I’ve always wanted to be a designer but my family had no money for the schools, so I started working right away and learned on the side.
Before, around 17, still in high school, I got on Facebook right when it arrived in Italy and somehow already saw the potential so I used it to sell my own creations (clothes and jewellery at the time). That, plus 4 years working in a shop and making graphics for them as an employee, made me understand I was interested in communication and marketing. I just had no language for it yet.

Once I’d saved enough, I left to take a marketing course, and was lucky enough to study with professionals who worked with relevant Italian companies and taught real, practical basics.

Got hired right after into an agency. This meant 3 years juggling the lead of a Twitter project for a big client, social media management for smaller ones, and helping the design team, but I was already picking up private clients on the side because working in marketing only made clearer that I wanted to start something of my own.

So after 3 years I left a stable job to go freelance and finally study design properly at a private school I could now afford.

Now, imagine studying and being freelance for the first time while trying to pay rent: I was clueless about running a business. I knew my craft, but I was already demanding too much from my brain and body without realizing it.

Then COVID happened too, Italy in full lockdown, and all that work, stress and uncertainty built up. That’s when I burned out: 2 months off, therapy, a slow rebuild from scratch…

This was actually where things started changing. A colleague I’d been sharing clients with, proposed we start an advertising studio together. suddenly we were two founders, with external freelancers and clients across Italy and Europe to manage. For the first time I had proper structure and a much more honest relationship with my own limits (thanks therapy!).

It worked well.
After two years though, I left to follow my life partner to the Netherlands, and also because given my values, I started feeling the need to actually work with people whose missions I believed in, rather than yet another big company campaign.

So I took my time settling here, spent a few years as an employee to build a base without rushing it, and then started my own coaching and branding practice. Much happier, much more aware and with a very healthy relationship with work, finally.