Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Quaint Revolt, Sasha-Gay Trusty has guided SWAYE Media through some of the ins and outs of publication. Her passion for connectivity through media is fully apparent as we navigate the cultural significance of publication in this introspective interview with her.
Joyce Chen (Content Writer) recently sat down for a meeting with Sasha-Gay Trusty to discuss her profession and journey to get to where she is today.*
*This interview has been edited for clarity and length
Q: Tell us a little about yourself.
Trusty: I was born in Jamaica. I moved here just shy of my 9th birthday, so I’ve been here on and off since. I went back a little bit for high school, but I came back and finished up here. From there, I went on to community college to initially study criminal justice. Then, I switched to psychology, and in the last leg, I changed it again to journalism. That was really where my heart laid and I wanted to find a way to craft my own career in the arts and on my own terms. So I did that, and then I went on and studied journalism and anthropology at Georgia State. Throughout all of that, even while I was in my associate’s program, I was actually running “Quaint Revolt”. I started that in 2014 and right when I graduated and went to Georgia State, that’s when the transition from just manning it as a blog and trying to craft my own voice to publication happened. I like to say that my business, my education, and my becoming a woman all coincided with one another. Essentially, as I was building myself and getting in tune with who I am, all of that bled into my education and the things I set forth with in “Quaint Revolt”. Since then, I’ve just been living the entrepreneurship life. Journalism was really the thing that helped me piece together all of my interests and all of the little facets of myself that I couldn’t quite synthesize earlier on.
Q: Can you elaborate more on your career?
Trusty: I am the founder and CEO of “Quaint Revolt Media”. We’re a publisher and lifestyle brand for disruptive creatives! I say disruptive creatives in terms of people who use creative work to build a life or design lives of their own. Making a living, yes, but also just building a life based on your whole identity. I think “Quaint Revolt” is a great site of collaboration and community and I made sure I created a safe space for people to be and express themselves through creative work. I love the work that I do and my whole heart is in it.
Q: So what inspired you to start “Quaint Revolt”?
Trusty: At the time, I was really trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my journalism. I had always been in the arts. I was in a creative collective with my friends in high school. We just always found ways to band together and create spaces for ourselves. As an arts and culture journalist, I really wanted to figure out what was happening. I wanted to know the Atlanta creative culture, I wanted to know who’s who, what’s what, where’s where. And again, I’m from Jamaica, and even though I grew up here, I’m not native to the culture of Atlanta. So there was still a lot of historic context, you know, just history and things I didn’t understand. I wasn’t present for the evolution of the arts culture here, so I set out to document everything around me and tried to understand this culture in its totality. From there, I found myself analyzing cultural production in Atlanta to how it is in the diaspora as a whole. For me, growing up in Jamaica, cultural production is a daily occurrence. It could be something as minor as my DJ neighbor playing music during lunchtime when everyone’s talking a break, and we might dance, and then we’ll go about our day. Just little pockets of creativity bringing people together and I noticed all those similarities here. I really wanted to discover how these things happen, who facilitates it, and I set forth with the company to do that. I wanted to know, I wanted to understand, I wanted to see, I wanted to experience all of it. I think the best way to do that as a journalist is to just explore, interview, and talk to people.
I wanted to know, I wanted to understand, I wanted to see, I wanted to experience all of it. I think the best way to do that as a journalist is to just explore, interview, and talk to people.
That was honestly the biggest inspiration. I wanted to amplify voices that I thought were overlooked but were doing exceptional community building through creative work.
Q: Has the vision for “Quaint Revolt” changed much from its original conception?
Trusty: Absolutely. I think when I started, it was more personal. It was a blog, of course. I collected magazines, I’ve grown up with magazines, I’m a big consumer and advocate for published goods. I spent a lot of time with images and art and magazines, really. I always had a love and a passion for publication. But I think when I started, I was trying to hone myself as a writer and thinker. Again, I was in the social sciences, so I had a lot of thoughts. I was reading a lot about culture through my anthropology and African-American studies classes, learning about the diaspora and the inner weavings of that. So, really, the blog was a way to express my own ideas and thoughts, what I was doing academically, and just in my career. It absolutely evolved into me trying to solve a problem. I think when I started, I was trying to solve a problem for myself, but through going out there and meeting people, I realized there were a lot more of us lacking platforms that were focused on our work [and] perspectives as people of color, as people navigating the creative industries from very particular socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds. Those things really inspired me and it evolved the mission of the company. It became something much bigger, more so about providing a service and filling the need for the larger collective versus me exploring myself and all the things I’m drawn to.
Q: What is your experience like working at “Quaint Revolt”? Have you gained any new knowledge?
Trusty: Oh my gosh, absolutely. I don’t even know where to begin. Especially in the beginning- I mean, even though I’m a few years in, I’m still very much in the beginning of being a business owner. I’m still learning those things. I’m only three years in on that regard, and only one year in on actively focusing on the entrepreneurship side. I will say that over time, you have so much to learn that you have no choice but to learn. For me in particular, I didn’t have any guidance in my family in terms of how to do the things I wanted to do. I come from a very traditional background. My family is an everyday middle-class, working family split up between here, Jamaica, and all over the world. We’re all kind of spread out, with a lot of nurses, bankers, service workers, things like that. So I had no guidance in regards to building a website. I had to teach myself everything, from the beginning. I taught myself how to build websites, craft my own brand. I did my own graphics, I taught myself literally everything I needed. I set up my company before I even picked up an entrepreneurship book. I learned literally all of the foundational things in terms of being a creative, in terms of being a business owner, in terms of being an academic. I taught myself everything and I did that because I was eager to. I’ve learned things that I could not have learned in a classroom, and throughout this journey, I’ve learned so much. Not just in terms of skills, but also just about myself. As an entrepreneur, my business is so deeply connected to who I am as an individual, so along the way as the business evolves, as I evolve, and I notice that my personal progress is directly tied through my company’s progress. In learning about myself, I understand my company a lot better and I’m able to consistently refine it to match where I am, where we are as a team, and overall, let that consistent growth reflect through the company as well.
Q: What do you enjoy most about working at “Quaint Revolt”?
Trusty: I enjoy the connection. I enjoy my role as editor in chief more than being founder and CEO. I love sitting down and talking with my team and working through their pitches, reading their first drafts, and just being hands-on. You know, the simple things that really remind you of why it’s important. It’s hearing people, talking to people after an article is published. I love the process of bringing ideas into tangible experiences, or transforming ideas into products. Whether its a media product, something that you read, or see, or watch. Or, even if it’s a live experience where we’re here and we’re networking and talking. Bonding over childhood to career experiences and what’s next in our journeys. I love the connection part of the work I do; that’s the most rewarding thing to me because it feeds me. I love seeing people feeling validated. I think that as long as I can do that with my work, I’m going to always be doing it.
I love seeing people feeling validated. I think that as long as I can do that with my work, I’m going to always be doing it.
Q: Have you encountered any major challenges that you didn’t previously anticipate when jumping into the publication field?
Trusty: Oh, yeah. Again, I kind of just thrusted myself into this with no playbook, so I didn’t even know I was an entrepreneur. Whether I understood it or not, everything was a challenge. I had to figure out the language and I had to figure out how to run a team. The first time I tried it out, it didn’t work so well. Then I had to figure out budgeting and raising money. It was a lot, so it’s a constant challenge. A lot of this time, while I was working on the company, I was still in school, so this year is really the first time this has been my only focus. I’ve never had freedom to deal with challenges in business. I’ve also had to deal with personal challenges. In the beginning, I had a long-term relationship, I had family, and I had school. It was dealing with all of the consistent challenges of learning what my cup of tea was, learning our processes, crafting our processes from scratch. But then, there are all of these other hurdles. There are things personally happening in your life and then there are the challenges with the business. It’s a constant challenge. Let’s say, in the beginning, one of the first things were “Oh, I don’t have a team.” Okay, well now you’ve acquired a small team, then you have the challenges of “We don’t have the budget to keep this team on staff for a long time.” Now we need to figure out how to fundraise. Every challenge is different, but it’s a constant challenge. What I will say that I’ve learned is to go with the flow. Go with the rhythm of the challenges, because those are consistent and the more you go through it, the more quick you are to handle it.
Go with the rhythm of the challenges, because those are consistent and the more you go through it, the more quick you are to handle it.
Q: What are your main goals currently?
Trusty: My overall goal right now is to provide spaces for people who need it. I like to be helpful in the right ways, as long as it’s effective. For me, my overall goal in life is to say I did something- I helped people feel good about themselves, I helped people believe in their work and believe in their potential -that’s my goal.
Q: Regarding SWAYE, why did you take on the mentor role?
Trusty: It was a no-brainer, honestly! I’m a big advocate for independent media. I love the community building that media has inherently. As a team, as an outlet with a very particular perspective that’s speaking to a very particular audience, there tends to be more of a deeper connection to media like that. For me, I wish I had more mentors earlier on who were interested in the things I was interested in. I had mentors when I was younger, but they were more so like life coaches who grew me professionally. I took this on with SWAYE because I know the importance of seeing someone do what you’re interested in doing. I think you guys are ahead of your time. When you see people trying to do something that’s amazing, why not chime in? For me, it felt natural to take this on. I think it wouldn’t make sense if I didn’t. To see young kids form something that is positive, that is helpful to their communities, why wouldn’t I take that on? I believe in helping others anyway, and the simple fact that you guys just reached out and were even open to talking with me- I felt like that was an honor. At the end of the day, as a person in media, I always want to convince other people to go into media. If you’re interested in media, we definitely need more independent voices. We need more outlets, we need more communities centered around special interests. I’m very happy to be of some kind of assistance to you guys.
Q: Do you have any words of wisdom for someone who might have aspirations of working in the publication field?
Trusty: First thing I always say is work on your own voice. Master the foundations, especially if you’re working in publication as a writer or journalist. If you’re in the visual side, I would say master your aesthetic. In order for you to master your aesthetic or voice, you need to have mastered the basics. Have a good grip on grammar, AP style, all that good stuff. But then, also focus on making your voice your own. I think one of the things that I was really opposed to with my exposure to journalism is that they all want you to talk in a very particular way, especially when being in news or heavy journalism. They require a particular style. I think that’s very limiting in connecting. This entire world is a melting pot. It always has been, but now we’re in this hyper-technologically advanced era. Everything’s connected, so we can’t keep projecting the same voice, the same tone, the same inflection, the same looks. We need to see a variation of people physically, yes, but we also need to have our own voices, speak in our own ways. If you want to be in the publication field, know the basics well enough so that you can craft your own voice and your own aesthetic going forth with your work. Something that is distinct to you, so that when people see your work, you can start building a portfolio. I would also say absolutely research. Do the business research, do the market research, do the industry research. Gather as much information as possible because that will inform everything you do. You can’t match your goals with what the current climate is if you aren’t aware of the ins and outs of your industry. Think like an admin with everything, you need to know how everything works. Make sure that you’re feeding yourself with information about your craft. Being knowledgable will always save you. Always be learning.
Make sure that you’re feeding yourself with information about your craft. Being knowledgable will always save you. Always be learning.
Check out Sasha-Gay Trusty’s work on “Quaint Revolt” here:
Sasha’s Socials:
Quaint Revolt’s Socials: