Podcasts about Blackberry Farm

How do you capture a sense of place, indulgence, and timeless detail all in one bite? You savor Tuck Shop chocolates, of course!We're delighted to be hosting founders Sarah Michler and Caroline Witmer, whose story began with a bittersweet moment—discovering that their favorite Nantucket chocolate shop, Sweet Inspirations, was closing. That spark of nostalgia inspired them to create something entirely their own: an exquisite confectionery that celebrates distinctive flavors and the joy of being in your happy place.In this episode, Sarah and Caroline share how their friendship, complementary talents, and shared love of fine chocolate came together to inspire a brand infused with meaning and memory.Get ready to have your palate intrigued and your senses stirred as we explore their favorite creations, creative process, and the beautiful notes that make Tuck Shop chocolates truly unforgettable.Their handcrafted confections have been celebrated by brands such as the Bowery Hotel, Blackberry Farm, The Peninsula Beverly Hills, Vogue, Goop, and J.Crew, just to name a few.Above all, Sarah and Caroline's friendship reminds us that when passion and a shared dream come together, something truly special happens. The sweetest things in life just aren't tasted. They're felt.Connect with Tuck Shop at shoptuckshop.com and @shoptuckshopConnect with Anne @styledbyark.com and @classicandcuriouspodcast

Muriel "Aggie" Murch and her husband, Academy Award winning film editor and sound designer Walter Murch, have lived on Blackberry Farm in Bolinas for some five decades, along with their children, chickens, and horses. The two just celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary.They both have newly published books, and are out on the circuit telling their stories that stand at the intersection of the organic farming movement and the independent filmmaking movement of the 1970's.Director Francis Coppola, Walter's longtime collaborator, describes his new book, Suddenly Something Clicked, as "a vast encyclopedia of cinema and everything that can be touched by it."Director Phillip Kaufman said this about Harvesting History While Farming the Flats: "Blackberry Farm is Aggie Murch's Walden Pond. She made existence sustainable, rebuilt life over and over, helped spirits enter the world and gently helped them leave. She's got the gift."We have known and admired the Murches for some four decades and asked if we might do a story to celebrate this moment of love and publishing and graciously they said yes.Produced by The Kitchen Sisters, Davia Nelson & Nikki Silva, in collaboration with Nathan Dalton, Brandi Howell and Hannah Kaye. Mixed by Jim McKee.  Special Thanks to City Lights Bookstore and Peter Maravelis.Funding for our stories comes from listener contributions to The Kitchen Sisters Productions, The Robert Sillins Family Foundation, The Every Page Foundation, The Susie Tompkins Buell Foundation, The Buenas Obras Fund, The TRA Fund, Barbara & Howard Wollner, Michael Pollan & Judith Belzer, Bonnie Raitt, and you.Our deep thanks to our community for your spirit and for supporting the stories.The Kitchen Sisters Present is part of Radiotopia from PRX, a network of independent podcasts that widen your world.Thank you for subscribing and thanks for listening. 

On this week's episode, host Caryn Antonini is joined by Cassidee Dabney, Executive Chef at the Barn at Blackberry Farm, a luxury resort and farm located in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. Chef Cassidee grew up with an appreciation for nature's bounty and seasonal freshness which provided a solid foundation for her culinary path. She is a graduate of the New England Culinary Institute and worked in various locations around the world, most of which were spent with the Four Seasons hotel group, before settling at Blackberry Farm. An acclaimed chef, Cassidee has been nominated three times for the James Beard Award - Best Chef Southeast and continues her culinary innovation at Blackberry Farm, known for it farm to table cuisine. Cassidee not only brings extraordinary culinary talent but also a deep passion for Southern hospitality, seasonal cooking, and storytelling through food.For more information on our guest:@cassideeHomeblackberryfarm.comCaryn Antoniniwww.cultivatedbycaryn.com@carynantonini@cultivatedbycarynshow###Get great recipes from Caryn at https://carynantonini.com/recipes/

In this special coaching-call episode, we deep dive into what has made Blackberry Farm a successful hospitality operation before getting into some Q&A where we discuss:- Advice to independent developers- Operating agreements w/ restaurants- Scaling w/ investors vs. bootstrapping & a ton more!Connect & Invest with Jake:Follow Jake on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jwurzakTake the Hospitality Investing Masterclass: https://learn.jakewurzak.com/Learn How to Invest with DoveHill: https://bit.ly/3yg8PwoTopics:(00:00:00) - Intro(00:04:38) - Inspirations from Blackberry Farm & Blackberry Mountain(00:21:14) - Advice to independent developers(00:25:40) - Operating agreements with third-party restaurants(00:35:27) - Purchasing an existing hotel vs. developing from the ground up(00:44:12) - Pop-up hotel experiences(00:48:03) - Scaling with investors vs. bootstrapping(00:55:05) - The risk of betting on newer brands(01:00:21) - Creating a case for a market where there's little data available to pull

Mary Celeste Beall is the proprietor of East Tennessee's Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain, two of the shining stars in the American hospitality world. Mary Celeste joins host Kerry Diamond to talk about her role at the award-winning properties, cultivating a culture of excellence, and finding her voice as a leader who never expected to lead one day. She also discusses the life and legacy of her late husband, Sam Beall, and learning to live with grief. Mary Celeste explains the family's “make a great day” motto and talks about the resilience and positivity required to make it a reality. For Jubilee Wine Country tickets, visit here. Click here for the fall issue of Cherry Bombe with cover stars Jeni Britton of Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream and Abi Balingit of The Dusky Kitchen.Check out Jessie Sheehan's new cookbook and get tickets for her tour. Visit cherrybombe.com for subscriptions and show transcripts. More on Mary Celeste: Instagram, Blackberry Farm, WebsiteMore on Kerry: Instagram

This podcast hit paid subscribers' inboxes on Sept. 13. It dropped for free subscribers on Sept. 20. To receive future pods as soon as they're live, and to support independent ski journalism, please consider an upgrade to a paid subscription. You can also subscribe to the free tier below:WhoChip Seamans, President of Windham Mountain Club, New YorkRecorded onAugust 12, 2024About Windham Mountain ClubClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: Majority owned by Beall Investment Partners and Kemmons Wilson Hospitality Partners, majority led by Sandy BeallLocated in: Windham, New YorkYear founded: 1960Pass affiliations:* Ikon Pass: 7 days* Ikon Base Pass: 5 days, holiday blackoutsClosest neighboring ski areas: Hunter (:17), Belleayre (:35), Plattekill (:48)Base elevation: 1,500 feetSummit elevation: 3,100 feetVertical drop: 1,600 feetSkiable Acres: 285Average annual snowfall: 100 inchesLift count: 11 (1 six-pack, 3 high-speed quads, 1 triple, 1 double, 5 carpets – view Lift Blog's inventory of Windham's lift fleet)Why I interviewed himThe Catskills are the closest thing to big-mountain skiing in my immediate orbit. Meaning the ski areas deliver respectable vertical drops, reasonably consistent snowfall, and an address reachable for first chair with a 6 to 7 a.m. departure time. The four big ski areas off I-87 – Belleayre, Plattekill, Hunter, and Windham – are a bit farther from my launchpad than the Poconos, than Mountain Creek, than Catamount or Butternut or the smaller ski areas in Connecticut. But on the right day, the Catskills mountains ski like a proto-Vermont, a sampler that settles more like a main course than an appetizer.I'm tremendously fond of the Catskills, is my point here. And I'm not the only one. As the best skiing within three hours of New York City, this relatively small region slings outsized influence over North American ski culture. Money drives skiing, and there's a lot of it flowing north from the five boroughs (OK maybe two of the boroughs and the suburbs, but whatever). There's a reason that three Catskills ski areas (Belleayre, Hunter, and Windham), rock nearly as many high-speed chairlifts (nine) as the other 40-some ski areas in New York combined (12). These ski areas are cash magnets that prime the 20-million-ish metro region for adventures north to New England, west to the West, and east to Europe.I set this particular podcast up this way because it's too easy for Colorad-Bro or Lake Ta-Bro or Canyon Bro to look east and scoff. Of course I could focus this whole enterprise on the West, as every ski publication since the invention of snow has done. I know the skiing is better out there. Everyone does. But that doesn't mean it's the only skiing that matters. The Storm is plenty immersed in the West, but I can also acknowledge this reality: the West needs the East more than the East needs the West. After all, there's plenty of good skiing out here, with a lot more options, and without the traffic hassles (not to mention the far smaller Brobot:Not Brobot ratio). And while it's true that New England ski areas have lately benefitted from capital airdrops launched by their western overlords, a lot of that western money is just bouncing back east after being dropped off by tourists from Boston, New York, Philly, and D.C. Could Colorado have skiing without eastern tourism? Yes, but would Summit and Eagle counties be dripping with high-speed lifts and glimmering base villages without that cash funnel, or would you just have a bunch of really big Monarch Mountains?None of which tells you much about Windham Mountain Windham Mountain Club, which I've featured on the podcast before. But if you want to understand, rather than simply scoff at, the New Yorkers sharing a chair with you at Deer Valley or Snowmass or Jackson, that journey starts here, in the Catskills, a waystation on many skiers' pathway to higher altitudes.What we talked aboutChip is the new board chairman of the National Ski Areas Association; searching for a new NSAA head; the difference between state and national ski organizations; the biggest challenge of running a ski area in New York; could New York State do more to help independent ski areas?; how the ski area's rebrand to Windham Mountain Club “created some confusion in the market, no doubt”; the two-day weekend lift ticket minimum is dead; “our plan has always been to stay open to the public and to sell passes and tickets”; defining “premium”; what should a long liftline look like at WMC?; lift ticket and Ikon Pass redemption limits for 2024-25; the future of Windham on the Ikon Pass; rising lift ticket prices; free season passes for local students; who owns WMC, and what do they want to do with it?; defining the “club” in WMC; what club membership will cost you and whether just having the cash is enough to get you in; is Windham for NYC or for everyone?; how about a locals' pass?; a target number of skiers on a busy day at Windham; comparing Windham to Vermont's all-private Hermitage Club; how about the Holimont private-on-weekends-only model?; some people just want to be angry; the new owners have already plowed $70 million into the bump; snowmaking updates; a badass Cat fleet; a more or less complete lift fleet; the story behind K lift; the Windham village and changes to parking; and the dreaded gatehouse.   Why I thought that now was a good time for this interviewRather than right now, maybe the best time for this interview would have been a year ago, or six months ago, or maybe all three. It's been a confusing time at Windham, for skiers, for employees, for the people running the place. No one seems to understand exactly what the bump is, what it plans to be, and what it wants to be.Which doesn't stop anyone from having an opinion, most of them wildly misinformed. Over the past year, I've been told, definitively, by a Saturday liftline's worth of casual skiers that Windham had “gone private.” The notion is pervasive, stubborn, immune to explanations or evidence to the contrary. So, very on brand for our cultural moment.Which doesn't mean I shouldn't try. I'm more than willing to bang on ski areas for their faults. In Windham's case, I've always thought that they groom too much, that the season is too short, that the season pass price (currently $2,000!), is beyond insane. But it's not really fair to invent a problem and then harangue the operators about it. Windham is not a private ski area, it is not shut off from locals, it does not require a $200,000 handshake to pass through the RFID gates. Inventing a non-existent problem and then taking offense to it is a starter kit for social media virtue signaling, but it's a poor way to conduct real life.But honestly, what the hell is going on up there? How can Windham Mountain Club justify a larger initiation fee than Vermont's truly private Hermitage Club for a ski experience that still involves half of Manhattan? Why is it so hard to make a weekend Ikon Pass reservation? Does anyone really go to the Catskills in search of the “rarified reality” that WMC insists it is somehow providing? What is the long-term vision here?All fair questions, all spun from WMC's self-inflicted PR tornado. But the answers are crystalizing, and we have them here.What I got wrong* I said that “Gore's triple chair,” which was only a “12, 13-year-old lift” was going to McCauley. I was referring to the Hudson triple, a 2010 Partek (so 14 years old), which will replace nearby but much smaller McCauley's 1973 Hall double, known as “Big Chair,” for the coming ski season.  * I said that the club fees for Windham were roughly the same as Hermitage Club. This is drastically untrue. WMC's $200,000 initiation fee is double Hermitage Club's $100,000 number. Windham's annual dues, however, are much lower than HC's $18,500.* I said that Windham was automating its first snowmaking trail this year. That is incorrect, as Seamans points out in our conversation. Windham is installing its first automated snowmaking on the east side of the mountain this year, meaning that 40 percent of the mountain's snowmaking system will now be automated.* I said that Windham had a water-supply-challenge, which is not accurate. I was confusing water supply (adequate), with snowmaking system pumping capacity (room for improvement). I think I am covering too many mountains and sometimes the narratives cross. Sorry about that.Why you should ski Windham Mountain ClubIf you really want an uncrowded Catskills ski experience, you have exactly one option: go to family-owned Plattekill, 40 minutes down the road. It has less vert (1,100 feet), and half Windham's acreage on paper, but when the glades fill in (which they often do), the place feels enormous, and you can more or less walk onto either of the mountain's two chairlifts any day of the season.But Plattekill doesn't have high-speed lifts, it's not on the Ikon Pass, and it's not basically one turn off the thruway. Windham has and is all of those things. And so that's where more skiers will go.Not as many, of course, as will go to Hunter, Windham's Vail-owned archnemesis 15 minutes away, with its unlimited Epic Pass access, Sahara-sized parking lots, and liftlines that disappear over the curvature of the Earth. And that has been Windham's unspoken selling point for decades: Hey, at least we're not Hunter. That's true not only in relative crowd size, but in attitude and aesthetic; Hunter carries at least a 10:1 ratio* over Windham in number of LongIsland Bros straightlining its double-blacks in baseball caps and Jets jerseys.In that context, Windham's rebrand is perfectly logical – as Hunter grows ever more populist, with a bargain season pass price and no mechanism to limit visitors outside of parking lot capacity (they ski area does limit lift ticket sales, but not Epic Pass visits), the appeal of a slightly less-chaotic, more or less equally scaled option grows. That's Windham. Or, hey, the much more exclusive sounding “Windham Mountain Club.”And Windham is a good ski area. It's one of the better ones in New York, actually, with two peaks and nice fall line skiing and an excellent lift system. It doesn't sprawl like Gore or tower like Whiteface, and those fall lines do level off a bit too abruptly from the summit, but it feels big, especially when that Catskills snowbelt fires. On a weekday, it really can feel like a private ski area. And you can probably score an Ikon Pass slot without issue. So go now, before WMC jumps off that mainstream pass, and the only way in the door is a triple-digit lift ticket.*Not an actual statistic^^Probably though it's accurate.Podcast NotesOn New York having more ski areas than any other state in the countryIt's true. New York has 51. The next closest state is Michigan, with 44 (only 40 of which operated last winter). Here's a list:On the three New York state-owned ski areas that “have been generously funded by the state”It's basically impossible to have any honest conversation about any New York ski area without acknowledging the Godzilla-stomping presence of the state's three owned ski areas: Belleayre, Gore, and Whiteface. These are all terrific ski areas, in large part because they benefit from a firehose of taxpayer money that no privately owned, for-profit ski area could ever justify. As the Adirondack Explorer reported in July:The public authority in charge of the state's skiing, sliding and skating facilities saw expenses and losses jump in the past year, its annual financial report shows.The Lake Placid-based Olympic Regional Development Authority [ORDA], whose big-ticket sites are the Belleayre Mountain, Gore Mountain and Whiteface Mountain alpine centers, disclosed operating losses of $47.3 million for the last fiscal year. That compared with losses of $29.3 million for the same period a year earlier.It's important to acknowledge that this budget also covers a fun park's worth of skating rinks, ski jumps, luge chutes (or whatever), and a bunch of other expensive, unprofitable crap that you need if you ever want to host an Olympics (which New York State has done twice and hopes to do again). Still, the amount of cash funneled into ORDA in recent years is incredible. As the Adirondack Explorer reported last year:“The last six years, the total capital investment in the Olympic Authority was $552 million,” [now-fomer ORDA President and CEO Mike] Pratt told me proudly. “These are unprecedented investments in our facilities, no question about it. But the return on investment is immediate.”Half a billion dollars is a hell of a lot of money. The vast majority of it, more than $400 million, went to projects in the Lake Placid region, home to some 20,000 year-round residents—and it turns out, that breathtaking sum is only part of the story.Adirondack Life found New York State has actually pumped far more taxpayer dollars into ORDA since Pratt took the helm than previously reported, including a separate infusion of subsidies needed to cover the Olympic Authority's annual operating losses. Total public spending during Pratt's six-year tenure now tops $620 million.… Taken together that's more money than New York spent hosting the 1980 Winter Olympics. It's also more money than the state committed, amid growing controversy, to help build a new NFL stadium in Buffalo, a city with a population more than 10 times that of the Lake Placid region.There's also no sign ORDA's hunger for taxpayer cash will shrink anytime soon. In fact, it appears to be growing. The Olympic Authority is already slated to receive operating subsidies and capital investments next year that total another $119 million.To put that amount in context, the entire Jay Peak Resort in Vermont sold last year for $76 million. Which means New York State's spending on the Olympic Authority in 2024 would be enough to buy an entire new ski mountain, with tens of millions of dollars left over.It now appears certain the total price tag for Pratt's vision of a new, revitalized ORDA will top $1 billion. He said that's exactly what the organization needed to finally fulfill its mission as keeper of New York's Olympic flame.More context: Vail resorts, which owns and operates 42 ski areas – more than a dozen of which are several times larger than Belleayre, Gore, and Whiteface combined – is allocating between $189 and $194 million for 2024 capital improvements. You can see why New York is one of the few states where Vail isn't the Big Bad Guy. The state's tax-paying, largely family-owned ski areas funnels 95 percent of their resentment toward ORDA, and it's easy enough to understand why.On New York's “increasingly antiquated chairlift fleet”Despite the glimmer-glammer of the lift fleets at ORDA resorts, around the Catskills, and at Holiday Valley, New York is mostly a state of family-owned ski areas whose mountains are likely worth less than the cost of even a new fixed-grip chairlift. Greek Peak's longest chairlift is a Carlevaro-Savio double chair installed in 1963. Snow Ridge runs lifts dating to 1964, '60, and '58(!). Woods Valley installed its three lifts in 1964, '73, and '75 (owner Tim Woods told me last year that the ski area has purchased at least two used chairlifts, and hopes to install them at some future point). Intermittently open (and currently non-operational) Cockaigne's two double chairs and T-bar date to 1965. These lifts are, of course, maintained and annually inspected, and I have no fear of riding any of them, but in the war for customers, lifts that predate human space travel do make your story a bit trickier to tell.On Holiday Valley selling a chairlift to CatamountI noted that a lift had moved from Holiday Valley to Catamount – that is the Catamount quad, Holiday Valley's old Yodeler quad. Catamount installed the new lift in 2022, the year after Holiday Valley pulled out the 20-year-old, 500-vertical-foot fixed-grip lift to replace it with a new high-speed quad.On Windham's pass price in comparison to othersWindham's season pass price is the eighth most expensive in America, and the most expensive in the East by an enormous amount (Windham also offers a Monday through Friday, non-holiday season pass for $750, and a Sunday through Friday, non-holiday pass for $1,300). Here's how WMC compares nationally:And here's how it stacks up in the East:On WMC's ownershipWe talk a bit about Windham's ownership in the pod. I dug into that a bit more last year, when they bought the place in April and again when the mountain rebranded in October.On Blackberry Farms Lodged between Windham and New York City is a hilltop resort called Mohonk Mountain House. In its aesthetic and upscale cuisine, it resembles Blackberry Farm, the Tennessee resort owned by Windham majority owner Sandy Beall, which The New York Times describes as “built on a foundation of simple Tennessee country life as reinterpreted for guests willing to pay a premium to taste its pleasures without any of its hardships.” In other words, an incredibly expensive step into a version of nature that resembles but sidesteps its wild form. I think this is what WMC is going for, but on snow.On the location of Windham's tubing hillI frankly never even realized that Windham had a tubing hill until Seamans mentioned it. Even though it's marked on the trailmap, the complex sits across the access road, well removed from the actual ski area. Tubing is not really something I give a damn about (sorry #TubeNation), other than to acknowledge that it's probably the reason many small ski areas can continue to exist, but I usually at least notice it if it's there. Circled in red below:On Hermitage ClubWe talk a bit about how Hermitage Club is similar in size to Windham. The southern Vermont ski area sports a slightly smaller vertical drop (1,400 feet to Windham's 1,600), and skiable acreage (200 to Windham's 285). Here's the trailmap:On Holimont, Buffalo Ski Club, and Hunt HollowNew York is home to three private, chairlift-served ski areas that all follow a similar business model: the general public is welcome on weekdays, but weekends and holidays are reserved for members. Holimont, right next door to Holiday Valley, is the largest and most well-known:Hunt Hollow is smaller and less-renowned, but it's a nice little bump (my favorite fact about HH is that the double chair – the farthest looker's left – is Snowbird's old Little Cloud lift):Buffalo Ski Center is the agglomeration of three side-by-side, formerly separate ski areas: Sitzmarker Ski Club, Ski Tamarack and Buffalo Ski Club. The trail network is dense and super interesting:On Windham in The New York TimesI referred to a feature story that The Times ran on Windham last December. Read that here.On Vail's pay bumpWhen Vail Resorts raised its minimum wage to $20 an hour in 2022, that presented a direct challenge to every competing resort, including Windham, just down the road from Vail-owned Hunter.On Windham's village expansionWindham will build a new condominium village over some portion of its current parking lots. Here's a concept drawing:The Storm explores the world of lift-served skiing year-round. Join us.The Storm publishes year-round, and guarantees 100 articles per year. This is article 57/100 in 2024, and number 557 since launching on Oct. 13, 2019. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.stormskiing.com/subscribe

Mahavir Patel is President & CEO of Aatmos, which focuses on investing in communities with growing demand and limited supply, investing in capital and culture. They partner with Marriott, Hilton, and IHG, as well as some of the most provocative creatives and curators in the country. Links:AatmosMahavir on LinkedInConnect & Invest with Jake:Follow Jake on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jwurzakTake the Hospitality Investing Masterclass: https://learn.jakewurzak.com/Learn How to Invest with DoveHill: https://bit.ly/3yg8PwoTopics:(00:00:00) - Intro(00:02:42) - Managing a lifestyle hotel with Marriott(00:19:08) - Differences between Mom & Pop style hotels vs. major brands(00:12:51) - The clash between old-school and new-school hospitality(00:16:01) - What do most people underestimate about hospitality?(00:19:55) - Converting a motel into a lifestyle hotel(00:32:25) - What did you miss in this project?(00:39:33) - F&B(00:44:12) - What are you doing less of as you do these conversions?(00:47:57) - The inspiration of Blackberry Farm(00:52:04) - How do you make your sub-100-key hotels profitable?(00:57:47) - The inn-keeper concept(01:07:41) - Where do you want to be in 5 years?(01:08:49) - What's your favorite hotel?

Cassidee Dabney is the Executive Chef of The Barn at Blackberry Farm, one of the most renowned culinary destinations in the U.S. We learn her path to leading a world-class kitchen team and she shares the one must-have item every cook should own. We dive into The Barn's menu and its hyper-local “Foothills Cuisine®” of Appalachia- a cuisine inspired by the freshest seasonal ingredients and produce grown just steps away from the kitchen. Cassidee also talks about her commitment to community, including her volunteer work with food-related projects at Boys & Girls Clubs and her efforts to support Share Our Strength through fundraising dinners. Enjoy this episode as we go Beyond the Plate… with Chef Cassidee Dabney.This episode is brought to you by Martin's Famous Potato Rolls.Follow Beyond the Plate on Facebook and X.Follow Kappy on Instagram and X.Find Beyond the Plate on all major podcast platforms. www.beyondtheplatepodcast.com www.onkappysplate.com

A luxury resort tucked away in the foothills of Tennessee's smoky mountains, Blackberry Farm defies easy categorization. Spread across thousands of acres, it encompasses everything from world class restaurants and spas to a fly fishing program, equestrian facility, farmstead and larder. Blackberry Farm also boasts a surprisingly robust design department, perhaps part of the reason why it has become a favorite getaway for luminaries in our industry. On this episode, proprietor Mary Celeste Beall speaks with host Dennis Scully about balancing different goals for different parts of the business, why it sometimes makes sense to spend on illogical investments, and the story of tragedy and resilience in her own life that underpins all of her work at Blackberry Farm.This episode is sponsored by LoloiLINKSMary Celeste BeallBlackberry FarmDennis ScullyBusiness of Home

For me, this episode's timing could not be more perfect. I dropped off my first kiddo at college last weekend and that has brought with it a tidal wave of emotions – grief, sadness, tons of tears, and reflections on the passing of time, my marriage, and my identity as a mom. I have had to lean on my closest friends multiple times already, and I know that those friendships will continue to be a salvation to me in this new phase of life and letting go.Do you remember singing, “Make new friends, but keep the old; one is silver, and the other is gold”? Today, I'm thrilled to welcome one of my “gold” friends to the Cracking Open podcast — Charlotte Hardwick.Charlotte and I have been dear friends for over 30 years. In this week's episode, we dive into the highs and lows of female friendships, exploring their benefits and complexities, and how they significantly impact our lives.However, there is much more to Charlotte than the jewels of long-standing friendship. She also comes to this conversation with a wealth of expertise in wellness and nutrition. With over 20 years of experience developing wellness and life-balance programming, Charlotte has worked with individuals, families, and organizations across the country. She brings her teachings into the homes of her clients, into studios, and on retreats in South Carolina, Costa Rica, Mexico, and at the creative and memorable Blackberry Farm hotel and wellness center in the Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee.Charlotte's extensive knowledge is built on studies from around the world, including MA degrees in nutrition and early childhood development and over 100 dietary theories. Charlotte's mentors include Dr. Andrew Weil from the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine, Dr. Deepak Chopra, Dr. David Katz from Yale University's Prevention Research Center, and Dr. Walter Willett from Harvard University's nutrition department, among many other leading health and wellness experts.In our conversation, we delve into her vast experience in health and wellness, offering concrete tips and tools for living a more balanced and grounded life. We also get real about what we seek from friendships in our 50s, exploring the highs and lows that have sustained our bond for 30 years, while also discussing why female friendships are crucial for our physical, mental, and spiritual well-being. God knows they have saved my ass more than a few times!Charlotte truly embodies the qualities of a “gold” friend — honest, loving, and authentic. I hope you come away from this episode feeling inspired to make healthy choices for your own life and feeling grateful for your own long-standing "gold" friendships.Love,MollyP.S. As you may have noticed, our team has made some changes to the look of the Cracking Open podcast. As much as I loved the original design, it felt like the right time for a fresh new look. I love it and hopefully you do too!Learn more about Charlotte Hardwick hereRegister for Charlotte's next retreat at Blackberry Farm hereFollow Charlotte on InstagramMolly's next 3-month Cracking Open group coaching program starts in September 2024! Learn more here.Interested in a VIP Coaching Day with Molly?Email Molly for more details!Follow Molly on Instagram and Facebook

Get ready to travel down memory lane with David Rule as he candidly shares his culinary journey with Southern Character. David's career began in high school, igniting a lifelong passion for the restaurant industry and creating a story of persistence, creativity, and a deep appreciation for quality ingredients. Beginning with the smell of his grandmother's fresh sausage and biscuits on summer mornings at Lake Tansi and the right place, right time connections he's made over the years, David's approach to cooking and hospitality honors his Southern roots.  David credits Blackberry Farm as his informal culinary school where he forged deep mentorships and a can-learn attitude which he carried forward to his latest venture: Mountain Hospitality Concepts—featuring three unique restaurants in downtown Sevierville. Join Southern Character to learn about Chef David Rule's restaurant career, the importance of strong mentorship, and how he combines family tradition, culinary roots, and a commitment to giving back to create a true feeling of hospitality.

“If the walls could talk, they would probably say ‘Sit a spell, sit down, have a cocktail. Talk to your neighbor.' One of the things that's really special that hasn't changed about High Hampton is the sense of ‘love your neighbor'. Get to know who's at the inn with you while you're here. Sit out in the lobby and play board games together. Walk the lake trail together. I think there's something really special about the people who are here, who come as strangers and leave as friends, and then continue to come back.” We're in great company with Scott & April Franqueza, Executive Chef & Pastry Chef of the iconic High Hampton Estate. A part of the National Registry of Historic Places, this American treasure recently was thoughtfully restored by the Beall family behind Blackberry Farm, and is ready once again to welcome another century of guests. Before coming to Blue Ridge Mountains to create the culinary focused and craft filled landmark for the High Hampton community that they've curated today, Scott and April left accredited culinary careers in New York City in search for a slower way of life - a slower way of sourcing and cooking food. They found themselves in good company working with the Beall family for many years across Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain's renowned dining destinations before saying “yes” to lead this new adventure.  As we celebrate the Fourth of July, Scott and April surprise us with so many sweet stories and savory details in how they are making this celebrated destination and dedicated community their home.  Top Takeaways [1:50] A glimpse into the fairytale storybook, or shall we say cookbook, that tells the love of a baker and a chef who met at the Culinary Institute of America in New York many moons ago.  [7:05] April & Scott's early culinary careers were humble and hungry. To steal a line from Frank Sinatra, “If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere; it's up to you, New York, New York.”  [10:30] At Blackberry Farm, the Beall Family welcomed April & Scott with southern charm to their sprawling farm in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains, inviting them to take part in crafting their impeccable service and outstanding cuisine, as one of the most celebrated small luxury resorts in the world.  [19:40] After several years of renovations, High Hampton reopened in 2021 with a sense of familiarity, a feeling of homecoming, a welcoming energy that was complimented with added and elevated amenities.  [22:25] Discover modern luxuries and family traditions abound across the estate, snuggle up next to a roaring fireplace with a board game or lace up your tennis shoes for a round of pickleball, enjoy an afternoon of fresh air on the golf course or sneak into the wine cellar for a wine tasting.  [28:30] Dine In Good Company Scott & April across an assortment of restaurants, from fine dining to casual lunches, quick bites that turn into grand gatherings, each featuring classic, regional cuisine, re-imagined for a new era of travelers. [35:00] How the team at High Hampton is cultivating future hospitality and culinary talent while also building small businesses through the relationships with their local community. [42:40] There's always something to celebrate at High Hampton from 4th of July fireworks and summertime family movie nights to apple cider donuts after the Thanksgiving Turkey Trot, from warm baked cookies with Mrs. Claus by the fireside to a Champagne and caviar toast at midnight on NYE.  Notable Mentions Café Boulud by Daniel Boloud Per Se by Thomas Keller Magnolia Bakery Dominique Ansel  Chef Gavin Kaysen Chef Aaron Bludorn Chef Frank Stitt Glenn Roberts of Anson Mills Evan Chender, The Culinary Gardener Banner Small-Batch Butter Sunburst Trout Farms Providence Farmstead Simpson's Meats Western Carolina University  Whiteside Brewing Co. Highlands Wine Shoppe Wild Turkey Bourbon Visit For Yourself High Hampton Website | @highhamptonnc @aprilfranqueza | @scottfranqueza

Join us as we laugh, learn, and converse with the incredible powerhouse women behind "I️ Have This Friend." Read below to learn more about Emily Persky and Ingrid Hung. We're two childhood best friends from LA. A lot has changed since meeting in 7th grade Civics class—we've gone to college, built careers, and traveled the world. But one thing has stayed the same: We love bringing together interesting, creative people to build something amazing. Before starting I Have This Friend, Ingrid first moved to New York to start her career as Danny Meyer's assistant at Union Square Hospitality Group. From there, she traveled around the country training in the front and back of house at top restaurants like The French Laundry, Eleven Madison Park, and Blackberry Farm alongside some of the best culinary talent out there.Before starting I Have This Friend, Emily worked at Facebook + Instagram consulting global luxury brands on their content & marketing strategy. Instagram - @ihavethisfriend TikTok -  @ihavethisfriend_ 

Blackberry Farm was recently named the #1 hotel in America for food and drink by Food and Wine magazine. Previously, Andy Chabot explained how they've achieved this, and then how they hire and train their teams. In this episode, Andy shares how they gather and incorporate feedback from both staff and guests to constantly improve.Thoughts, questions, suggestions? Send me a text messageThis episode is brought to you with support from Sojern. I teamed up with Sojern to study how hoteliers use data to drive revenue and build stronger guest relationships. You can see what we found in this research report: How Hotel Brands Are Using First-Party Data to Drive Revenue & Build Stronger Relationships. Want to get my summary and actionable insights from each episode delivered to your inbox each day? Subscribe here for free.Follow Hospitality Daily and join the conversation on YouTube, LinkedIn, and Instagram.Music by Clay Bassford of Bespoke Sound: Music Identity Design for Hospitality Brands

Located in the Great Smoky Mountains in Walland, Tennessee, the 68-room Blackberry Farm is a verdant escape known for its food, wine, and Southern hospitality. The small inn was originally purchased by Samuel E. Beall III, founder of the Ruby Tuesday chain, in 1976. After adding land and more buildings, it blossomed into the exclusive property it is today. In 1998, Samuel's son and Mary Celeste's husband, Sam, took it over, transforming it into a culinary powerhouse and must-visit getaway tucked away in East Tennessee.After the unexpected passing of her husband in 2016, Mary Celeste took over as proprietor while raising her five children. She didn't shy away from the challenge. In fact, she credits the power of believing in herself for ushering the resort into its next and most exciting era yet. Thank you for listening! For more of our great interviews, find us at hospitalitydesign.com.

Blackberry Farm was recently named the #1 hotel in America for food and drink by Food and Wine magazine. In our last episode, Andy Chabot explained how they've achieved this. In this episode, Andy shares their approach to hiring, training, and developing their people. Listen now to learn about:Recruiting The Right People: Explore how Blackberry Farm "casts a wide net" to engage potential employees and how it assesses cultural fit quickly and effectively.Hiring and Training: Discover how Blackberry Farm prioritizes hiring good, genuine people and trains them to excel, regardless of their previous experience.Career Development: Learn about the tiered training program that allows employees to progress at their own pace, fostering personal and professional growth.Employee Engagement Strategies: Understand the changes implemented in 2009 that shifted the focus towards engaging their people and how they encourage both vertical and lateral movements within the company.Whether you're a seasoned professional or new to the industry, this episode offers valuable lessons on creating a thriving workplace culture and delivering exceptional service.Thoughts, questions, suggestions? Send me a text messageThis episode is brought to you with support from Sojern. I teamed up with Sojern to study how hoteliers use data to drive revenue and build stronger guest relationships. You can see what we found in this research report: How Hotel Brands Are Using First-Party Data to Drive Revenue & Build Stronger Relationships. Want to get my summary and actionable insights from each episode delivered to your inbox each day? Subscribe here for free.Follow Hospitality Daily and join the conversation on YouTube, LinkedIn, and Instagram.Music by Clay Bassford of Bespoke Sound: Music Identity Design for Hospitality Brands

Blackberry Farm was recently named the #1 hotel in America for food and drink by Food and Wine magazine, and in this episode - the first in an exclusive miniseries on this renowned Relais & Chateaux hotel in Tennessee - we're learning from Andy Chabot, who rose from a server at the property to its SVP of Food and Beverage.What You'll Learn:The Art of Hospitality: Understand what makes Blackberry Farm a standout destination in America and how Southern hospitality is woven into its fabric.Culinary Excellence: Learn about the farm's ingredient-forward approach, how it emphasizes local produce, and the unique structure of having multiple executive chefs to diversify the culinary experience.Innovative Beverage Programs: Explore how Blackberry Farm caters to its guests' sophisticated palates with a diverse and deep beverage selection.Cultural and Community Engagement: Gain insight into how Blackberry Farm interacts with both the local and broader food and beverage community.Leadership and Culture: Hear from Andy about his leadership style and the organizational culture at Blackberry Farm, focusing on long-term, generational decision-making.Balance and Burnout Prevention: Learn how Andy and his teams manage work-life balance and prevent burnout in what could be a high-pressure environment.Tune in to be inspired, informed, and invigorated by the magic of hospitality at Blackberry Farm.If you enjoyed this, you may also enjoy part 1 and part 2 of Andy's interview with The Grape Nation. Thoughts, questions, suggestions? Send me a text message Want to get my summary and actionable insights from each episode delivered to your inbox each day? Subscribe here for free.Follow Hospitality Daily and join the conversation on YouTube, LinkedIn, and Instagram.Music by Clay Bassford of Bespoke Sound: Music Identity Design for Hospitality Brands

For Part 2 of our visit to Blackberry Farm, we check out sister property Blackberry Mountain, a 5200 acre haven nestled in the Smoky Mountains. We speak with Logan Griffin, Director of Food and Beverage at BBM, along with Andy Chabot, to discuss the vast wine program, mixology, and one of the best spirits collection in the country. We further pursue our "Feast for the Ears" wine and food pairing session with Chefs Joey Edwards, PM Exec.Chef at Three Sisters and Joel Werner, Exec. Chef at the Firetower. Logan and Andy selected six wines to pair with our chefs creations.Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support The Grape Nation by becoming a member!The Grape Nation is Powered by Simplecast.

New Englander and wannabe chef, Andy Chabot attended the Culinary Institute of America at Hyde Park in NY. His love for food turned into a passion for wine. After CIA, Andy headed west to work at wine mecca Little Nell in Aspen, eventually heading back east to settle in at BlackBerry Farm with second generation owners Sam and Mary Celeste Beall. Sam, along with Andy wanted to transform Blackberry Farm into a true wine destination…mission accomplished, two decades later, Blackberry Farm has over 150K bottles in their cellars, is the recipient of the James Beard Award for “Outstanding Wine Program” along with two “Best Chef” awards, and numerous Wine Spectator Grand Awards. Andy Chabot is the SVP of Food and Beverage at BBF and BlackBerry Mtn. We tour the wine cellars with Andy, Asst. Bev. Dir, Kelly Schmidt, and Somm John Schlicting and select wines to pair with our dishes from Exec. Chef Cassidee Dabney, The Barn, and Trevor Iaconic, The Dogwood at BBF.  Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support The Grape Nation by becoming a member!The Grape Nation is Powered by Simplecast.

Like several of Knoxville's best chefs and restaurants, owner Brian Strutz is an alum of Blackberry Farm's kitchens. A Dopo is an homage to a life-changing trip he took to Italy years ago, where all they had was an oven. Strutz still uses an all-natural starter and his staff pulls mozzarella curds each day. Serious Old School in Tennessee! NOTE: on this episode, we also mention Potchke, an Eastern European-inspired deli Strutz is involved in. His business partner Laurence Faber and wife Emily Williams are the creators of that concept. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/pizzacity/support

"Believe in yourself, follow your gut, and never say never, you have no idea what you can do." These words of hope and inspiration from Mary Celeste Beall, mother of five children and proprietor of the Blackberry farm, are what we all need to hear during the holiday season.In 2016, Mary Celeste Beall's life took an unexpected turn when she lost her beloved husband, Sam, in a shocking ski accident. Just weeks later, her professional life also transformed when she was asked by her beloved father-in-law to be the proprietor of the legendary Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain resorts, a position Sam had occupied for years.Mary Celeste initially joined her late husband, Sam, as he spearheaded Blackberry Farm into a renowned food, wine, and wellness destination. In her role as Proprietor, Mary Celeste, alongside her father-in-law, Sandy, and the Blackberry team, played a pivotal role in the creation and opening of Blackberry Mountain. It has since become a haven for preservation and personal exploration in relaxation, wellness, and adventure.Under Mary Celeste's leadership, the Blackberry brand has received numerous accolades, including three James Beard Awards for Best Chef—Southeast, Outstanding Wine Program, and Outstanding Service for Blackberry Farm. Additionally, Blackberry Farm was named Bon Appétit's No. 1 Hotel for Food Lovers, while Blackberry Mountain has garnered recognition from ELLE Décor Travel A-List as the Best New Hotel, Hideaway Report as Hideaway of the Year, and inclusion in Travel + Leisure's It List for best new hotels in the world.In today's episode, you will hear how Mary Celeste has not only been highly successful as the proprietor of Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain but also excels at being open-hearted and honest about her emotions.Mary Celeste begins the conversation by sharing her vulnerability, shedding tears as she discusses a loved one who is hurting. This leads us to the story of her grief over losing her beloved Sam and her journey as a solo mom to five kids.The episode also explores how to keep loved ones alive in memories, stories, and laughter while allowing oneself to feel new love. It emphasizes that life is meant to be lived in connection with others, even when experiencing the loss of a deep love and father to your children.This episode goes beyond Mary Celeste's roles as a mom, proprietor, and widow. It delves into her life as a passionate and creative woman, known for her humor and hope.Despite almost canceling the interview on an "off" day, Mary Celeste's decision to proceed teaches us that it's possible to hold the emotions of grief and joy in the same moment. By allowing all our emotions to be expressed, we create deeper connections with others—a meaningful gift during this holiday season.Mary Celeste's story of moving through loss to find strength and purpose is nothing short of inspiring. Tune in to this episode to be inspired by Mary Celeste Beall's remarkable journey of resilience, hope, and embracing the full spectrum of emotions.Mary Celeste's Websites: https://www.blackberryfarm.com/https://www.blackberrymountain.com/Find Mary Celeste on Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/marycelestebf/ https://www.instagram.com/blackberryfarm/ https://www.instagram.com/blackberry.mountain/Learn more about Molly Carroll hereConnect with Molly on Instagram and Facebook

In this episode of Building Texas Business, I sit down for a compelling conversation with Clayton Garrett and Scott Snodgrass, the innovative founders of Agmenity and Meristem Communities. They share their inspiring journey of transitioning from agricultural services to conceptualizing master-planned communities. I learn about their groundbreaking project, Indigo, an organic farm-centric community in Richmond, Texas. Clayton and Scott reveal their entrepreneurial backstories and how their passion for farming and experience in real estate development converged in their work. I also come to understand the delicate balance of maintaining culture during growth. Clayton and Scott provide insights into the significance of soft skills, fiscal responsibility, and a culture of positivity. We explore the unique dynamics of their partnership and leverage diverse strengths. It is fascinating to see how these entrepreneurs have fused urban farming with real estate development through their trailblazing work. SHOW HIGHLIGHTS Agminity and Maristim Communities, founded by Clayton Garrett and Scott Snodgrass, are pioneering the concept of integrating farming and real estate development to create unique, farm-centric communities. The duo has a rich entrepreneurial background in farming and real estate development, and their project Indigo, located in Richmond, Texas, is a testament to their innovative vision. The founders share their experiences in the hiring process, emphasizing the importance of recruiting the right team, setting timelines, and maintaining clear communication. They also delve into the challenges of preserving a strong company culture as the team expands and ensuring everyone remains aligned with the company's vision. Agminity's business model involves incorporating urban farms into master plan communities. The company has expanded its operations across different states, including Texas and Florida. Clayton and Scott highlight the critical role of soft skills and fiscal responsibility in their leadership approach, fostering a culture of positivity in the workplace to keep work enjoyable and engaging. The business partnership between Clayton and Scott has been instrumental in their success. They discuss the advantages of diverse personalities in leadership and the art of leveraging these differences to refine ideas. Maristim Communities transitioned from offering agricultural services to developers to developing their own master plan communities. The company's flagship project, Indigo, includes an organic farm within a master plan community. While managing their expansion, they realized the importance of keeping their team connected and maintaining a strong company culture despite geographical distance. They are considering implementing corporate retreats to foster team unity. Their hiring process has evolved from hiring out of desperation to a comprehensive process that includes multiple interviews, written components, and on-the-ground working days to ensure a good fit for the company's culture and values. LINKSShow Notes Previous Episodes About BoyarMiller GUESTS Clayton GarrettAbout Clayton Scott SnodgrassAbout Scott TRANSCRIPT (AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors) Chris Hanslik In this episode, you will meet Clayton Garrett and Scott Snodgrass, founding partners of Agminity and Maristim Communities. In this episode, you will learn how they have built an innovative company that brings urban farms to master plan communities, and done so by focusing on caring about people, being passionate for farming and delivering healthy food. Alright, clayton and Scott, I want to welcome you to the Building Texas business. Thanks for being here. Thanks for having us. Yeah, absolutely, let's get started. You've got some great stories to tell, but let's just talk about, I guess, what your company or companies do so they give the listeners a background on kind of the type of business you're in. I know you have Maristim Communities. You also have Agminity, so tell us about those companies and what you do for inside those companies. Scott Snodgrass What happened. You know we originally had Agminity. It was our first company together that we've been running for a number of years now and Agminity provides agricultural amenity services to developers. That's a big chunk of big words. So we usually break that down by saying that we put urban farms into master plan communities, into neighborhoods, and we do that in partnership with the developers that we work with there. So we had been around the real estate development world for a while providing those services, but really from a farmer's point of view and very much. Clayton and I had both been on the ground doing farming work there with Agminity and then that transitioned into Maristim Communities. Clayton Garrett And Maristim is a community developer. In our context in Houston we call those master plan developers, and so we're doing, in this instance, a master plan called Indigo in Richmond, texas, so southwest of Houston, and Maristim's goal is to connect people to amazing places. So, in fact, our tagline is places for people and we're focused on the design and the framework and how to connect interesting spaces. So, as you can imagine, we also put an organic farm in Indigo. Chris Hanslik You're very sure, Be odd if you didn't. Clayton Garrett Yeah it would be very strange. It's something we're incredibly passionate about and easy for us to do where it's a big challenge for other developers. So we've oriented a community around that and we're super proud to bring it to market in January 24. Chris Hanslik Great, so it sounds like a common evolution, with this Agminity being a service provider to developers and then transitioning now into a developer yourself of the full community. Clayton Garrett We had a property and we went to the development community and said, like, if this was your property, what would you do? We just asked questions, right, and we had known some things about what we're interested in prior to you by just being associated with it. So we're kind of the we're a consultant to a lot of other master plan developers and so we get to sit in the room when they're talking about where they're going to put a community center or how they're going to connect spaces, and so we were able to really engage on that front. And then when we had our own property, we didn't set out with a goal in mind, we were just other than like, hey, we have some, we've seen some things that didn't work in other places, like why do they make these decisions, and so we kind of framed our plans around what that was going to be. Scott Snodgrass But people look at us and they're like you're not developers, but you're doing development. And how did that happen? And then when they find out agriculture was in our history, they're like from farmer to developer, like that's a big shift, and so we have to explain that. You know, we had been sitting in those development meetings for years with a number of different developers and so we'd seen behind the scenes and we started to ask questions about why decisions, certain decisions, were made. I think we were also shocked that it may just be two or three people making the decisions for what's going to be a more than billion dollar community. When it's done like that was kind of shocking to us how small the actual employment side can be for those teams. And we said, okay, well, we have this property now and we heard some other people's opinions and it didn't really nothing resonated with us. We didn't find anyone we really wanted to partner with, and so we said, okay, well, you know, let's look at what we're going to do here. And we started going down the route of looking at, like maybe some light industrial, just ways that we could use some of the property, you know, return some income from it but also keep a farm there. We had a farm at that property as well, and then you know I don't know if you heard of it, but COVID hit. I did breach something about that recently. So what happened with COVID was, in the real estate development world, basically everything. There were only two parts of the market that were still active, so the like logistic side of industrial started to explode because everybody was ordering everything at home. All of a sudden, amazon needed a bunch of more distribution centers and fulfillment centers, and then also single family homes went through the roof as everybody was stuck at home and realized how unhappy with their home they were, and then the people who could afford to were looking to add a home with another office or zoom rooms became a thing at homes that people were starting to move into. So the single family market went kind of crazy in Houston, and still is, right now even. And so we said, okay, we've been walking alongside all these master playing communities. We really understand the human side of it and the connections between people and how important it is and was something that we were interested in fostering, and so we said, okay, I guess we looked at each other and we're like I guess we're going to be master playing community developers. Chris Hanslik I love how that just organically happened, and no pun intended with agriculture and organic. But let's go back to the beginning. What was the inspiration behind of your background in farming, if there was one? Tell us a little bit about how that just all came together and you two partnered up. Clayton Garrett Well, we're sitting in a lawyer's office, so my story I'm a licensed attorney, which is recovery. I like to say as well. So you know that wasn't a great ultimate fit for me. I was interested in building something. I've always been sort of more connected to small business side, but Scott and I joined forces in 2008 and at that time Scott had an edible landscaping company and I had seen a couple of models of large scale organic farms that were in the ecosystem, and I was really interested. I came from a food production background. I was managing an artist in Bakery in town that had about 70 employees. At that time, we had just finished purchasing Whole Foods as Bakery when they were kind of moving out of it, and so I wanted to be in the food space and I also want to be connected to agriculture, which I have, my family has a history of. So that was the genesis for me, and Scott was doing something really interesting in town, and so you know then after that, from my perspective, it's just been a series of opportunities coming our way, us looking at them in a unique light, I think, trying to be in a niche, qualitative business, not trying to have a discount model, which, you know, it's just not something that our personalities can wrap our heads around, and so, you know, agminity was an opportunity presented to us, a landscape architect in town brought us in and was like hey, we're trying to do this interesting thing with one of the great developers here in Houston, johnson Development and can you guys help? And so that you know a series of conversations later we're creating a farm with them, advising them on the plants that are going to be without throughout their community, and then that was the same sort of conversation around purchasing a farm here in town and kind of going after that vision. Chris Hanslik How about for you, Scott? What kind of got you started in this? What was that inspiration? Scott Snodgrass Yeah, so I was. Actually. I was managing a coffee shop and then shifted into actually buying coffee from Central American countries, primarily Nicaragua, and so I had been traveling in Nicaragua and really working on both sides of the relationship in the US trying to teach people about quality coffee. In 2006 and 2007 and even in almost 2008, when I was doing this work, the coffee scene in Houston was pretty lacking. There were, I think, three coffee shops. There were three of us like trying to actually do good coffee in Houston. That has now bloomed and now there's great coffee shops all over town. Chris Hanslik It's exploded, right. I mean they should open a new one down the street. I saw this week in Cuckoos. Yeah, yeah, of course we have slow pokes in the building. There you go. Yeah, yeah, and so we knew that was changing. Scott Snodgrass So trying to teach people here in the US that they should pay for quality coffee. So what is quality coffee? Enjoy it, learn to enjoy it and then pay a little bit more for it. And then cutting out the distributors who acted as the middlemen in the process and working directly with farmers or cooperatives of farmers in Nicaragua. So I was traveling down a couple of times a year talking to farmers, testing coffees, negotiating with them pricing and everything, and then importing it back into the US and, as a part of that, started getting asked all these agricultural questions and I was like no, I'm the sales and marketing guy. You know I'm your buyer and then I'm helping you with your marketing in the US. Basically, I don't know the ag stuff, but I realized their only access to information most of the small towns didn't even have an internet cafe in them at that time, so they had no access to the internet and the only access information they had on the ag side was the chemical salesman in their town who was in charge of selling all the chemicals. So of course every problem they went to him with he had a solution they could buy that fixed the problem. But it might also create another four or five problems for them. And so in seeing that, I was like, okay, well, I'm trying to help these farmers out anyway. On the sales side I have access to information. So I started to go start doing some research on my own and so started just like watching YouTube videos and reading things on the internet and checked out a few books at a library to learn about coffee production, and I think the bug kind of bit me and really got into agriculture then. And so I had started an urban farm and run it for three years here in Houston and then Clayton, and I joined up soon after that and also, you know, interestingly enough our lives had unbeknownst been intertwined In the past. We were both at UT at the same time, graduated a couple years apart, but there at the same time never knew each other. And then both of our families are from Lubbock, both involved in cotton farming in Lubbock, and my, my mom and my uncle both graduated just like in the class or a class away from Clayton's dad in Lubbock. So small world. Chris Hanslik You know, leading these intertwining paths to bring us back together, right, yeah, well, that's great. So then you hook up and you start working with these developers. Give us an idea, I guess. How did Agminity start to grow and what were, what were, some of the growing pains you experienced through that process? Clayton Garrett Yeah, you know, starting Agminity was really about sort of fulfilling one particular client's needs, right, and they were trying to do something. They were amazing in understanding that we were headed from a concept that had been sort of around in the US. I mean, there were probably at that time maybe 10 to 12 agri-hoods that were sort of known and they were trying to do it in a different way, sort of a more mass way, let's say, instead of a very curated, passionate project by a developer. So it was kind of walking alongside them and growing over time, really understanding what that individual project was. And then how could we start to apply it to other people and places and what is the market? Right, we felt like at one point we felt like we were doing something that was very specific and then over time we realized, oh, we, there's some ways in which we can use some of these lessons to apply them to different places. And so you know, I think that the market for Produce that's sort of connected to community and that in the, in the community, that farm can create within the broader context, I think that appetite is huge. I think people, from a development perspective, when we talk to developers, you know they're just like. Their questions are pretty rudimentary, like how does this work, like what is the structure involved, what is the compensation? And when you start to sort of go down the line, it's sort of a no-brainer for a lot of folks that are engaged and interested in it. So you know, it was just a matter of time. These development projects take a long time, as many of you know, and and so part of that process is just Having a timeline being available, having consistent communication around the people who are kind of the early adopters, and then broadening the appeal, saying that you know, this is available for lots of different people in different ways. Scott Snodgrass In each project is a big undertaking for us and we have full-time embedded staff at every farm. So harvest greener first project. We have four full-time staff members on the ground. Chris Hanslik They're farming and teaching classes every so Agminity that kind of goes to a question I was gonna ask. The Agminity actually runs the farm inside the community. So you employ people to do that right, just get paid by the developer, right by the homeowners association in other states we get, we may get paid through like quasi public financial Bodies. Scott Snodgrass On Florida's, cdd's tend to be the groups that are paying. So okay, so we employ and then get paid for doing that. So it's an amenity service that we're offering and then residents get to enjoy it, and so we were. You know you asked about some of the struggles there. Hiring has been, I'd say, the number one struggle at Agminity. We were first started just looking around in Houston because we were a new company, we were learning what we were doing. We didn't expect to like bring in top talent from around the country. You know to do this and we had already known this but struggled through it even more that there's not an urban farming scene in Houston. It's very small. Yeah we're already friends with all of the people who are in that scene and knew that none of them were, you know, interested in leaving what they were doing. They're all entrepreneurs themselves. None of them were gonna leave what they were doing to come join us at Agminity. And so it really was a struggle and you know, we went through a few rounds of employees of trying to figure out like who is the best fit, what sort of person is the best fit for that? And you know we have a CEO at Agminity now, justin Myers, who does a great job. He handles all the hiring now. Chris Hanslik Thankfully I didn't see, but he smiled. Yes, scott, big smile. He said that. Scott Snodgrass Thankfully, both to take it off of our plate and also because he does it better than we ever could have. Yeah, and I think we've really as a team kind of narrowed in on who is the right kind of person to come in and be one of these positions, because the reality is most farmers in big-scale agriculture they have that job because they like to be in their tractors alone, most of them they don't necessarily like being around people a lot. Yeah they tend to be more introverted, and so at our farms it's an amenity service, so our teams have to. They get interrupted constantly by residents who want to ask questions and see the farm and meet the goats and all those sorts of things, and so our team has that both sides. They have to be able to put their head down and do hard work in a hundred degree weather Outside in the afternoon, and they also have to be friendly and smile and talk to residents when they come out. Clayton Garrett I didn't have to be passionate about both of those things. Scott Snodgrass I mean, that's right, you know the people who we hire. Clayton Garrett This is all they want to do. This is a mission for them. So our company adminity reflects the mission drive that they have. Chris Hanslik So let's just to drill down a little deeper, because Hiring is the key to the kingdom, right? I think I don't care what business you're in, if it's an, especially the service side, yeah, hiring the right people that they had the passion for what your company's mission is critical. So what were some of the things that you learned, I guess, along the way mistakes in the hiring process, and what was the learning and the correction you made to kind of hone the process so that you could find the right fit? Scott Snodgrass Because I think there's a lot of learning for people in that yeah so Clayton mentioned passion. Passion is really important, but passion without grounding in experience is not great, and we went through a number of hires where there's these romantic ideals around agriculture and people are like, oh, I've been working this desk job for the man and it would be so great to get out in nature dance with the butterflies, and that's just not the reality of it. It's sweat and dirt and blood sometimes, and so it is very difficult work and so you need that deep internal passion that's realistic, that says this is going to suck a bunch of the time, but also the impact that I'm having on people having access to fresh produce. Learning about where their food comes, is so impactful to me that it'll keep me going, because it's difficult work and at the same time, we have to make the job better and continually find ways to. We can't change the weather in Houston Just the two of us and we're in other places. Clayton Garrett Just for a sense of scale, agminity is in the process of in various stages of development. We have seven agricultural farms within developments and it sounds like across different states. Yeah, across different states. So here there's four in Texas and then we've got three in Florida and one coming on. Our eighth one would be in Alabama. So it's across the Southeast and with different developers doing different sort of scales of development, which is really interesting, from sort of mixed use projects to larger master plans, traditional neighborhood design plans, so sort of more walkable. But I think the scale is relevant for what we're interested in, and so the competencies that people need to have. I mean our hiring process. It used to be sort of we needed somebody and we hired very quick At a desperation, yeah. And now I think there's a written component of our application process. There's probably, I think, over six interviews, hour-long interviews. There's a team, there's on the ground working days. There's sort of a filtering process where somebody gets kind of brought into our framework and they have to meet other people in the team and they get to hear it from them. So the goal is hey, you have to hear it To ground people in reality. Talk to Nathan on the farm and he'll tell you what his life is like right On a very real basis. And so and I think one of the other things I think we've learned is I want people to be as calm and as grounded as possible in interviews. So I really want them, I really want to get down to a non-stressed environment for them so I could see what they are in a non-stress environment, because there will be plenty of stress when they're on the farms or in any sort of engagement, and so those stress times are different than a normative time for most people. Chris Hanslik And that is a transition. Clayton Garrett I think a lot of people of our generation are looking at instead of the old ways of hiring where you're trying to put people on the spot or what it is. Chris Hanslik So what, if anything, do you do to kind of keep your team and immunity connected Throughout the state of Texas and across the state? Do you do anything to kind of build the culture for those? Scott Snodgrass employees. We're just talking about that today. Actually, right now we have Texas, that's kind of a hub, and then Florida is going to be a hub, so those two hubs are going to have their own connected kind of subcultures within the community. Alabama may get lumped in with Florida in that regard too, or here it's about halfway. But how we do it corporate-wide is a question we haven't answered yet. So we've talked about is that like a corporate retreat for all employees where we go somewhere, and so maybe it is going to one of these farm resorts? There's Flora Farms in Cabo. Chris Hanslik I was just there last week. Scott Snodgrass So Flora Farms is a good, something like that, or maybe it's Blackberry Farm in Tennessee, or maybe it's another location. Are we taking team members somewhere, letting someone else do the work, but still letting them enjoy the same kind of experience that they get to give other people, and then doing a series of workshops and team building and that sort of stuff? We've got to find some way to get everyone together. Right now. Our leadership on the ground in Florida. She was one of our leaders here in Texas, so we've been able to transfer the culture over there that way. But we recognize that it's like, the faster you grow, the more people you bring on, the quicker you dilute the culture that you have and the more influence aggregated that all those new employees have. And so we don't want to grow so fast that we just lose that dynamic culture that we have, because right now it's really healthy. So we're trying to find out kind of how to do that and you hire people who fit into your culture relatively well and who add to it and change it. That's one step, but also I think just making sure that those two groups stay connected so that they don't end up, you know, ending up diverging too far, will be really important. Clayton Garrett I mean we have a very strong leader at Agminity too. So common language, common framework, really caring about people and having other people care about fellow employees. I think everybody recognizes that there are easier ways to make money than to do this work, and so the people who are invested and engaged, they want to be recognized for the challenges that are there, but also the opportunities, and so most of the people are interested in food and plants, and so we speak to them in that vernacular often, and it's been incredibly rewarding. We don't really have a retention issue. People leave for great opportunities, which is something we're really proud of. Chris Hanslik Very good. So you started in Agminity and the farming game. We talked about this a minute ago. Let's go deeper. You transition into a Development company. What really was the calling there? That's not, like you said, a long time, long lead time projects and stuff. So what was the the bug or the catch for you to make that transition? Clayton Garrett Really to stubborn, very stubborn people Ha just incredibly obstinate about Accomplishing a vision. Yeah, I think having a company like amenity that has such a high mission and is is with truly lovely people as a Teams encourages, I think, a certain type of behavior from all of our other businesses from Maristome. So I mean, from my perspective it was, you know, we really looked at our property and our project and sort of what could happen in the ecosystem and we tested. We did a bunch of pressure testing with the market, let's say, and so we asked other developers, we asked consultants, you know, for feedback, and so we went to the market and got feedback and that feedback we liked some of it, we didn't like other of it, yeah, and so then we just decide, you know, like Scott mentioned earlier, we decided we need to own and control this, and so once we made that decision, then this is sort of there's a cascading effect, right and so if a sense of scale, where it's a Maristome is developing indigo and Richmond and indigos has will have 650 homes, residences, 120 multifamily units with a commons around a 42 acre farm. So when you think about master plans in Texas, you know relatively small, about 235 acres. When you think about, you know our California friends and our East Coast friends, you know that's a pretty big project, right, about 400 million dollars of assessed value from a taxable value standpoint. So that's a very different scale than Agminity is a consulting business, right, right. And so we had to have great partners and so through our years of working in Around real estate, we understood we needed to get some great consultants, and so we had seen some amazing people doing large-scale projects. So, for instance, one of our consultants is Terry Slavik Siyuki, who was the CMO of Newland communities, which is one of the largest master plans Companies in the US. So, like that level of talent we needed to bring on our team because we were first-time developers and so to be able to attract folks like that and to kind of help them, like, have them help us plan and conceptualize our project, was really impactful, both in raising capital and, you know, bringing on other team members as well. Chris Hanslik So sounds like you know, with Meristem you're managing consultants where at many, you were managing employees. What's that? One of the similarities? What have been the differences and the challenges in the stem construct of managing contractors? Scott Snodgrass There's been, yeah there's been so many similarities that have been surprising, I think you know, first, when you're out there trying to select consultants for a project, so say we're doing indigo, we need to have a land planner who helps us develop the land plan for the community. We don't have expertise in land planning on our own, so we need somebody's gonna help us do that. It's not unlike hiring someone, right? You start talking to people about how you're doing this thing, asking do they know anyone who does this work that they'd recommend, just in the same way that you would look for an employee through those sort of good relationships. And then you know. Then they come to you and they present their work and what they've done before and why they think they're a good fit for you. So the interview process Relatively the same in that regard, and then we've really found that like, like we said, you know you see these billion dollar projects only with two, three, four employees working at that firm or in that division of the firm, but there's a group of 10 to 15 consultants that are there doing a significant portion of the work. And I think that the difference is that it's very easy because those people work for another company with its own values and its own vision. It's very easy for your vision as a developer, to again be watered down through all of those steps. Like we don't have the expertise in land planning, civil engineering. Like I don't know. I don't know all of the nuances of getting sewage from someone's house to the wastewater treatment plant and getting it treated and I'm not interested in learning. Clayton Garrett Yeah. Scott Snodgrass But our civil engineers. Clayton Garrett It needs to work. Scott Snodgrass It really isn't very important, and so our civil engineers have to know how that works, but their value set isn't necessarily our value set at Maristown communities. And so how do we make sure those things align? And we're learning more and more that that being in the development chair, wearing the development hat, is really about crafting a vision and then, as much as you can, through all of the steps in the process, trying to hold on to that vision in every way that you can. Because inevitably you come up with some great utopian idea and it gets punched around by your consultants first, and then it gets, you know, severely drugged through the mud by the municipalities, your county and your city and other people, right. And then, once you actually go Out to the public, you're gonna get public commentary on it, it's gonna get beat up a little bit again, and so it's really about how do we craft a vision that's strong enough to make its way through all of that and then, through the whole process, be willing to take the hits and get back up and still keep that vision. And so not only do we have to hold that vision ourselves, but we have to convince each of our consultants in that process to hold a vision which is very similar to a company culture. Sure, in many ways. Chris Hanslik What you're gonna think it about on the financial side. What are some of the lessons that you've learned? Maybe wish you had known, but you learn the hard way that helped you maybe Manage growth and that you might tell a. You know a listener that's an aspiring entrepreneur. You know. Try to avoid this. You know, pothole if you can. We're serial entrepreneurs. Scott Snodgrass So we had another business we haven't talked about yet, which was a farm. It's the property we're now developing and at that farm we we took a really like go big swing on the farm, and I think that was the big financial lesson is like we made sure to have the capital we needed to go out and do everything. So on the financial side we had everything set up. But if you don't have the back end handled really well too, and then you're just gonna bleed all that money that you've arranged for, and so we really struggled on the staffing side of having the right staff to keep that like really grow that business and get it to the size it needed to be to support the financial Infrastructure that it demanded, and so I think that's one. It's just always I think most entrepreneurs go the opposite way and we have done that before where it's like you don't capitalize yourself well enough and you're just bootstrapping constantly. Right and that's a big struggle and it doesn't put anyone in the right mental place to do their best. But if you go the opposite way, you know you can have the same problems if you overcapitalize but you don't have the operation side handled right. Chris Hanslik I mean, since I might collect anything to add to that, you know. Clayton Garrett I mean so many lessons around financing. I mean, I think when we were financing this project, you know we did everything that every bank, institution, private lender asked us to do and still they were, you know, having trouble wrapping their heads around sort of us as a development entity, a new entity, right, and sort of. Our vision and you know, it's really fascinating to me is the things that people would comment on them being a fiscal challenge around is really which means risk Right, is the thing that we're getting the compliments and is creating the most value for us. So, for instance, indigo's a walkable neighborhood with traditional neighborhood designs, which means alley load. Houston, if you're familiar with it, does not have a lot of alley loaded home types and so. But when we looked at, we did some market research. When we looked at the market is massive for that, there's a huge appetite on a relative basis for that and you can see lots of reasons why I think, if people have ever lived in that sort of Framework, so that is the thing that is creating a tremendous amount of value for us and the sort of financing world Considered that to be risk right, and so to really try to understand what that is, I think is a critical lesson and how to overcome it. And I think you know people told us no, all over the place told us we're crazy. You know those lessons are very familiar for us at this point. But also we've been able to be stubborn, like I said earlier, and kind of craft our vision and hold our vision. And you know we're, you know we're set up for this project to be very successful and have an identity in the future as well. Chris Hanslik That's right, let's talk a little bit about leadership, and I asked both of you kind of how do you describe your leadership style? How has it evolved over time? How do you try to show up for your people? Scott Snodgrass So, this has been a big learning process for me, I think, since the first time I was an employer right, the first business I had, it was just me and a business partner. We didn't have any employees. That's. It was really just about learning that partnership relationship, and Clayton and I continue to evolve that and see all the benefits in being founding partners together and not just alone. Chris Hanslik Yeah. Scott Snodgrass There's tremendous value there. But on the leadership side, with employees, you know I very early on I don't have it's easy for me to perform highly in the work that the company does, and so I would place that same standard on every employee, expecting every employee to be able to accomplish the same amount of work per hour that I was, or at the same level of detail that I could. I have a high capacity for stepping into a new space, quickly figuring out the ecosystem and then understanding how things work and crafting a plan. And I'm very ideological, it's like a line for me, this step, and so I've had to learn to put a little more effort into the soft skills side of things and to recognize that, like, my role in the company needs to be different than anyone else's role in the company. And so then, therefore, I can't have the same expectations of anyone else, or even, you know, like Clayton and I, can't have the same expectations of each other, even though we're in the same role, because we're different people. And so just I think, recognizing the differences in people and then having some more of the soft skills, being able to slow down a little bit and say, okay, in this moment we need to make sure this person feels cared for. The work doesn't matter right now, let's just care for this person. And so shifting more and more to a focus, I think, on humans, which is what. Marisem does as a development company, so we have to do it from an employment standard as well. Clayton Garrett Right, clayton, and I think the job of leaders to be a servant to the company. I mean, we, you know, people think we we have this conversation occasionally with our kids or wives like, oh, you own the company, you can do whatever you want, you know right. And you're like, no, that's not how it works, right, we are serving, we are servants to the sort of overall framework of the community. Chris Hanslik So you know, I think there's a. Clayton Garrett One of the things I think is a job is to prioritize a number of different things. But from a leader standpoint, you really do have to prioritize various things. Like top of the list is payroll every two weeks for us, right, and so that's a high priority. I was talking to a leader of a company with a couple hundred employees and I asked her she's the president. I asked her, like do you still think about payroll, you know, and she's like yes, in fact, we're talking to our owners, our principals in our company about that every day, because they need to be on board about what needs to happen. And when we think about cash and we think about all those other things, and and I was just relieved to think that it never I mean it never goes away from the sense of like this is a priority that a leader needs to understand and they need to understand the cash position at all times and you understand sort of their fiscal responsibility. And then there's all the soft skills Right, are you being true and authentic? Are you showing up? And I think you know, I think that's relatively easy for us to do because we're passionate about what we do. I think, scott, I think we have the at times. I think we have the absence of when people complain about work or what they're doing or it doesn't matter. It's like we just have the absence of that. We don't. We feel like what we do matters, but it's less about. It's less about promoting a positive ideal than just not having the negative right Right which people experience, and so people in our organization are excited about typically what they do and how they're doing it and they can show up in authentic ways. So I think there's some other good lessons, like being playful around what we do, you know, trying to play as an organization and be curious, you know. Do you believe that's a big part of the lesson for leaders allowing that space to happen? Chris Hanslik That's great. So let's talk about this. Scott, you kind of mentioned it, but what has been the learning and the value for the two of you than being co-founders and partners, because that's not always an easy thing and, in fact, can be the downfall of an organization. If they're more than one at the top and they're, you know they get sideways. So talk us about that a little bit. Scott Snodgrass You know, I mean, it's no surprise we talk about it in marriage terms. Quite a bit you know, and you know both of our wives, I'm sure, are here plenty and are like, yeah, and you do the same thing. Clayton Garrett You come over here you know, and they're not wrong. Scott Snodgrass And so I think it's actually. I think it's really helpful because there are things that your employees, no matter what level that they're at, are going to struggle to share with you, to tell you about who you are, and it's a little bit easier when you have someone who's at the exact same level as you, has the exact same authority that you do, and so, like we're 50-50 in everything we do. You know, we anticipate doing all of our businesses together. If we open new businesses in the future, anticipate doing that together. It just keeps things simple and we're a good pair. I think we're very complimentary. So if you had two people who were the same personality, that might not be great, because you're bringing the same things and you're lacking the same things when you come to the relationship. And I don't know that when we became business partners, we knew that. I think we just lucked into it. Clayton Garrett And we had struggles. Scott Snodgrass And that's why it's lasted so far, but I do think there's a lot of value in that. And then also, I think having two partners it's also great for your employees in the regard that like if someone's having an issue with one partner, they have another partner they can go to and talk to them and say hey, you know, help me deal with this situation. And we're, you know, we have different employees who were, over the years, have been naturally drawn to one of us versus the other, just because of personality, fit being better, and so I think there's a lot of great benefits to it. No doubt it is a struggle at times, but I think that struggle is the kind of refining fire to a degree, and it's when Clayton and I can't agree on something. We're 50-50, so no decision can be made unless we can agree on it, and so we're kicking the idea back and forth, we're both beating up each other's arguments, and then you know, figuring out in the end like which one is coming out of this fire, and even stronger than it went into it. Chris Hanslik Right, that's great. That's a really good, healthy process. Clayton Garrett I was joking the other day with Scott that we're designing buildings and frameworks around buildings now, right and relatively large-scale master plan and I was like we were arguing about something and I was like how about we just each design our own buildings? Chris Hanslik Like, let's just do that. Clayton Garrett Let's just divide the line. But you know, sometimes you do want to put a piece of duct tape down the middle of the room and be like you stay over there and I stay over here. But I think the lesson I mean I think structurally I think one of the most important lessons that we've been very true to is Scott mentioned it but we've never changed the incentives. So there's been lots of different ways, lots of different times, lots of good reasons to change incentives around what we do. But from my perspective, what we're trying to accomplish is this macro vision, and so all of the minor sort of day-to-day stuff even capital calls and you know, various things like that is sort of secondary to what we're trying to accomplish, and so for me that's been a critical structural component. That's been really helpful and it just feels like we have a. I feel like I have a partner. I'm in this like if I want to go on vacation or if there's life happens, which it does right. We've been in this eight years now and we've both had numerous babies and like life and deaths in the family, right, and so you need somebody to help. In fact, I feel tremendously lucky to have a partner and I look at some of our business friends who own businesses, don't have a partner, and I'm like man, that is a challenge to not have somebody to rely on in lots of different ways. So you take the good with the bad not that there's a lot of good, but we also have fun. I mean, I think that's another part of it's. Like we celebrate wins. That's a big part of what we try to accomplish. Like we're on this, our spouses and families are on this journey, but like really, the two of us are on this very specific journey and so we have somebody to share and reflect like, can you? I mean, we talked about our story a little bit. It's like we started out of a landscaping company. We knew there was something there and we've come to the place where we're, you know, doing a $400 million community. Like that journey is shared and so we get to talk about that. Yeah, and which is amazing, that's really cool. Chris Hanslik All right, we're very dynamic story, so I appreciate you sharing it. I mean, it is very to me innovative and I can see why there's been so much success. But I can see where the interest is around that. Let's turn a little bit to the personal side. So both of you, I'm actually both Tex-Mex or barbecue Tex-Mex. Clayton Garrett Yeah, same. Scott Snodgrass Okay, this is why we're good partners, that's why you're good partners. We're gonna be very similar, you agree? We? Clayton Garrett would agree on all the best barbecue restaurants in town, though. Chris Hanslik So we would go down. All this to you Very good, all right, and then. So I'll go with you. First. Scott, if you could take a 30 day sabbatical, where would you go? What would you do? Scott Snodgrass Oh goodness, probably Central America and like take the kids and kick around in the cloud forest a little bit. Very cool yeah. Clayton Garrett Very cool, like I'd love to get a Japan and really experience like a very different culture than what I'm used to, so that would be something interesting. Very good. Chris Hanslik Well, guys, thanks so much for taking the time to come on the podcast. Love your story and best of luck to you With Indigo. I know it'll be a success, Thanks. Scott Snodgrass Chris, yeah, appreciate it no-transcript.

Guests on this topic include Lois Shuler Caughron and her daughter Ruth Caughron Davis. Lois is known as the last woman out of the cove. Lois and her late husband, Kermit Caughron, were the last settlers to move from Cades Cove after establishing the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. - Aliceson Bales of Bales Farm, Mosheim, TN, with her recipe for Buttermilk chicken and how to make chicken broth. - James Beard Award-winning food writer Ronni Lundy reads from the chapter Honest Fried Chicken from her 1991 book Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken: The Heart and Soul of the Southern Country Kitchen. - Roy Milner (Chief Fermentation Officer at Black Berry Farm Brewery) with a mini visit on the nature of his work. Roy will be a presenter during the Saturday educational portion of the Appalachian Homecoming.

Mary Celeste Beall's life drastically changed in 2016, when she lost her husband Sam in a tragic ski accident. Just weeks later, her professional life also changed, when she was asked to step into the role of proprietor of the legendary Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain resorts, a role Sam had occupied for years. We spoke to Mary Celeste about her experience becoming a leader, while also navigating her grief.   In this episode, Mary Celeste shares:  The conversation that led to her becoming proprietor  How she gained the team's trust What it was like to have her work and her life completely integrated  The motto that gets her through  Her tips for being a great host 

Seed Saving & Stories with our seed-saving pal John Coykendall of Knoxville, TN. John tells us how he became a seed saver, some of the varieties he has saved, where to find old-time heirloom seed like the ones he saves, and shares plus some cute stories. John and I (Amy) worked together in the garden at Blackberry Farm together in 2007, where I learned from John the importance of this heirloom seed.

Live from Blackberry Farm, discuss Fly Fishing with Brian Begbie, Director of Fly Fishing Programs at Blackberry Farm

We are bottling a whole lot of goodness as Today's Paige takes us on the road to the 2022 Highlands Food & Wine Festival. On this episode of Paige Kornblue talks sustainability and community with Tarpon Cellars winemaker Jeremy Carter and Oysters Carolina owner Ryan Bethea. Plus, Blackberry Farm Brewery's Chief Fermentation Officer Roy Milner shares his passion for crafting world-class beer that points back to the legendary Tennessee Farm: farm ales, table beers and Belgian-inspired beers too. Throw in an exclusive back-stage performance by Nashville's Grammy-winning string-based band, Old Crow Medicine Show and we've got Southern Hospitality at its best!  Learn more in the TRAVEL and FOOD + DRINK sections of www.PaigeKornblue.com 01:52 Tarpon Cellars & Oysters Carolina www.TarponCellars.com www.OystersCarolina.com 14:12 Old Crow Medicine Show www.MedicineShow.com 17:04 Blackberry Farm Brewery www.BlackberryFarmBrewery.com www.HighlandsFoodandWine.com

Humble, powerful, visionary hotelier Mary Celeste Beall shares her unique perspective on grief, growth and parenting six years after her beloved husband Sam died in a tragic ski accident. Beall took over running the legendary Blackberry Farm resort and has navigated how to stay true to Sam's legacy while creating a vibrant future that includes an exciting new venture, Blackberry Mountain.Want to stay up to date on the latest Speaking Broadly episodes? To hear more conversations with Dana Cowin and her fierce guests, subscribe to Speaking Broadly (it's free!) on iTunes or Stitcher. If you like what you hear, please take a moment to rate + review us on Apple's podcast store and follow Dana on Instagram @speakingbroadly and @fwscout. Thanks for tuning in!Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support Speaking Broadly by becoming a member!Speaking Broadly is Powered by Simplecast.

In this week's episode of Passport to Everywhere, Melissa Biggs Bradley highlights two fascinating guests from previous episodes. First, Melissa welcomes Mary Celeste Beall from the legendary Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain in Tennessee, two properties that are at the pinnacle of American hospitality. The two discuss sustainability, staying present in life and while traveling, what to do on the farm, and the richness of the Smoky Mountains, as well as Blackberry's road to becoming  a legend in the world of luxury travel. Then Jane Poynter, founder, co-CEO, and CXO of Space Perspective joins Melissa to talk about the future of travel, space tourism, pushing the boundaries of science, and much more. As the airports and airlines are pushed to extremes with travelers this holiday weekend, this episode also features a classic Travel Hack, what to do if an airline loses your luggage.Follow Melissa on InstagramLearn more about Indagare TravelInformation about Blackberry Farm and  Blackberry Mountain. Follow Mary Celeste Beall on Instagram For more on Space Perspective

From a six-room country inn Mary Celeste and her family have created a business and a brand at the pinnacle of American hospitality.  They championed authenticity long before it was a buzzword, learned how not just to thrive on but also to survive their success and explosive growth, and survived as well the sudden death, at 39, of the company's head, Mary Celeste's husband, Sam, the son of Blackberry's founders. Their story is now a legend in the world of luxury travel, and no one tells it better than Mary Celeste. Information about Blackberry Farm and  Blackberry Mountain.  Follow Mary Celeste Beall on Instagram  Join Melissa Biggs Bradley on her worldwide journey   Indagare Travel https://www.indagare.com/

  Jared Pickard and his wife Velisa are the founders of Be Here Farm + Nature, a 300 acre Nature Sanctuary and Biodynamic farm in Sonoma County CA where they grow and make a collection of very unique self care products, entirely made by hand, and all on their family farm. Jared and Valisa became interested in farming after they realized that they wanted to farm in a beyond-organic way. They had an exposure to Biodynamic Farm, and after two years of farming in Georgia and an apprenticeship at Blackberry Farm, they were prepared to start their own project.  They now have their own 300 acres farm where they grow and make a collection of unique hand-made self care products. Be Here Farm produces a variety of unique, hand-made self-care products that use all-natural ingredients. Their products include spot treatments, body oils, and scrubs that are designed to nourish and revitalize the skin.  In this podcast you will learn about:  What are the differences between conventional and organic farming? What are the challenges faced by farmers in terms of profitability? What's missing from traditional farming? The difference between a chemical support system and a natural one? The difference between "high quality" food and regular? The difference between Monoculture and Polyculture A monoculture is a crop that is grown in large quantities, usually for commercial purposes. The term can also refer to the practice of growing one type of crop in a field, or to the culture that results from it.  Monocultures are often criticized for being environmentally unsound, as they can lead to soil depletion and water pollution. They can also be more susceptible to pests and diseases than other types of crops. A polyculture is an alternative farming system in which multiple crops are grown together. This can be anything from a few different vegetables in the same garden bed to a large-scale farm with a diverse mix of crops and animals. There are many benefits to polyculture farming: It helps to mimic natural ecosystems, which are more efficient and resilient than monocultures. Growing multiple crops together can help to improve yields by providing complementary nutrition and pest control. Polyculture farms are typically more biodiverse than conventional farms, supporting a greater variety of wildlife.  The Future of Farming Jared also shared his view on the future of the farming industry: "The future of farming looks bright, with more and more people interested in learning about and participating in regenerative agriculture. This type of farming is not only environmentally sustainable but also has the potential to provide nutritious food for communities on a local level.  “In order to make this happen on a global scale, however, we need to continue to educate people about the benefits of regenerative agriculture and support those who are already practicing it." We invite you to listen to this amazing episode of the Awesome Health Podcast. EPISODE RESOURCES: 10% discount code wadelove at sunpotion.com on the summer solstice serum(or on any of their products by emailing Jared that code at love@beherefarm.com) Website Instagram

Tommy Newberry is The New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The 4:8 Principle. He is the founder and head coach of AchievingOPTIMAL, an organization focused on helping Christian entrepreneurs and their families maximize their full potential. Tommy is also the author of the motivational classic, Success Is Not an Accident, 40 Days to a Joy-Filled Life, I Call Shotgun, Think 4:8, and The Daily Guide to a Joy-Filled Life. He's appeared as a guest on over 200 radio and television programs, including Fox & Friends, The Lou Dobbs Show, Your World With Neil Cavuto, Janet Parshall's America, The Fox News Strategy Room, and many others. Tommy's annual Couples Planning Retreat, held at luxurious destinations such as Blackberry Farm, Palmetto Bluff, and Barnsley Resort, takes world-class planning tools into the family realm allowing husband and wife to design a more intentional, simplified and enriching life together. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia with his wife, Kristin. They have three boys, two out of college, one married and the youngest still in high school. Episode Talking Points Growing up and learning the 4:8 principle The 4:8 principle Budgeting the things you put into your mind Building sustainable habits Optimal vs. doable "You are a beautiful, wonderful child of God" Defining success Resources The 4:8 Principle --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/the-monday-christian/support

Show Notes: https://wetflyswing.com/334 Sponsors: https://wetflyswing.com/sponsors Henry Winkler, an actor, author, producer, and angler, is here to chat about fly fishing, Happy Days, and his incredible life. We find out what it felt like to get offered the movie, Grease and why he turned it down, how he got the role in the HBO show Barry, and how he managed to do great things while being challenged with dyslexia. We dig into his books and movies - how they came to be and the inspiration behind them. And we discover similar truths about fly fishing and acting.  Show Notes with Henry Winkler 02:55 - For the past 10 years, Henry has been fishing in Swan Valley, Idaho 05:20 - Double hauling is the most tricky thing for Henry. He's been fishing since 1986 but he's never done a double haul. The second most difficult thing for him is the rules: the things you need to do in order to place the fly in the place you need it - mend, strip, watch, strike 07:20 - The truth about fly fishing and acting for Henry 09:00 - Henry's wife, Stacey Weitzman is also a good fisherwoman 10:55 - For a long time, Henry didn't think he was capable of dry fly fishing, then one day he started dry fly and became successful at it 12:30 - Henry describes the guides that he's had 15:09 - Henry and Lin Oliver wrote 39 novels for children 15:15 - Henry also wrote a book about fly fishing called, I've Never Met an Idiot on the River. This was originally published in 2011. 16:30 - Henry recently won an Emmy for the TV series, Barry - an American black comedy crime drama thriller 17:20 - MacGyver was the first show Henry produced because he couldn't get hired as an actor 17:55 - Happy Days introduced Henry to the world. He used to receive 55,000 letters a week and people welcome him to their homes all the time. 20:30 - Henry, who played principal Himbry in the movie Scream, was asked to go uncredited because the producers did not want to detract any attention from the younger, lesser-known actors 23:05 - Hank Zipzer: The World's Greatest Underachiever - is a story about a boy who has dyslexia. Henry also considers himself dyslexic. 27:15 - Henry's favorite fly pattern is called the Winkler - it's a pattern that someone made for him when he fished a river in Blackberry Farm, Tennessee. It's like a little mayfly. Unfortunately, we don't have a picture. He said it works well. 29:28 - Henry tells the story of when he went to New Zealand for 10 days to fish. He was sponsored by an outfitter. His favorite trip though was when he went to Argentina. 32:00 - Henry was offered the role of Danny Zuko for the movie, Grease, but he turned it down because he played Fonzy for already 10 years and he couldn't sing 33:20 - Henry tells the story of how he got the role for the TV series, Barry. His son Max directed his audition. Conclusion with Henry Winkler So there you go..  Henry Winkler, the man, the myth, the legend. Words can't describe how happy I am to be able to speak with one of my childhood idols.    Thanks to Fonzie and Happy Days, lots of people had a wonderful childhood. Henry is proof that a disability can't stop you from doing great things. So thank you, Henry. I hope you live for as long as you wish. See you on TV! Eyyyy! Show Notes: https://wetflyswing.com/334

With Knox Mason preparing for its final day in business July 2, chef Matt Gallaher is planning to regroup and take it easy – a strategy he might have picked up while cooking for The Eagles. Gallaher joins the podcast to talk about his journey from learning chef skills at Blackberry Farm to making meals for rock stars and the Tennessee governor to opening his own culinary concepts. Plus, we talk about what kept Knox Mason from surviving the pandemic and what's missing from the downtown dining scene. All that and a whole lot more on this week's episode of "The Scruffy Stuff," presented by knoxnews.com. 

We visit with Chef David Rule on his new project Trotter's Whole Hog Barbecue, Sevierville, TN. You may know Chef Rule from his former work with Dancing Bear, Blackberry Farm, and Walnut Kitchen. His current restaurant is The Appalachian, Sevierville, TN. Back in 20007, David used to help me load the huge compost bin from the main kitchen when I worked in the garden at Blackberry Farm. Unfortunately, it was not so easy to get help with that. Most people didn't want to deal with it. In addition, Fred Sauceman's Pot Luck Radio Series features a special appetizer found at Ridgewood BBQ in Bluff City, TN.

Love and Legacy. These two "L" words are what makes the long hours and the hard work worth it all in the end. Setting big goals and rising to new levels of entrepreneurship are frivolous endeavors if it doesn't serve a greater purpose. If you agree, this episode is for you! Welcome back to The Her Effect Podcast. Today Jaime joins us from her walk on the side of a misty Smokey Mountain. As the birds chirp in the background and the leaves crunch beneath her feet, listen in to hear how Jaime cast vision for her family. Hit play to hear about Jaime and Nathans's recent trip to Blackberry Farms, how they are raising their standards for parenting, how and why they prioritize investing in themselves, their framework for how to find God's vision for your children and so much more! Whether you are single, married with no kids, or in the thick of parenting, this episode will give you a few practical ways to tap into the heavenly vision for you and your loved ones' life. LINKS: What is the HER Effect? "The HER Effect is an ecosystem created to surround, equip, and support women everywhere as they rise, stepping fully into their journey of Becoming HER." Learn more: thehereffect.com Meet Jaime: thehereffect.com/about/meet-jaime Follow Jaime: Facebook Instagram YouTube Follow The HER Effect: Facebook Instagram MIG: migliving.com Subscribe and share The HER Effect with a friend: Apple Google Spotify QUICK EPISODE SUMMARY:  The importance of investing in yourself Overcome the guilt  Investing vs spending for yourself How to get a heavenly vision for your family The responsibility every parent has  It's time to take your dreams off the back burner The importance of during into your husband Set a new standard for parenting

Hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains is a beautiful and iconic way to experience the area, as well as a unique way to connect with nature and find tranquility. Today, our guest will discuss some of his amazing hiking adventures and the social media impact he has had on so many individuals.Creating Memorable Hiking and Outdoor Adventures in the Great Smoky Mountains Our host, Joseph Franklyn McElroy, is joined by our special guest, Johnny Osborne, an acclaimed long-distance hiker, adventurer, rock climber, and mountain biker, also renowned for his social media skills. With well over a million followers on various forms of social media platforms, Johnny is a master at creating memorable online hiking experiences in the Great Smoky Mountains –and throughout the United States –while documenting his accomplishments as a hiker. Johnny is especially passionate about promoting, protecting, and perpetuating the legacy of the Great Smokies Mountain National Park. When not enjoying various outdoor pursuits, Osborne resides in Alcoa Tennessee, where he manages his social media platforms and works with clients such as Blackberry Farm and Blackberry Mountain Resort.Tune in for this fun conversation at TalkRadio.nyc or watch the Facebook Livestream by clicking here.Show NotesSegment 1Joseph starts off tonight's show with of course his sponsor which is his own, the Meadowlark Motel! He mentions several upcoming events that you can find at meadowlarkmotel.com. Joseph also reads a poem by Lawrence Hall called “New Hiking Shoes for the Trail Ahead.” He transitions into introducing his guest, Johnny Osborne, an acclaimed long-distance hiker, adventurer, rock climber, and mountain biker, also renowned for his social media skills, with well over a million followers on various forms of social media platforms. He lives in Tennessee and is 20 minutes away from the Smokies National Park. He became passionate about outdoor lifestyles due to his fond memories with his family like going to the Smokies and bonding. Osborne became serious about hiking after being invited by his sister numerous times to go hiking with her. He used to run rather than hike while in college but once he went hiking with his sister again, it “ignited a fire” that made him fall in love with it again. He talks with Joseph about some intriguing memories hiking.Segment 2Joseph mentions Johnny's social media channels and how he talks about the leave no trace principles of hiking in many of his videos. This topic is about cleaning our environment, educating, advocating, and more when it comes to recreating responsibly. Johnny also mentions a nonprofit organization, Save Our Smokies, who are having an event on the weekend of Earth Day to clean the entire Smokies National Park. He also talks about the positive impacts of being a part of the hiking community like being the voice of information to provide knowledge about being safe. Joseph talks with Johnny about his impressive social media skills and having a big following. He wants to grow and create more educational content for his youtube channel. Johnny talks about doing challenges and taking on the South Beyond 6,000 challenge which he read about in an article. This challenge encourages hikers to climb forty 6000 foot peaks in the Southern Appalachian Mountains.Segment 3Johnny speaks with Joseph about his experience hiking in the Black Mountain Crest Trail. He also did the Great Smoky Mountains National Park nine hundred mile hike which includes going through all of the trails in the area. Johnny also speaks about doing the Foothills Trail Hike in the Appalachian Mountains. He talks about a funny moment of how on his first day on this hike, a huge storm came along. When this happened, he found a spot to camp and the next morning he realized that he was about only 2 miles from where he wanted to be. Johnny has hiked in many states and countries. He reminisces about the beautiful atmosphere when he hiked in the Rocky Mountains. When it comes to his social media, he refers to himself as someone who is encouraging and not an influencer. He differentiates these two terms as someone who is selling something (influencer) and someone who is coaching (encouraging). He says that it's about supporting and motivating others when educating people about hiking. Johnny also gives some of his thoughts about how other people on social media can grow their platforms and build a community. He speaks about being consistent in delivering relatable content.Segment 4In the final segment, Johnny speaks about being involved with the Blackberry Farm and Mountain Resort in Tennessee. He has been with them for 7 years and is an information technology manager at Blackberry Mountain. He says that they are opening up a restaurant at the brewery they have in the location. Johnny speaks about his passion about the Great Smoky Mountains and advocating for being responsible while enjoying recreation and memorable experiences. Other things Johnny also enjoys besides hiking is to go mountain biking or even kayaking. He talks more with Joseph about places he enjoys visiting in Tennessee and the Smokies. His favorite rock climbing spot for example is Ijams in Knox County. You can reach out to Johnny on Instagram at johnny onthetrail, as well as Facebook and Youtube with the same username. Johnny also shares with us that he has merch and the proceeds will go to nonprofit organizations and park charities. Joseph thanks Johnny Osborne for being on the show and looks forward to hiking with him some time soon!

For this episode we are joined by an old friend, Claire Balest, owner of Claire Balest Hair + Makeup who has worked all over the world for her work in the wedding industry. At a pivotal “crossroads” in her career Claire decided to branch out into her own business, and her path has been nothing but meteoric since then. In this episode, Claire talks about the nuances of starting her own business and how her go get it attitude drove her success. She also gives us some wisdom on how to build out a robust team of experts that translates to any field. Claire has made empowering her clients a central ethos for her business and a thoughtful refocusing of what beauty can be. The result is a stellar example of success in the industry!Highlights: An introduction to Claire and her work (00:00) Claire takes a different direction with her career (02:00) Claire's perspectives on building a great team, and empowering her clients (06:23) Finding the “right fit” with clients (13:20) Navigating the industry in the age of overwhelming information (19:20) Problems in hair and makeup that Claire is tackling (23:53) How Claire discusses beauty with her clients, deconstructing “perfectionism” (30:50) Lessons to take from the French and focusing on skin care (39:30) Claire's recipe for what makeup to use (46:20) Claire's message about beauty (51:15) Links:Dr. Jason Hall, MD Website: https://drjasonhall.com/ Twitter: twitter.com/jhallmd Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jhallmd/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DrHallPlasticSurgery/ Links Referenced Claire Balest Hair + Makeup: http://www.clairebalest.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clairebalest/ TranscriptDr. Hall: Welcome to The Trillium Show, where we help you make the changes you want to see in your body, in your mind, and in your life. I'm your host, Dr. Jason Hall.Dr. Hall: So, welcome back to The Trillium Show. Today I have the distinct honor of being joined by Claire Balest. Claire and I have known each other for a long time. She is the owner of Claire Balest Hair + Makeup.She has been recognized by Martha Stewart Weddings, Brides magazine, all sorts of industry publications, for her work in the wedding field, in makeup. She has traveled around the world to do destination weddings at places where you would definitely recognize and is a fixture up at Blackberry Farm for their wedding events. So Claire, welcome to the show.Claire: Thank you.Dr. Hall: Now, you have been all over the world for work, and some of the places that we were talking about before we hit record, places like Aspen, the Yellowstone Club, the Bahamas. What's the coolest place you've been for work?Claire: It's not really a fair question, but I could give you a top three, maybe. Yellowstone Club is amazing; Montana has my heart, but I have to say we just did an event in Aspen at Kevin Costner's ranch out west, and it might be my favorite, simply because I thought I would run into Rip out there, from Yellowstone. I was hoping it didn't happen, but there's always next time. And maybe he's going to hear this podcast, and… I don't know.Dr. Hall: So Rip, if you're out there listening, an invitation is an order. So—Claire: [laugh]. I'm just putting it out into the universe. I mean, my husband knows. He said he would be honored. I mean, Rip from Yellowstone. I can't. Anyway, Brush Creek Ranch was amazing. Aspen was definitely an incredible destination to have worked.Dr. Hall: You have a background in the theater and have been working in film behind the camera after your theater career. And then I heard a story that you kind of had a pivotal turn, you know, one of these times in life where your life is headed in one direction, and a decision that may take you 30 seconds to make totally changes the course of your career. Tell me about that.Claire: Right. Yeah, so it was one of those crossroads where, you know, I had a job and I had a choice to make. I had a phone call about production with a production company that I had been trying to work with for a long time. And I had to choose between continuing to do what I was doing with this other company, which I was grateful for, but it essentially meant that I was breaking off and going on my own. And I actually had a conversation with the person that I reported to at the time, and she was like, “I completely understand your decision, but we just can't—you're not going to be able to continue working, you know, with us.”And so that was when I broke off and started working on my own. And that was it. I mean, it was truly one of those like, “Okay, I'm going this direction.” And it was just such an incredible decision. But it was truly a leap of faith, which any business owner understands. I mean, it is, like, a faith-based business, you trust that work is going to come to you and the right work is going to come to you, and it definitely has.Dr. Hall: I would imagine if you're anything like any of the rest of us who have gone out on their own and started their own business, that there were a lot of sleepless nights in there. You didn't have a set schedule when you made that decision. It was a one-time thing.Claire: Right. When I started doing that it was you know, I was freelance. So, you basically sit and wait for the phone to ring. But when you're good, you know, I always say talent is a given, but you have to really be present. You have to make an impression and show people who you are, which is to say, are you timely? Are you dependable? Are you always going to show up, no matter what? Are you looking out for other people on the team? And I am just inherently one of those people and that's just how I work, and so that kind of spread rapidly and people started passing my name around, and it grew from there.Dr. Hall: That's a great answer and said with a lot of confidence that people starting out could look at and say, “Well, you know, of course. She's Claire Balest; she's successful now.” Did you feel that same way? A week after you made that decision?Claire: Did I feel the same way?Dr. Hall: Did you have that same level of confidence in yourself, a week after you made the decision to go out on your own?Claire: I didn't have the perspective a week after I made the decision. I didn't even know that what I did, that who I was unique. Which is to say, you know, I'm at the stage in my life where I realize that most people aren't going to go above and beyond, right? They're going to do the job and they're going to leave. And I just—that's really not in my DNA.I am a great wingman. I'm a great person to work with because I'm looking out for the people, not even on my team, but the people on the crew, or the—you know, how can I help? So, I didn't have the perspective to know that it was all going to be okay, that the brand was going to grow into a brand far bigger than I had ever expected, but it was just one of those, like, left foot, right foot, breathe. Keep doing the right thing, and, you know, hopefully, eventually magic happens.Dr. Hall: I think it's obvious that it did. And one of the really interesting things that you just said in that answer was talking about the perspective that you've gained over time, and how important that taking care of the team was, but also how rare it is for people to actually show up and give 110%.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: You've built a great team. How do you pick people that are going to give 110% like you do?Claire: That is the magic question, isn't it? I mean, everyone's looking for these perfect employees. I have to say, there's not a perfect answer. I've had people come out of the woodwork, and find me, and pursue me. There's a difference in people saying, “Hey, you know, I really want to do hair. I want to be a makeup artist. Can I shadow you?” No, you have to touch 1000 faces a day, and grow, and make mistakes, and make good choices and bad choices, and then you come and work on the team. That's not how you become a makeup artist or hairstylist.The people that have sought me out have just… there's something about, like, their email that just clicked with me that I thought this person understands. Like, the way that they're talking to me is unique, and so, you know, have a phone call with them and see how that goes. I always tell my team, like, people don't remember what you did to their hair, they don't remember the color lipstick you put on them, but they will always remember how you made them feel in the chair. So, the way that we work to make our clients feel is empowered, is special, is beautiful, is you know supported. And, you know, finding those people that ascribe to that same mentality is difficult, but somehow I've done it. They all kind of came to me differently.Dr. Hall: That your business is principle-based, here in your answers, we're talking a lot about making people feel empowered, making your clients feel empowered, and basing what can be seen as very superficial business—much like cosmetic surgery [laugh]—Claire: Absolutely.Dr. Hall: —but making that about making people feel better, I think is very unique. And how did you come to that? Or is that just you?Claire: I think it is just me. But it grew over time to where I realized that one of my superpowers is to champion my clients. It's just something that I have grown to realize that they need and that I am able to do well, and it goes far beyond hair and makeup. There's so many women who sit in my chair and just start to tear themselves apart about, you know, “I need a facelift, I need injections, I need—oh my goodness, look at my skin.”And it's just like, they can't sit down in peace. They're just tormented by maybe they think that I'm looking at them and criticizing because I'm in their personal space. Years of seeing women do that has caused me to completely reframe the way that I see myself and the way that I see other people. Because we don't need to do that. We don't need to do that to ourselves, we don't need to do it to each other.This idea that we're not okay the way that we are and that there's something out there that we haven't gotten to yet, but if we just did that, then we would be okay is, you know, sad and endless. So, I see beauty in everyone that sits in my chair. I try to speak beauty to everyone that sits on my chair. When I start working on different areas of their face. I'll speak to it, “Your skin is amazing.” Or, “You have the longest lashes,” or, “Your eyes are the most incredible color.”I think that it's important to speak it because it allows them to reframe the way that they see themselves. Because they're not looking for what's right about themselves; they're looking for what's wrong. So, part of my job is I feel like I should call out beauty. And so I do. Much to my—my husband is always like, “Can we just order dinner? Do you have to tell the server how beautiful her brows are?” “Yes, yes, I do. And then we'll order dinner.”Dr. Hall: That is so refreshing because we both are in an industry where people come to us because they either want to improve something that is already there or because they are unhappy with a part of themselves. And realizing, recognizing, and pointing out people's natural beauty, I think goes a long way towards reframing a conversation about beauty, across the board. Because it's there in everybody. And one of my questions for you is, you do hair and makeup, and so you're probably more qualified—or here more than just about any therapist out there—Claire: Absolutely.Dr. Hall: —about people's insecurities. How do you speak to that to your clients?Claire: You know, it's part of a way that I get to know them. Let's say that we're speaking about one of my bridal clients, or someone that I'm going to work with more than just one time, it's going to be over the course of months, or four days. I am always studying my clients. When I talk to them—I'm sure you do this—when I talk to them, I am trying to glean as much information as I can about the way that they see themselves, what they like about themselves, what they dislike about themselves, what makes them feel beautiful, what doesn't make them feel beautiful. And I'm storing all that away and trying to figure out the best way to come alongside them and support them.So, if I can become aware of their insecurities ahead of time, I'm going to be able to support them better over the course of, you know, our four days together at their destination event, better than if I was just picking out lipstick shades for them. All of it goes hand-in-hand and all of it goes towards their overall experience of what happens in the makeup chair. They don't know all the psychology that goes into it. They don't need to know all the psychology that goes into it. They need to walk away feeling like their hair and makeup team was their ride or die, and that we had their back until the very end. And we have developed these inexplicable bonds with our clients as a result of this. And so many of our clients tell us that their favorite part of the weekend was in hair and makeup. I don't think that's an accident.Dr. Hall: That's awesome. I think that's testament to what you do and how you treat the clients that you work with. When you're interviewing a client or a client is interviewing you—and you can explain to me how that process works—are there people that you interview to work with—or that are interviewing you to work with that don't share those same feelings? And how do you deal with that situation?Because that happens—and I'm asking that partly for myself because that happens in my office fairly frequently. People come to me with requests that are—while they may be physically possible, may not accomplish the goals that they don't even know that they have for themselves, yet. And so how do you deal with that situation?Claire: You know, I think initially, I thought that I was supposed to book every client. Now, I have come to the place to realize that I shouldn't book every client. There is a great hair and makeup team for everyone; it's not necessarily always going to be us. And I think that you learn that through working with people who perhaps have a different—a very different aesthetic than you, and you feel like you're really not doing your best work and giving them what they want most because that's really not what you're known for. I am known for natural beauty, glowing skin, barely-there makeup.We can definitely—you know we love to play around with more dramatic looks over the course of the weekend, depending on what the party is, but for the most part that is what we have come to the most sought after for. So, as a result, when people come to us and they want something completely different, yes, it can be done. But if the client just isn't the right fit, or if the aesthetic isn't the right fit, I don't have a problem directing them somewhere where I think that they would be happier.Dr. Hall: I think that's a good way to answer the question. The right fit, though, really is something that I'm interested in learning myself because, like you, our practice has the same issues. And I'll be honest, I'm still looking for the best way to deliver that message. Because it's a hard message to deliver.Claire: I think it's more coming from an angle of what's best for them. Not that, you know, you don't like what they're wanting—whether or not you do—and just being honest about what you do and what you do best, and empowering them to make the decision about maybe there's someone out there that does what you're looking for better than what I do. I mean, I'm certainly not attempting to advise you from a medical perspective.But yeah, if I mean, if you can tell that it's not a good fit, then I like to hand people a solution and say, “Here's where I would go. I think this person would be a great fit for you. I want to make sure that you feel supported. I want to make sure that you get exactly what you're looking for.” But I will say that my team and I, for the most part, you know, I believe that like attracts like, and so many of our clients come to us because of what we really do best. And that situation is not the norm.Dr. Hall: I'm sure you get clients that come in armed with YouTube and Pinterest and things. I've heard you say, in other places that—you liken YouTube and Pinterest, to the WebMD of the aesthetic industry, which I thought is hysterical—Claire: It is.Dr. Hall: —and true at the same time. [laugh].Claire: It is exactly the same thing. It's way too much information for the general public. They're only going to hurt themselves with it. It leaves everyone confused. They're all diagnosing themselves with cancer. They're all trying to contour from some video that they watched on—I mean, it's too much we need to shut the platform down. Do you think we can do that together? Should we, like?Dr. Hall: Maybe. I don't know—they may hear this and de-platform us, and we have to find something else.Claire: We're about to be canceled right now.Dr. Hall: Yeah. [laugh].Claire: But yeah, it's too much information. I don't feel like our bridal clients, that doesn't so much come into play there. It's more when women are trying to learn how to do their makeup, they are so inundated with information that they can't figure out what they're supposed to do. I mean, we are so filled with information from the second we wake up to the second we go to bed, we don't know how to filter any of it, and we're going on and seeking more.And it's just—you know, I try to be a voice in the beauty industry that uncomplicates things. I totally believe that the beauty industry is one of the most confusing places ever. It makes billions of dollars off of keeping women confused. There are some great brands out there, there are great products, but for the most part, we don't know how to navigate that space. And I like to, kind of, be a voice that will uncomplicate that very complicated industry, and simplify it, and just say, “Here are the things that you need.” It's very, very basic.Which is how the beauty box came about, where I customize boxes for my clients, or for people who just want the basics, their every day, tell me a few products that I need that are just going to make the most difference. They don't need 20 products. They don't need 10 products. I think five products for everyone is—it's different; not everyone needs the same five products, but I have a way that I customize products for people, and it's kind of like a lesson and a box. And it's my way of, kind of, demystifying the industry to a place where you don't have to go into Sephora and try to navigate a store that has hundreds of thousands of products in it. Let me tell you what I would recommend.Dr. Hall: The beauty industry is incredibly confusing, and makes a fortune every year keeping people confused because confusion leads to panic-buying, leads to filling your makeup cabinet, filling your bathroom with makeup and skincare products, and all sorts of things you don't need.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: And that's one of the things that I'm trying to do with this show is educate because our industry, plastic surgery industry is very similar. And one of the earlier shows, talked about breast augmentation specifically because that is our equivalent in the surgical space because women will come in having been all over—probably from one end of the internet to the other—gathering research from who knows where, and come in and sit down in my office with a bunch of pictures and essentially, tell me how to do their surgery. And it's because Google has made everybody think they're an expert.Claire: Right. Well, and there's no barrier to entry on the internet, right? There's no one screening. You can put anything up there, any pictures, any—you know. And that's research. I love that you said they've done their research and they come in. Well, who's doing the research on the research? It's all just unfiltered information out there that is, I think, doing more harm than good.Dr. Hall: I totally agree. That being said, do you have clients use Pinterest, or YouTube, or Google to bring in photos of things that they like?Claire: Absolutely. I think Pinterest, and Instagram, and image-driven platforms are wonderful tools for people to communicate what they like or what they don't like. I think it's very helpful to have inspiration images but to know that those can't really drive the engine. It's just inspiration; it's just a tool. Hire people who are going to give you the end result.Don't give them a picture and say, “Do this.” Just say, you know, “This is something I gravitate towards. I'm really not sure what it is about it.” Because a lot of times, a client might bring in a picture of a model with a smokey eye and say, you know, “I love this. It's just so natural.”Okay, perfect. Let's unpack that. What she's really talking about is the skin. Maybe it's like, beautiful lighting, and the model has on very natural lip and her skin is gorgeous. But she has a smokey eye. If I didn't ask more questions, my client is going to end up with a smokey eye. And I'm thinking, “Well, she thinks that's natural.”It's all about the consultation. It's all about reading our clients' minds. And they don't have the verbiage; they don't have the context for understanding what it is that they want. They know what they don't want, but it's our job to interpret what they're bringing us, what they're thinking, what they're hoping to achieve, you know, we have to pull that out of them.I can't blame her if she shows me a picture and I recreate that picture. That's not her fault. That's my fault. You know, I think the consultation is everything, talking to our clients is everything because we can really get to the heart of what it is that they're hoping for by asking more questions, instead of assuming that they're not the expert. We're the experts, so it's our job to really get to the heart of what they're wanting.Dr. Hall: I couldn't agree with that more. I tell my own patients, when we start having these conversations in consultation, is that your result happens in the consult. The operating room, the makeup chair, that's time for execution, but the result is planning, it is consultation, it is all the boring stuff that happens before you actually sit down in a makeup chair—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: —lay down on the operating table. That's the important part.Claire: I mean, I have to say ours is slightly less permanent. We can change a lipstick color. [laugh].Dr. Hall: [laugh].Claire: But yeah, I see where you're going. Yeah, it's all about the consultation.Dr. Hall: Yeah. And so taking the time and setting your client—your patient—up for success by having a beat getting into the psychology of what they're trying to accomplish and why is so important. So, let's shift gears, we've kind of gotten really deep, which is good.Claire: [laugh]. Have we? [laugh].Dr. Hall: I love it. I love it. Anytime you get a plastic surgeon and a makeup artist sitting here, talking about psychology—[laugh].Claire: Right. We may need to take a break.Dr. Hall: We may need to take a break. But I do want to shift gears and ask you about some aesthetic things because there are a lot of things that you take care of that I take care of as well. One is eyebrows. And women have been pulling eyebrow hairs out—Claire: [laugh]. “Pulling out.”Dr. Hall: —for—plucking—Claire: Yes.Dr. Hall: The term.Claire: Yes.Dr. Hall: Plucking is the—Claire: I'm looking at you right now. You're not doing that. So—Dr. Hall: No, no. I have bushy, like, Burt and Ernie eyebrows.Claire: [laugh].Dr. Hall: But what problems are you seeing that you are trying to correct with makeup?Claire: We're mostly trying to create full brows these days. Most clients have overplucked their brows, and what we are doing is going in and filling them back in, trying to recreate a full brow, which is very on trend right now. And honestly, I hope it stays that way for forever. A child of the '90s, I overplucked my brows within an inch of their lives, and there's no hope for me; it's all makeup.But this younger generation, they need to leave their brows alone. They don't need to be plucking. Full, feathered brows are what's beautiful, and truly, we can shape them a little bit, but a client's best look is what she's born with, and shaping those slightly. But the brows are everything, the brows frame the eyes, so it helps to kind of ground the whole look. I think that brows are one of the five products, I would say for sure that everyone needs, unless they just naturally have full brows. We all need to, like, play up our brows a little bit more so that everything else is balanced on the face.Dr. Hall: How much does shape matter? Because from a surgical standpoint, what has happened with the brow fullness, unless we're talking about hair transplants—which is certainly an option—is kind of in the past. What we're looking at is position and shape. How important is it for you when you're doing a wedding when you're helping a client with makeup to get the shape right? And what shape are you going for?Claire: It depends on what their face is. It's very different client to client. It would be like me asking you the same thing, right? I look at a client and it's a completely different canvas and I'm working with what they have, their features, and I'm creating shape around them. That being said, some people are so used to being overplucked that they can't handle if I were to give them a full brow. They couldn't handle the way that looks.So, I do take into account clients' comfort levels with how full I'm going to take their brows. But full brows are it. I love a full brow. I want the full brows to stay. I hope that we never go back to the plucking. To the arched, overplucked brow.Dr. Hall: I do too because those are—for us—are difficult to get right because there's not much there to shape and position. And in some ways, it gives the surgeon a little bit of a free pass because there's not much there to alter. You know, when we're talking about surgical brow reshaping, a lot of it is position-related and shape-related. And that's where you see a lot of these surgical misadventures where the people have these constant surprised—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: —look on their face, from trying to overcorrect and exaggerate that arch. And really, I feel exactly the same way you do in terms of what is beautiful, what is pretty, is something subtle.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: You want a little arch, but it doesn't need to be exaggerated. It doesn't need to be a look of constant surprise or shock.Claire: Right. I think it's interesting. When people look to what's beautiful, they're looking at other images. They're rarely looking at themselves and thinking what is it I can play up about myself? What are the things I love about myself? What are the features I love about myself? What are ways that I can enhance those features?They're looking to change their look entirely based on other images or other people that they see. So, for me, I love to celebrate the beauty within each client. I mean, forgive how cliche that sounds. But for example, when I have someone who's covered in freckles, right, a beautiful ginger who's covered in freckles, I am never going to try to cover her freckles. I want that to come out. I mean, that is a signature statement in and of itself. I want to give her beautiful skin. I don't want to try to mask or hide anything.And you know, it'd be like for her to look at someone else and say, “Oh, but if my skin was”—you know, well, that's unrealistic. It's unattainable. I think that we need to be looking more at ourselves for inspiration on what beauty is and on how we can be our own unique beauty rather than trying to create it off of something we saw on Instagram.Dr. Hall: That's so true. That is so true because what that ends up setting up is this endless cycle of chasing something else, of chasing some unattainable image of self, of whether it's eyebrows, or cheeks, or lips, or breasts, or stomachs or—because what I think what a lot of people don't realize is—and maybe I'm off base on this—is that a lot of stuff on social media is heavily edited.Claire: Oh, yeah.Dr. Hall: And so the images that people are bringing in, you know—certainly the things that I see—are airbrushed or Photoshopped to within an inch of their life, and there's no way to make that happen in real life.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: And so part of my consult is actually being a photo critic.Claire: Absolutely. And helping them unpack, like, what's actually happening in the image.Dr. Hall: Mm-hm.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: Yeah. How do you talk to people? Kind of, getting back to what I think is a very unique view of beauty and addressing each person individually, talk to me about the conversation that you have with somebody who is sitting in your chair and beating themselves up because they don't like their skin, they don't like the way their eyes are shaped, or their lips are too thin. Walk me through that conversation?Claire: Like how I would start to do their makeup or—Dr. Hall: No, how do you talk to them? How do you get those people, those clients of yours that are very hard on themselves? How do you get them to start to flip that script around and start to see the natural beauty in themselves, to allow you to be able to bring that out?Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: Because that speaks to the psychology of what we do and how do you have that conversation. Because I have very similar conversations in my office every day, and I'm interested in what conversations you have.Claire: So, when a client sits in my chair, I can almost instantly feel their energy, how they feel about themselves, the way they present themselves, just from the way that they're sitting, or the way that they hold themselves; it's a whole vibe. And I will start asking questions, I will start talking about what we're trying to achieve. When I register that there is a client who is in the depths of self-dislike, I will start really trying to buoy her with affirming things that I see about her that I like. I will never just make things up, but there are always things, there is always beauty. And so when I see it, I'll speak it to her and try to just start building that up, build the trust level.There are times where clients are so self-deprecating, that I will—I'm a very touchy person, I will put my hand on their leg and I will be like, “Not in my chair.” You know, you are not allowed to talk about yourself that way in my chair. Or we'll start—you know, I'm incapable of being too serious. I don't know if that's come across yet here, but I really tried to make them feel comfortable. I tried to disarm them.You know, it is a very vulnerable thing to sit in someone's face and be in their 18 inches, and they're thinking I can see every aspect of what might be wrong with their skin, or their, you know, whatever it is going on that they don't like about themselves, so I instantly want to make them feel like I am on their side, that I am not criticizing whatever they feel is going on. And I just look for ways to support them. Because in a situation like that, it is not about the makeup. There is a lot more going on. I'm never going to be able to affect the way that they see themselves just from makeup alone. If I can affect it at all, but I can certainly try.Dr. Hall: Yeah, like I said, there's another area where our careers and you know what we do in consultation really is very similar because I see the same types of things. And there are some people who you can do a wonderful job, get a wonderful outcome, but because of what's going on inside that patient's head or that patient's heart, it's not going to affect—Claire: It's lost on them.Dr. Hall: Yeah, it is.Claire: They don't experience it the same way.Dr. Hall: Right.Claire: Well, and I think that's an interesting segue into, like, let's talk about perfectionism.Dr. Hall: Mm-hm.Claire: I told you before we started recording that there needs to be a divorce between the idea of perfectionism and what beauty is. Like, if you think about that long enough, your brain is going to start to melt. How did we ever marry those two ideas: Beauty and perfectionism? They're completely separate entities, and yet, we're all—in our culture anyway—our society celebrates this very unattainable idea of perfectionism.It is very American and we don't celebrate individual beauty. So, I think the fact that we are the experts—so we get to, as business owners, as the experts within our respective fields, we get to kind of drive the narrative about what we see beauty is, and communicating that to our clients, to our patients, and creating our own movements.Dr. Hall: The topic of perfectionism comes up daily. And around my office, it's the P-word. We don't talk about being perfect. Because perfect is, like you said, is an unattainable goal.Claire: It's unattainable, and it's unidentifiable, and yet we all use that word all the time.Dr. Hall: Mm-hm. You can't identify something that's perfect because it's a very subjective term.Claire: It is very subjective. Perfect to me is very different than perfect to you.Dr. Hall: Right. And we're beauty comes into that—you can nerd out on, you know, the golden portion, and all the measurements and all this other stuff, but at the end of the day, just like perfection isn't—beauty is subjective. And really, beauty for an individual has to do with their own feelings of themselves, not how their eyes look, not how big their breasts are, not you know, whether their jawline is nice and defined. You know, those are nice things to have, but they don't necessarily make beauty.Claire: Right. And they aren't necessarily perfect. I feel like such a small voice in an abyss of this movement in our culture of perfectionism, so I realize that, like, I'm yelling into the void here, but I really believe that if we could spend all the time—at least women—if women could spend all the time on other things besides self-criticism and this sprint towards perfectionism, we could literally solve the world's problems. I mean, we spend so much energy chasing after things that are completely unattainable. I mean, you probably don't experience it because you're not a woman, but, like, women—all of the women out there listening, they know what I'm talking about. We spend so much useless time thinking about what we should change about ourselves instead of celebrating, celebrating things about ourselves. And regardless of what we all look like there's always things to celebrate.Dr. Hall: Oh, absolutely. And I think before we pressed record, we were talking about the French, and they're this celebration of, really, of life is really what it boils down to—Claire: Absolutely.Dr. Hall: —is celebrating life. You can go in the internet, research on the internet, the number of articles written about French women and their croissants, and their wine, and their cigarettes, and all the things that are taboo for us—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: —you know, you're supposed to do that because you want to look good. You don't want to eat carbs. Cigarettes are bad for you—cigarettes are bad for you, though. I mean, I'm a doctor. Cigarettes are bad for you. But—Claire: [laugh]. The French aren't going to get away with that one.Dr. Hall: No, they're—Claire: We're going to go ahead and shut that down.Dr. Hall: No. But about how they enjoy their life, and they enjoy their life despite the fact—it's almost like despite the fact that they do all these terrible things, they still manage to enjoy themselves.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: And that's a mindset that has nothing to do with what's in your glass of wine or—Claire: It's so true.Dr. Hall: —or what croissant you eat.Claire: It's funny, Barbara Close, who was the owner and creator of Naturopathica, said, “Everything in moderation, including moderation.” I went on a retreat with her, and she said that and I thought, “That is so true.” And I think the French really embody that whole mentality of just everything in moderation, including moderation. You know, Americans are the opposite of that.Not to hate on the Americans, but you know, we overcomplicate everything. Everything is overdone, overwrought. And you know, the thing that we are so obsessed about—at least I am so obsessed about with French beauty is the simplicity, the lack of perfection. It just seems effortless. Whereas American beauty is full of effort. Even that no-makeup makeup look is full of effort.And the French have just kind of perfected that imperfectly perfect beauty routine, Joie de vivre. They've got it down and we're obsessed with it. And yet we continue on the train that we're on going the other direction. But we're very obsessed with—and I think it comes back to we need to simplify. I think during the pandemic, we all streamlined our beauty routines, we all rethought what's really important that I do.Like, hmm, I think skincare might be more important than makeup, and so skincare sales are going through the roof because nobody's really wearing makeup because people are in masks and so people start taking care of their skin because they don't have makeup on. Which, by the way, is much more important than wearing makeup.Dr. Hall: That's exactly where I was going to go with that is, unfortunately, the skincare industry has followed right along with the makeup industry in trying to make skincare absolutely as complicated and difficult as possible when it doesn't need to be.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: I spend a great amount of time in my office, essentially talking people out of buying a hundred different skincare products, there's about three that most people need.Claire: Right. You talked about it on your podcast last week, right?Dr. Hall: Right. In the aging podcast an episode or two ago. You know, there are three things that people need, and then it's a matter of restoring youthful skin to a point where it can age naturally. And we're not—we're essentially undoing years of ultraviolet and environmental damage. So, you know, we're not giving somebody perfect skin. You know, to get back to what we were talking about—Claire: Right. Doesn't exist.Dr. Hall: —doesn't exist. What we're doing is we're making skin healthy again, so that God's design can kind of keep doing its thing.Claire: Right. And for me as a makeup artist, I mean, you're thinking, of course, medically. I'm thinking, if a client sits down in my chair and they have done their job, which is to say they have taken care of their skin, I can do my job. But when they neglect their skin, and they sit down on my chair, I can't affect texture; there's nothing I can do. That happens long before they sit in my chair.If they do their job and take care of all of the things that they need to do before the wedding weekend, for example, then I'm able to make their skin look like they have no makeup on. But if they haven't taken care of their skin, you're going to see the makeup. So, I think about it from a much more cosmetic standpoint. And for me, you know, good skin, it's not age-driven. Again, back to French beauty.I love the idea of looking beautiful at every age. Your skin isn't suddenly not beautiful because you're 30, or 40, or 50 you know, I'm sorry, if Brad Pitt can be 60 now, like, what is 60.Dr. Hall: Is he really sixty?Claire: I think—isn't he 60? Is he 50? It doesn't matter. The point is, Brad Pitt—Dr. Hall: He's been around for a while.Claire: So, you know it's—age has been completely redefined. So, I don't think that beautiful skin is age-driven. I think that our goal should not be preserving our 20-year-old bodies or our 20-year-old skin; we need to look great at every age. Which again, is what French women have figured out. I think glowing skin, hydrated skin, those are, you know, the non-surgical ways.Dr. Hall: I agree with—I think what you're—where you're going with that is healthy skin—Claire: Yes.Dr. Hall: —is pretty skin—Claire: Is pretty skin.Dr. Hall: —no matter what age is.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: I can't give somebody who is 60 the skin of a 20-year-old. If they've got genetics that keeps their 20-year-old skin through 60, that's awesome. But there's nothing that I can do that's going to turn back that clock. We can work towards making that 60-year-old skin really pretty, really naturally pretty.And that's one of the things that you had just talked about, looking good, looking like you don't need makeup because of the texture—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: And things like that. That's actually one of the things that I love seeing in my office is the women that come in with foundation caked on and complaining that there are makeup cracks around their eyes, right, because it's so heavy. And they just—you know, they're looking for Botox. And then six or eight months later, they come in wearing powder or tinted sunscreen because they don't need their makeup anymore—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: —because we've been able to make their skin what it should be at that age.Claire: Right. And it's counterintuitive. You know, like, so many people think like, “Oh, you know something doesn't look right, so they want to pile on more and more and more makeup.” The reality is, you need less makeup when your skin is looking great. The point of foundation is to even out discoloration in the skin; it's not to really affect texture change.So, that happens with skincare. And then if you need a little extra coverage, you know, my favorite is a tinted moisturizer, especially for women, I generally don't speak to age because essentially, we all want the same thing when it comes to makeup, but I will say that the older our skin gets, we obviously have more texture to it and less is actually more. Like you said, you see these women, you know, you're not sure exactly how to speak to it, maybe but, like, you know that her foundation just was not right. She had too much foundation on. She's not fooling anyone; it looks like foundation. Nobody believes that it's actually her skin.If your skin is looking great, you need less of everything. So, a tinted moisturizer is actually the best choice for women as we age. It's not going to sit in lines. It's going to give us just enough coverage to even out any excess redness or discoloration in the skin, but essentially, it's going to allow your skin to come through and to not sit on top of the skin.Dr. Hall: I don't even know where to go with that.Claire: [laugh]. Sorry.Dr. Hall: Agree. Completely agree. I completely agree with all of that.Claire: I concur.Dr. Hall: I concur. So, other than a moisturizer, which you just talked about, what are things that every woman needs? Because I know people are going to look at the title of this, they're going to see your picture, and they're going to say, “I want to tips for makeup.” So, what are some things that most women are going to benefit from? Because if most women are like most women, they've got a makeup cabinet that full of junk that they've been sold when they walk through Sephora or Ulta—Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: —that they don't need.Claire: Right. And they get home and they're like, “Wait. What was this for, again?” And then it just sits—Dr. Hall: Why did I spend $300 on this?Claire: Right. Right. Yeah. First of all, I want to empower everyone listening with the fact that you do not have to buy what you're being sold when you go to either a department store, or Sephora, or Ulta. I guess everyone's buying online now so maybe they're not being, you know, sucked into the sales pitches, but it is so hard to know what to buy when you feel like you're being sold. So, you don't have to buy anything.So, the other thing, nine times out of ten, every woman needs a great under-eye concealer. There's always that one person who's blessed with great genetics and they just don't have any discoloration or darkness under the eyes, but for the most part we all could stand to be brightened a little bit under the eyes. So, a good under-eye concealer, and typically I like for those to be peach or pink-based, so that's going to cut any you know gray, green, blue under the eye. It's going to cut that discoloration and brighten and lift under the eye. And I like multi-use products, so like a lip and cheek, you can use the same blush color as a lipstick.If you have a cream blush, and a little pot, you can put that on your cheeks and pop some on your lips, and two products in one. I think we all need a little brow help unless you naturally have full brows. A brow pencil, or even easier is a wand that you can deposit pigment on and brush through your brows to get just a little extra tint especially for blondes or gingers, they tend to need a little bit more color and their brows because they're so fair. And a mascara. But you know, if I could only pick two things, I would say an under-eye concealer and the lip and cheek product.Adding color to the lips and cheeks. Gives that youthful—you know we all have more color when we're younger, right? And our lips and our cheeks, you want to look like you took an invigorating walk. So, all the color that, you know, the flush that comes to your cheek when you exercise, place that on the apple of your cheeks and put it on your lips, and it does a whole, whole lot, goes a long way.Dr. Hall: It also serves to highlight those areas that tend to lose volume as we age.Claire: Absolutely.Dr. Hall: So, in some ways, faking a little bit more cheek volume, which is very youthful.Claire: Faking. You say faking; I say playing up.Dr. Hall: You say playing up? See?Claire: I can't—Dr. Hall: You say ‘po-taa-to,' I say ‘po-tah-to.'Claire: [laugh]. But you know another tip for aging skin. And again, generally don't speak to age, but anytime you put an illuminator or something that has a glow to it, or something that has pearlescence, or—God forbid—glitter in it, if you put that on your cheekbones and you're concerned with texture in your skin, what is that going to do? Highlights or draws attention to whatever area that you use it in. So, if you put it on a heavily textured area, then it's going to bring that area out.So, I might recommend not using—you know, use something that has hydration to it, that's going to add a glow that looks like it's coming from within, but maybe don't use a pearlescent topical highlighter. Does that make sense to you?Dr. Hall: It does. It does, yeah. Very well. Very well. So, I'm still thinking about this two-for-one product and I'm—Claire: Your mind blown.Dr. Hall: My mind is blown. I'm also—you've inspired me. I'm going to, on the way home today, I'm going to go buy one of those, like, shampoo-body wash combos.Claire: [laugh]. It's the same idea.Dr. Hall: Same—Claire: Yeah.Dr. Hall: Totally same idea.Claire: See, women are masters at multitasking. So, we just continue to blow your mind about how we can multitask.Dr. Hall: I think if most guys take any more shortcuts to their daily grooming routine, like, it would be a bad place to live.Claire: Right.Dr. Hall: Yeah.Claire: It's over.Dr. Hall: Yeah. Yeah. Because you live with three of them, so—Claire: I do.Dr. Hall: —you know how that goes.Claire: I have two small boys and one large boy: My husband. And it's not pretty. It's not pretty in my house.Dr. Hall: I joke around that I'm my wife's oldest child.Claire: I say that same exact thing. But here's the problem. It's not a joke.Dr. Hall: No.Claire: It's the—it's the truth.Dr. Hall: No it is very, very true. Very true. So, I very much want to be respectful of your time, so we can kind of wrap this up. Is there one message that you would like people to take away from our conversation today?Claire: There are no industry secrets out there. They're all on the internet, right? We've talked about that. I think the secret is that it's not that complicated. I think that women need to not let the beauty industry overwhelm them and look for the simple ways that they can play up a few things that they like about themselves, and believe that is enough.Choose a few things that you like about yourself—which means you have to stop and identify a few things that you like about yourself—this is actual homework—and find a way to play that up. If you have great lips, if you love the volume in your lips, lip, and cheek color. Instantly going to bring so much life and color to the face. If you have great brows, play them up. If you have great eyes, play them up.But don't fall victim to the idea that you have to have all the things, that you have to be contouring, and highlighting, and wearing a smokey eye, and have these full brows, and have this—it's too much. All of it's too much. I think simplicity needs to be our goal, not perfection.Dr. Hall: I think that's a very profound message and one that I think we could all learn from. So, where can people find more about you?Claire: My website, clairebalest.com. My Instagram, clairebalest, pretty simple.Dr. Hall: Pretty simple. We'll link all that stuff in the [show notes 00:53:02], so that if you're listening and want to learn more about Claire, you can go there. Do check out her beauty box. That is the one thing that my wife asked for Christmas was one of Claire's beauty boxes. So, check that out; they're super cool. And, again, simplistic and designed to, kind of, bring the best of you out. So Claire, thanks a bunch. We'll have to do this again.Claire: Thank you.Dr. Hall: Thanks for listening to The Trillium Show. You can keep up with the latest on the podcast at jhallmd.com. Be sure to follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you want to connect with us on social media, you can find us at @jhallmd on Instagram and Twitter and @DrHallPlasticSurgery on Facebook. Remember, be the change you wish to see in the world.

Mary Celeste Beall is the proprietor of Blackberry Farm and Mountain, the mother of 5, and an extraordinary woman. Mary Celeste's story of moving through loss to find strength and purpose as she stepped in to lead the family business is nothing short of inspiring.

Acclaimed chef, restaurateur, James Beard Award winner, TV personality and author, Marcus Samuelsson, brought his culinary prowess to the Blackberry Farm kitchen for our annual Passing the Torch event, benefitting the Sam Beall Fellows program. During the event, he sat down for a conversation with publishing veteran Christina Grdovic to talk about his personal journey and his culinary career. 

Chef Jeremiah Langhorne visited Blackberry Farm as the guest chef for our Taste of Summer event. Moderated by writer Jennifer Justus, guests enjoyed a conversation with Chef Langhorne where he shared thoughtful insight on encouraging the next generation of food industry professionals and what he hopes to see in the future for the culinary industry.  

Tata Harper's world-renowned skincare products champion beauty without compromise. On today's episode, Tata Harper joined Blackberry's Senior Director of Guest Experiences, Kelley Harris, to talk about her journey into skincare, her personal routine, life as a mom and a business owner and what keeps her returning to Blackberry. They also talk a little about Tata's new Sensorial Reset Treatments, available for the first time in the country at The Wellhouse at Blackberry Farm.

Chef Dan Barber visited Blackberry Farm as our Scholar in Residence during the 2020 Taste of the South event with the Southern Foodways Alliance. On this episode, you'll hear his talk from the event where he challenges us to think about food and the hospitality industry in new ways.

In the second interview for The Blackberry Podcast's Kitchen Conversations series, Andy Chabot talks with Executive Chef of the Dogwood at Blackberry Farm®, Sarah Steffan. Follow along through Sarah's adventures in the culinary industry that led her to the kitchen at Blackberry Farm.  

Chef Mashama Bailey and John Morisano are the dynamic founding duo of Savannah's The Grey. On this episode, you'll hear a conversation they shared at Blackberry Farm in February 2020 during The Southerner's Table event where they discuss their book, Black, White and The Grey: The Story of an Unexpected Friendship and a Landmark Restaurant. Listen in as they share how gathering around a meal and having conversations is a step in the right direction toward healing the racial divide in the South and the country. Their book released in 2021 and is available now. 

During our Yoga with Charlotte event at Blackberry Farm, Charlotte Hardwick sat down with Blackberry Farm Wellness Lifestyle Expert Hope Parks to share her personal story, expand on her philosophy of wellness and offer tips that help easily and authentically incorporate wellness into our daily routines. 

With this episode, we're beginning a new series, Kitchen Conversations, where Vice President of Food and Beverage Andy Chabot sits down with each of Blackberry's six executive chefs, beginning with Cassidee Dabney, the executive chef of The Barn at Blackberry Farm®. Hear more about Cassidee, the philosophy behind her cooking and what she thinks about current food trends. 

Beginning with an invitation to a calming breath exercise, H(OM)E® founder Chrissy Carter shares a conversation about how to be at home with ourselves. Chrissy joined us at Blackberry Farm for an event inspired by her brand and spoke with guests about how to adapt the idea of meditation, yoga and home to their personal journeys. 

In this episode, @KreisBeall joins host @BrookeLJames to discuss what loss taught her about intentional living and honoring the legacy of those we've lost. In three years Kreis lost her son, her father and her mother-in-law and had a unique experience with each of those losses. Kreis speaks beautifully about what each of those losses showed her, and touches on Brooke's favorite subject, how setting up your affairs is an act of love for those who are left behind. Kreis recently published a memoir The Great Blue Hills of God with Convergent Books which dives deeper into her life. Pick up a copy to read her story.