You don’t have to leave the city to live well.
You just need to come home to yourself.

The Story…

The Homesteadista began not as a business, but as a personal inquiry — a search for balance, meaning, and sustainability while living and working in cities.

Like many professional women, I once believed hustle and accumulation were the currencies of success. I pursued intensity in work while trying to hold space for joy, rest, and purpose — until it became clear the tension wasn’t personal failure, but structural.

I initially assumed intentional living required escape: retreats, rural fantasies, or aesthetic minimalism. What I discovered instead was something far more practical and enduring: slow living as a design practice. Not about doing less, but about building ways of working — and leading — that people can actually remain in.

That realization shaped the evolution of The Homesteadista. Founded in 2016 while I was living in Asia, it began as a lifestyle and coaching practice and grew into a women-centered, community-rooted consultancy informed by global experience and close work with educators, organizers, institutions, and civic leaders.

Today, The Homesteadista is guided by one central question:

How do we design organizations, initiatives, and communities that reflect their values not just in mission statements, but in daily practice?

Meet Lisa

I’m a strategist, designer, and facilitator working at the intersection of culture, community, and organizational life. My path has taken me from Philadelphia to Asia and back, shaping a practice grounded in cultural fluency, systems thinking, and deep curiosity about how people build meaning — and power — together.

I hold degrees from Sarah Lawrence College and NYU/ICP, with executive training in values-based leadership and social impact strategy (UPENN, DePaul, Cornell). My work is further informed by professional training with the National Democratic Training Committee (NDTC), leadership development programs including She Should Run and Vote Run Lead, and applied learning in facilitation, de-escalation, chronic disease self-management, and yoga, as well as service on a mayoral advisory board focused on food access (FPAC).

Across my career — as an artist, writer, organizer, and consultant — the through-line has been consistent: helping leaders and organizations design systems of care, participation, and responsibility that allow people to stay engaged over time.

When I’m not working with partners, you’ll likely find me rearranging a room based on feng shui, testing recipes like an amateur Chopped contestant, or savoring the slower rhythms of city life with family, art, and good coffee.