Danielle Cohen knows a thing or two about persistence.
“I always told my mom I was going to have a motorcycle one day,” she laughs. “My will was strong, and I finally got one.”
It was riding motorcycles, in fact, that led Cohen to her current role as the producer and executive director of Urban Air Market, the largest outdoor design festival in the country, and the only independent fashion marketplace focused on sustainable design.
After graduating from college with a degree in sociology and women’s studies, Cohen moved to Thailand to teach English. After moving back to the U.S., she took a more traditional marketing job at a financial management firm. It was in her early twenties that everything changed.
“I was in a really bad motorcycle accident,” Cohen explains. “It shook me up enough to feel like: ‘Life is short. Am I really doing what I want to be doing?’ And the answer was no.”
So Cohen took a risk, quit her job, and moved back home to the San Francisco Bay Area. It was there, surrounded by a creative community, that she realized she could take her interest in marketing and channel it into something she really cared about. For Cohen, that meant working with artists and designers, first as an agent, and then in an event planning capacity.
After producing successful art gallery events and runway fashion shows, Cohen knew she wanted her work to benefit people in some way—and so emerged her interest in sustainability and her mission to help creators reduce waste.
At Urban Air Market, Cohen helps connect independent artists and designers with their ideal customers through a shopping experience that both builds community and supports the local economy. Whether it involves their packaging, delivery, upcycling, recycling, or the way they take the environment into consideration, the designers and businesses participating in Urban Air Market have to incorporate sustainable practices in some way.
What started out as a curated marketplace in San Francisco now includes pop-ups in Portland, Austin, and Brooklyn, and for the first time this year, Atlanta and Los Angeles. Next up: Portland on August 28 and Seattle—a new market—on September 10.
Cohen and her team, based out of WeWork Berkeley, seek out Urban Air Market’s new locations carefully.
“We look for forward-thinking cities with strong creative communities where there are conscious consumers,” Cohen says. As the market continues to grow, taking space at additional WeWork locations across the world just may be a possibility. “Being able to meet other folks and have conversations about what we do—it introduces more people to the idea of attending an Urban Air Market,” Cohen says.
When asked about the tips she’d share with other aspiring entrepreneurs, Cohen acknowledges the benefits of having a more permanent job when starting something new on the side—but she stresses that risk-taking and persistence are key.
“It’s good to make sure you have a cushion, but I think it’s okay to run and leap,” she says. “Don’t be afraid to fall flat on your face—just make sure you get up again and keep trying.”
Photos: Alexander Warnow