A story of resilience and hard work.
I am a second generation Chinese American born and raised in San Francisco. My parents immigrated to the US in their 20s from a rural village in China and my dad worked as a construction worker and my mom a seamstress. I am the first in my family line to graduate college and the first to travel overseas. I grew up in a very traditional Chinese household where my parents valued education, stability, traditional gender norms, and dismissed anything unconventional and what they deemed as “risky,” ie. being an artist. Unfortunately as a natural born artist with a love for piercings and colored hair, my parents and I never saw eye to eye when it came to how I should look, act, or even what career to pursue.
This only fueled my desire to show them that I could in fact be successful while pursuing my passion. Dreaming big became my motto as I powered through my early 20s determined to find a career through photography.
In 2014 I made a name for myself in the industry through working with an early fashion influencer that spearheaded the space when ‘influencers’ were still nascent. In those four years I developed a special niche expertise of creating digestible, sharable imagery that was relatable and beautiful on social.
In 2016 I branched out and started my own production agency. I expanded into the beauty industry and became a full service agency that produced beauty campaigns for Sephora brands. I recognized that the market was shifting from giant conglomerates to grass-roots startups in the beauty industry. Beauty brands needed a look and feel that was social-first, audience-first, a relatable down-to-earth aesthetic, and not the traditional highly produced ‘Commercial’ work we are used to seeing on TV. I first started by working with indie beauty brands that went viral, like Summer Fridays, and gained the attention of large beauty powerhouses that needed a rebrand. We now work with Sephora brands like Fenty, Necessaire, Biossance, Vegamour, Dr Dennis, just to name a few.
In 2021 I partnered with my architect husband to start a photo studio project. Living in LA where anything photogenic instantly becomes viral, combined with social media’s trending need to shoot “lifestyle content,” it only made sense that we brought Iro House to fruition. Iro House became an instant hit as it was the first photo studio on market with plaster walls and arched doorways. We’ve had celebrity guests like Hilary Swank and Sophia Amoruso and brands like Talentless, Tatcha, and Nuface shoot in our space, just to name a few.
In 2022 we are set to launch two more photo studio spaces after seeing the success of Iro House.
It’s been 10 years since I first graduated college and set out to pursue a career in the arts. I have so many more ideas and ambitions I want to continue to pursue but I’m happy to say I can look back and feel extremely proud of my accomplishments. This is just the beginning.
I hope that I would be able to inspire others with my story. I want young Asian American girls to know that regardless of your station in life and limitations in resources, I truly believe that through hard work and grit all dreams are possible.