Our Philosophy
YOLO Journal is a visually immersive print magazine and weekly newsletter with a trusted perspective on travel. We’re all looking for great insider intel from reliable sources with taste and no agenda, and don’t want to spend hours researching ideas and inspiration. So we gather and edit the very best from our well-traveled, discerning network and share their—and our—hard-won recommendations.
A few things to know about us: we’re less interested in what’s new than in what’s really good. We like to find the old-school gems, the soulful and independent hotels without a huge marketing budget, the family-owned trattoria across the street from the one in all the guides with the long line. We reject the idea that there are just a few select places (where everyone else on Instagram seems to be) that you “have to” visit. Ultimately, we hope sharing our discoveries inspires your own travel confidence—encouraging you to trust and follow your own curiosity to uncover beautiful, worthy, unsung places. Which you can then share back with us!
Our Story
Yolanda Edwards, Founder
Travel changed my life—even before I ever really went anywhere. My parents were not travelers, so my only exposure was the annual two-day drive between California and Washington State to visit my grandparents. I would beg my parents to stay at a highway motel with a pool—the glow of the water, the soda and ice machines, staying in a bed that wasn’t my own, the otherness of it all felt magical to me. When I was around 14, I discovered foreign magazines in our local international coffee shop, fell in love with the locations in the fashion stories, and knew I had to find those places! I worked hard (as a piano teacher), made friends with people whose parents were well-traveled, subscribed to the New York Times and cut out and filed every travel article, then made my first trip to Europe by myself when I was 16. I’ve never stopped traveling since!
When I was a junior editor at Condé Nast Traveler in the mid ‘90s, one of my jobs was to meet with photographers who came in to show their work, hoping to get an assignment. I learned so much from these meetings—especially that they had the best travel intel. From then on, I was convinced there should be a magazine that captured the really cool places around the world from people who were just following their curiosity, not a press release.
I worked in magazines for a long time, including at W, Cookie, Martha Stewart, and then back at Traveler again, this time as the creative director. It was a dream job. But when it ended suddenly in 2018, I decided it was time to make the travel magazine I’d always wished existed. I knew there were so many interesting people out there who were traveling in creative ways, and their stories never surfaced. I wanted to bring those to life—honest, personal travel recommendations from people who were super curious and creative, and also not necessarily writers. As for the title…given that my nickname is “Yolo,” in spite of the “You only live once” cliché, how can you not get behind the message?
While I travel a lot (some years close to 300 days!), my focus isn’t solely on my own travels. Even if I was on the road every single day, there’s no way I could cover the world, so I look at my role as being a curator of other people’s travels.
There aren’t many things that make me happier than learning that someone went to a place we suggested, and loved it. When I hear about readers meeting each other in a hotel, restaurant, shop, or beach…and they ask each other how they know about it and they both respond “YOLO,” this is the dream. Creating a community of travelers who support small businesses (and yes, sometimes big) and independently run hotels, and who are willing to go off the well-beaten path—which we all know has great impact on communities that need our travel dollars and our support—is YOLO.
Because you only live once, so let’s make it count.
Our Team
Alex Postman, Deputy Editor, was features director at Condé Nast Traveler. But we first met when we both worked at Martha Stewart and were raising our kids in the same Brooklyn neighborhood. While she loves a really nice hotel room, Alex brings an adventurous approach (she’s happiest camping on safari) and is always up for covering wellness treatments and spa trends—the more out there, the better.
Linda Denahan, Photo Director, also worked with us at Martha Stewart and Condé Nast Traveler, then spent some time at Domino before we lured her back to work with us. Also a Brooklynite, Linda will travel anywhere in the world for elephants and swimming pools, all the better if they’re combined.
Carly Shea, Associate Editor, has done a bit of everything for us since the early days—managing our social media, running to the post office to send copies of the magazine—and now works on our newsletter and website while traveling fairly steadily, from Cuba to Japan, always from the window seat.
Clara Hranek, Social Media Editor, loves taking photographs with an old Nikon and shooting on film, inspired by legends Slim Aarons and Joel Meyerowitz. She is currently studying art history and French at the University of Edinburgh.
Sarah Meikle, Contributing Style Editor, also worked with us at Condé Nast Traveler (before that, she was style director at Glamour and Teen Vogue). She’s now is a fashion consultant and personal stylist for private clients and like us, she loves uniform dressing.
Parker Hubbard, Art Director for Yolo Journal, is also the art director at Vogue and previously was the senior designer at Condé Nast Traveler. He is the designer of two Rizzoli books—Vogue: Postcards from Home: Creativity in a Time of Crisis and The United States of Fashion: A New Atlas of American Style.
Rula Al Amad, Director of Partnerships, is the founder of Magnet Media. She is a fast talking Palestinian raised in Italy and married to an American. She loves cooking, playing cards, and hosting friends and family.
Lauren Fusco Tutino manages everything in the Yolo HQ, from getting the magazines distributed around the world to customer service. She lives in Long Island with her husband, where she can be found walking her dog, Cali, kickboxing and making wine with her family.