. As a cosmetologist I feel I am able to really pull those qualities to the forefront and put them on display. People think that a makeover is changing someone, and I could not disagree more. I feel that giving someone a makeover or transformation is simply taking what they naturally have a showing them the right way to work with it. I love being able to provide individuals with the tools and knowledge that they need in order to be proud of who they are and what they look like. I understand what its like to try to fit into an image that simply isn’t you, and its unflattering. We all see trends and want to look exactly like the people portrayed, not knowing that its not a box that you need to check and fit into, its simply just finding the box that fits the shape of you, and that you want to check. I strive off of people realizing that they might not be able to use the same routine or habits as the person next to them in order to achieve the same results. The biggest reward to me is seeing someone shining from the inside out, and being proud of it.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

For me, building an audience on social media was a complete accident. I feel into the category of people making other people laugh on social media, Tiktok specifically. I found myself using audios that were trending and adding quips that I found funny or relevant to me at the time. A lot of what I was doing what making myself laugh and people kind of took note of it. I am by no means big on any social media app but I did find myself with a good size following that allowed me to promote the things that I wanted to be doing. Being able to make art, produce stickers of it and have even one person want to buy it really made making a fool of myself online worth it. The first time I was able to package an order off of Etsy and send it out to places like California, halfway across the country from me, or even Sweden, halfway across the world, really had me glowing. Just knowing that I was reaching a vast audience made me so happy. I was also able to find a bigger audience by posting videos about my daily life. Every day that I attend school I post a “Day In The Life Of A Cosmetology Student” video. I just record small snippets of my day to day routine and have been graced with a community who is interested in the same things as I am. Mostly I have found that consistency is what makes the biggest difference. Keep posting new content, even if it feels like it is for no one, someone will happen for you and like me, you might be surprised that it gains traction.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @styledbythesiren @stereotypicalsiren
• Facebook: Stella Siren
• Twitter: @stereosiren
• Tiktok: @stellasiren