Dispatch: A Superbowl Sabbatical
Beauty and Intellectualism with Adeline Koh, PhD of Sabbatical Beauty
The Eagles are headed to the Superbowl today, which means I’m still on my Philadelphia winter sabbatical. Although I think televised sports are mostly rigged and stupid, this is a delicate cultural matter for all Philadelphians—a holiday week I’ve been honoring by default. Gotta be respectful of my people, you know?
Praying for a win tonight so I don’t have to deal with the city being both depressed and cold.
The last time the Eagles won in 2018, I was cocktail serving downtown with a budding brand idea very few people took seriously. I was still living with my mom in North Philly and my biggest goal at that point was to just move out. This was when my sister and I used to fight about who got to use the kitchen — me with testing out my skincare and her with her catering.
In hindsight, 7 or so years is eons for your life to change, even if it doesn’t feel like you’re making strides in that moment. I used to put so much pressure on myself to move a mountain and spent so many days defeated wondering how I was going to move the needle on my business and in my life. Those days feel light years away, but they really aren’t!
If you’re stuck in a cycle of feeling like this, just keep moving. It still blows my mind how much ground you can cover as long as you just do something.
This time around, not only have I quit my business, but I’ve made an entire career of whoring myself out over it — which brings me to a new connection I made.
Speaking of Sabbaticals...I met with Adeline Koh, Ph.D. of Sabbatical Beauty on a mild Friday night for dinner and wine at a cozy little Italian spot in Fitler Square. I used to take my Matichon to the nearby dog park, back when my days revolved around figuring out what the hell I was trying to do with my life.
Adeline came into my orbit through the Beauty Independent piece I wrote last month on why I shut my business down. She messaged me on here afterward, hoping to connect, and was surprised when I confessed that I had quietly admired her brand as aspirational when I was coming up as a local founder. Like me, she started out to solve her own skincare needs — formulating her own clean products here in Philly — but back then, I was far too petrified of connecting with like minds; I would have never reached out. The irony that as two Philadelphia founders, we’re only just meeting through the internet and not through the city!
If you’re an early-stage founder reading this, take this as your sign:
Don’t wait five or six years like I did, hoping for the universe to do the heavy lifting. Just reach out! It’s funny how once the ice is broken, you may realize you were both fans of each other all along—and there was never a reason to make it a bigger deal than it was to begin with.
Over glasses of velvety Malbec, Adeline shared that she was from Singapore, one of my favorite places travelled. “I can see that,” Adeline said, to which I laughed. What would give her the impression that I’d love an obscenely expensive city-state built on exclusivity and luxury?
Instantly, we connected over the fact that neither of us ever intended to end up in beauty. Adeline got her start in academia with a focus on race & gender studies, which sparked my curiosity. I tend to find myself drawn to founders with unconventional entryways into beauty—maybe because I see a bit of myself in them. There’s something fascinating about how people who weren’t groomed for the industry still find themselves holding steady on the wheel.
Adeline’s Sabbatical Beauty is several press mentions and beauty awards deep, yet she isn’t hyper-fixated on participating in industry politics. She’s managed to build something awesome, seemingly without the desperate need for validation that so many founders chase.
She told me that in the early days of Sabbatical Beauty, industry figureheads encouraged her to change so much about her brand—something I also resonated with deeply. When you’re starting out, it’s so easy to second-guess yourself, to be overly influenced by people who seem to have the authority and knowledge you don’t yet see in yourself. She felt immense pressure to conform, even hiring an expensive branding agency at one point, layering on all the bells and whistles, until her brand was stripped down to something she barely recognized — all this only to realize none of it truly moved the needle.
"Yeah, at the end of the day, people don’t care about that shit," I agreed.
I had been through a similar cycle myself—thinking I needed to do more before realizing the extra stuff was mostly unnecessary. The aesthetics, the overthought branding, the industry-pleasing tweaks—none of it mattered as much as I once believed.
The truth is, if your product is good, people will buy it. The biggest mistake you can make is being overly invested in things your customer doesn’t even think twice about.
We talked about how the people most passionate about their craft often have the hardest time fitting into industry norms. Beauty, for all its emphasis on innovation, still operates like a sorority, where success often hinges on how well you play along. What happens when you don’t have the desire to participate?
I find myself able to gracefully navigate both sides of the field — insider enough to understand the game, outsider enough to see through it. Adeline attributed this to my Libra rising (she’s also mathematically skilled at reading the stars), and honestly, I get her plight. The industry can feel absurd in that way, part machine, part mirage.
I shared with her a prediction I’ve been holding onto: the industry will start to reward those who can market indirectly by way of being themselves. Intellectualism is becoming the new marketing vehicle (ahem, the rise of brands migrating to Substack?). It’s no longer just about what you show, but what you know. Thought leadership, think pieces and, long form content will become the new bridge to success.
As the goalpost shifts for what is considered aspirational, so does the way we decide what—and who—we’re sold on. The product itself is no longer the goal. We’ve been inundated with consumerism, even more so thanks to the accessibility of acquiring things (hello, Afterpay, Klarna — any form of paying in 4).
Now, social and cultural capital by way of thought are the new ways to signal status. People want to buy from those leading the charge, not just selling a product.
In other words - intellectualism is the new top of funnel.
Brands that can manage to spark conversation, challenge ideas, and offer perspective will be the ones to soon capture attention. I encouraged Adeline to keep not fitting in — and if you’re a founder that considers yourself a misfit in this industry, I’d encourage you to do the same.
With this, Adeline brought up a French sociologist she was certain I’d love—and probably already knew—Pierre Bourdieu. The moment she mentioned him, I knew we were locked in. My love for Bourdieu often goes ignored, mostly because few people ever know who he is! But his work has profoundly shaped how I think about class, culture, and the invisible hierarchies that dictate taste. Adeline allowed me to reflect on my time at The New School studying his theories on social capital, distinction, and the ways in which power is embedded in the mundane choices of daily life.
From there, our conversation drifted beyond beauty and into the shifting landscape of consumerism—specifically, how intellectual arrogance is becoming a defining force in what people buy and why. The rise of conservative core, with its emphasis on restraint and tradition as a new form of status signaling, suggests that consumption is no longer about the accumulation of goods but the discernment of which goods are worth acquiring. In an age of oversaturation, selectivity is emerging as the ultimate luxury.
Adeline Koh, Founder of Sabbatical Beauty
I swear, the best founder conversations are rarely about strategy. They’re about the unseen forces that shape what we create and why.
Our energy must have been radiating because sometime around dessert, the restaurant owner, George, floated over with complimentary Limoncello. I’ve never turned down a gift from an Italian man—a fitting gesture for the circumstances. He must have sensed that whatever we were percolating on deserved a proper wash down.
As my thoughts began to move at more of a delay, I was reminded why I have such a strong affinity for founders. When I’m around a fellow visionary, the spark always manages to return.
Lately, I’ve been going to sleep late, doomscrolling TikTok, trying to will myself back into creativity. Meeting with Adeline pulled me out of that fog, bringing me back to a feeling of inspiration and connectivity—something I had lost my grip on these past couple of weeks. And what I took away from our evening was a simple reminder: whenever I don’t feel the spark, there’s no need to panic. It will circle back, eventually.
As we parted ways, Adeline left me with a gentle nudge: to lean into my love for the unfamiliar. A spiritual reminder that my personal growth flourishes in spaces of otherness, uncertainty, and the unknown.
Such a good read! I'm fed.