By Catzie Vilayphonh  |  Send to Friend

Where do I begin with the introduction of my good friend Yoshi? Well for starters, her real name is Jessica Gueco. She's Filipino not Japanese, she inherited the nickname Yoshi because of all the funky Japanesy hairstyles she'd rock. Secondly she writes for 4 different blogs while holding down a day job at Rokkan designing websites (and you call yourself a professional blogger). Lastly, Yoshi is everywhere, mostly with her camera in hand snapping pictures away. If you dont recognize her, you're probably not getting invited to the right parties. Yup, that's why she's my internet BFF.

Catz: To begin with, name all of the blogs/site you write for.

Yoshi: www.fatlace.com/stayfresh/yoshi
www.itsdesignrelated.com
www.ctothejl.com
www.whattheforks.wordpress.com

Catz: How the hell do you find time to write for them all?

Yoshi: Good question! But it's an easy one. All the blogs are totally different from each other and each one also has its own type of audience. For instance, the Fatlace blog is kind of a compilation of all the blogs put together -- its more about my life, my interests, and random shit. iDR is more for the design/fashion/culture, viewers who really are into the whole typography, photography, and "fashionography." Here I can be more "creative" with my posts and project that side of me. CtotheJL is a blog that I try to contribute to as much as possible, this is more for product reviews, features and stuff like that, more geared toward the street and active lifestyle. Finally, WhatTheForks is just an absolutely insane idea my friends and I came up with (I can't mention the other co-founder because we all pretty much know her -- or of her). But basically, this is an "ode" (more like OBSESSION) to our beloved Twilight. Hehehehe.

Catz: Twilight?

Yoshi: The movie/book!

Catz: Break it down for me.

Yoshi: Basically it's a tween movie/book about this normal girl who moves in with her father to Forks, WA. She encounters this group of kids at her new high school and turns out they're all a "family" of vampires. To cut it EVEN shorter, its a soft-porn version of Romeo and Juliet, but with vegetarian vampires.

Catz: Vegetarian vampires? I'm so lost...

Yoshi: You should read the book, or watch the movie. Please do! Then you can join our blog!

Catz: You grew up in San Francisco and now live in New York. Do you ever miss your hometown?

Yoshi: How can I answer this without hurting anyone's feelings? I miss many parts of SF, mostly just my family. I think I outgrew my hometown way too fast. I was ready to leave by the time I turned 14/15! Its a wonderful place to live and have a family. But its one of those places that gets small real fast. I think it also had to do with the fact that I was able to travel to so many places before graduating from college, so I knew that there was so much more out there for me. I promised myself that once I got the diploma in my hand, I was gonna get out of SF.

Catz: You have a degree in production right?

Yoshi: Nope! I got my degree in Politics (or Political Science).

Catz: Que? then how the hell did you end up in the clothing/design industry?

Yoshi: The politics degree was more for my parents' sake, to say the least. Although I DID dream of becoming an FBI agent or working for the government, my true passion still lay within the creative scope. I knew I had to at least try it before I really committed myself to The Government - duh duhm duuuuuhhmmmm. It started off with Homeroom Clothing first, met Alex (Homeroom's owner) and we shared a lot of the same creative visions. Then, through that, I was able to intern under Mama Clothing, shortlived because I moved about 2-3 months later to NY, but I did learn a lot from Gabriella (Mama's owner).

Catz: When did you realize that you wanted to go in that direction? And move to NYC?

Yoshi: I realized that I wanted to go that route when I got my diploma. It was literally like someone just opened the door to my birdcage and I was set free. I did what my parents wanted me to do (graduate) and I knew I had the skills and mindset to do just about anything, so finding a job wouldn't be THAT hard (so I thought). So why not? I would then get a hand at my creative side, move to NYC, and at the same time acquire a job that would allow me to have Illustrator and Photoshop. That's how I ended up with my first job as an Associate Producer at an Employee Assistance Programming firm on Wall St. (Title sounded good enough plus they'd allow me to mess around with Adobe systems!)

Catz: Sounds like my last job as an attorney's assistant, I was so good at doing all of my boss' presentations they had to hire another secretary to do my office work. Ok, so were you co-designing on the side while you were at the Wall Street firm? How did you build up your network as newbie in NYC?

Yoshi: While at the Wall Street gig, I was still doing stuff for homeroom, and by "stuff," I mean "designing," marketing and sales. When I moved to NY, I was able to befriend a lot of influential people within the streetwear industry by pure chance. Well, mostly through my cousin, Eddie "ixl" -- he's a DJ and introduced me to a ton of people. Many thanks to Chase Whitaker, Nico Reyes, and Jeff Ng, and special thanks to Mark Arcenal, Lenny McGurr, Josh Franklin and Wendy Lam, for giving me a chance and leading me in the right direction. I also worked on weekends at ReedSpace for a few months, to get more income as well as gather more knowledge about the streetwear industry: Who was the target audience, who were the main brands, etc, etc.

Catz: The industry grew really fast and there was a lot of overnight hype fueled by the belief that anybody could do it. You're not currently working for a clothing company/showroom/design collective, but you still maintain your blogs. Was that a way of maintaining a balance and not getting streetwear overload?

Yoshi: Yes, I think so? Well, I was offered to do the buying for Fatlace, which I still do now, and after that, I left Homeroom to concentrate on that as well as bettering myself as a producer at Heavy.com. That's when I really started getting into blogging, so much fun! But yes, I was able to stay in the background without having to rip through the chaos that was streetwear at the time. I liked it that way.


Catz: So how does one pick up on a career that is entirely different from what they studied in college? Was there a lot of re-learning tools and software, or did it come naturally?

Yoshi: Being a producer/project manager requires a TON of logic and common sense, both of which politics was all about, as well. Logic, logic, logic, the ability to think ten steps ahead and ten steps behind. All of this I was able to use in the field I'm in now. A lot of tools I had to learn, but being the tech nerd that I always wanted to be, it wasn't too difficult. Plus, the more you know, the better you'll be able to communicate across all ends, from your client to your tech/development team to your account manager.

Catz: Any advice for our readers who may not be appreciating their psychology/engineering degrees and want to jump into the design biz?

Yoshi: I say, if you're already well on your third year, just FINISH and get it over with! You'll be able to do whatever you want as long as you have a degree. I find that with many jobs nowadays, they don't really see what type of degree you have. They look at your resume first and foremost. Your brain and your skill-set is most important. My best advice is to get yourself out there, don't be afraid to try something new, but just make sure that you are learning from the experience in more ways than one so it will benefit you in the future.

Catz: So where do you see yourself in the future?

Yoshi: I ask myself that almost every other day. I would love to continue to work as a project manager/producer and work my way up. It's such a gratifying feeling to have worked on projects from beginning to end and knowing that you have had a hand in all the steps to get to launch. But, also, I still feen for my creative side. So I hope in the future, I'll be able to intertwine the two somehow. Those kinds of moves I don't plan to make for another couple of years. Also, I may end up back in the Bay Area. I'm missing out on a lot of family stuff and my parents aren't getting any younger, so I'd like to be there with them. Living in a city this big, where you can bump into at LEAST 500 people everyday and not know a single person gets kinda lonely.

Catz: Any last words?

Yoshi: "Special thanks to my girl Catzie for picking my brain and asking awesome questions.