How to be more with less 🍵

Dear First name / creative,

 

In business, many people tend to associate success with scale—quantified in hours, projects, or dollars. Everything measured against a standard. The more days you work, the more clients you take on, the more zeroes you tack onto your monthly revenue, the better. Or so they say.

 

I may be an entrepreneur, but I know better. There comes a point where you have to pause and reflect on what you want out of it, not what others expect from you. For me that was when I decided to take a step back from my digital agency and establish Squarestylist in its place. I haven’t looked back ever since.

 

My success at the end of the day was not in how many more hours I could give up or how many more services I could offer. In fact, it was the opposite. I find myself peeling back the layers, paring down the unnecessary demands I put on myself until I am left with the essentials.

 

Success can also mean giving yourself space—the choice to go where your curiosity leads you instead of blindly chasing the next traditional milestone.

 

Here’s your reminder that we don’t need to have it all. We just need enough to sustain our simple joys in life, whatever they may be.

 

 

When it comes to selecting tools for your tech stack, these were the words of holistic brand designer Melissa Yeager that stayed with me.

 

As a guest expert on my signature program Standout Squarespace, Melissa talked about her decision to migrate her courses from Teachable to Squarespace Courses. While Teachable seemed to fit her studio needs on paper, the platform padded on features that she didn’t need but kept the overall experience lackluster.

 

She values visual continuity in her courses above all as a designer so she felt that keeping everything unified and branded in Squarespace Courses was best for her.

 

I believe the same principle applies to choosing any platform that works for you, as in Flodesk vs. ConvertKit or Squarespace vs. Shopify. Remember that it’s not always about which side can stack up on “more features,” but about which choice aligns best with your priorities.

More importantly, it’s alright to change your mind once you notice that your past decisions no longer serve your current situation.

 

You can read up on Melissa’s thoughts about Squarespace Courses in her blog post below.

 

Naklé—named after its founder, Stephanie Naklé—is a multi-cultural studio that specializes in shaping luxury brands across the world’s major cities. Laura of Studio Stellar steps in to provide a white-glove web design service befitting a renowned creative director to labels such as Armani, Dior, Estée Lauder, Hermès, and La Mer.

 

The approach to the site is decidedly editorial and minimalistic with haute couture imagery of her featured projects against a handpicked serif font and a muted cream backdrop. The subtle animations and color transitions add a nice touch to your scrolling experience.

2.1 Nakhlé is Laura’s first attempt at building Squarespace sites with Standout®️ techniques such as the pop-out navigation, sticky images, change background on scroll, and other hover effects.

Laura is gracious enough to share details about her design and development process in our showcase. Do check out her entry below and let us know what you think!

 

Studio Snippets

3.1 Calling cards embossed with the brand’s new wordmark—one of the few tactile forms of memorabilia from our rebrand here at Squarestylist.

Squarestylist is about to turn five, so our team is grateful for your continued support in the organic growth of the brand from personal project to creative resource library. I’ve taken the time to document the process behind this careful rebranding—an unearthing of our core values instead of a departure from our humble roots.

 

We’ll be unfolding more brand experiences for you in the near future, so I hope you stay curious about what lies ahead.

 

 

My typical day used to start with a cup of strong coffee to get myself ready for work. It gets the job done. But I’m not fond of how it gives me energy in frenetic bursts; it can make me anxious for several hours just to disorient me from the caffeine crash right after.

 

These days, rather than reaching for a second cup of coffee I’m discovering the wonders of macha—and the small change is making all the difference. Tea still wakes me up, but unlike my regular caffeine fix this eases me into my first task with a calm, focused energy that lasts longer into the day.

4.1 Taking in the earthy, nutty texture of matcha each morning feels meditative to me—it allows me to slow down and contemplate my plans before I work on any task.

Now it’s part of my ritual to whisk myself a cup of frothy, ceremonial-grade matcha from Pique before heading to my desk. Any other matcha enthusiasts? I’d love to hear from you.

 

What does success look like to you? I hope that this newsletter invites you to think about what inspires you each day. May your studio always work for you, not the other way around.

 

Rache