Spotted: Downtown Oakland
What are you up to today?
I'm leaving work right now. I work at Pandora. I'm going to meet my roommate in Berkeley, and we're going to Urban Ore. We're looking for a hallway table and other fun things. We heard that they get all the good stuff on Fridays, so that's where I'm off to — maybe cocktails after!
Sounds like a good plan! It's fun to get lost there.
Oh yeah, it's crazy! The toilet section, my favorite! Just kidding. It's just weird that there's a whole section of old toilets.
I was just going to ask you what your favorite section was!
There's also a weird section that's just a bunch of old walkers piled on top of each other — kind of weirds you out once you walk past it. But, actually, the furniture section is really good. There's a lot of midcentury modern stuff that, if I had more space, I'd buy!
So what are some of your favorite things to do in the area?
I actually live in the city. I mean, everyone's a foodie up here, so I just like to eat, you know? I'm not special that way.
Any places you've discovered lately?
Well there's the neighborhood shop up where I live in Nob Hill called The Nook. It's a chill little coffee shop, but they have an amazing happy hour with $1.50 PBRs. It's not really a foodie place, but it's comfortable! And it's up on Hyde, the street car comes by with its bell ringing, the street is tree-lined, and it's just a lovely little spot. What else? The Liho Liho Yacht Club is probably the best thing nearby. It's a Hawaiian-Polynesian-American fusion.
Oh wow! Both are in San Francisco. What spots have you discovered lately in Oakland?
Oakland, my favorite is probably Duende. That place is delicious — amazing paella.
What's your occupation?
I work on the advertising side at Pandora.
What do you like most about it?
I get to work with music every day, which is amazing. We have our curation and artist partnerships departments, so it's nice to connect with people on an emotional level every day. If I were just doing straight advertising, it'd be very cut and dry. But since the advertising is coming through music, I feel like I actually get to touch people through what I do. That's kind of hard to find in advertising. And just the people are cool! The culture is great.
What's some of your favorite music currently?
I'm one of those people who discovers old music and loves it. This feels like a shameless plug, but we have a feature soul channel that's really good and it's helped me discover FKA Twigs. I love her. That's the latest one that I've found.
Have you always worked in music related jobs?
No, I started off in the mobile app development space. I was with a small app developer, and then they wanted to monetize it. I graduated when mobile apps were in their infancy, and people were trying to figure out how to put ads in them. That's how I ended up getting into mobile advertising. It was just a random $8-an-hour internship that just turned into a career like sheer dumb luck! [laughs]
I also wanted to ask you, what's something that's caught your interest lately?
Man, I have really random hobbies. I just recently got back into piano, which is strange.
So you've been playing it forever?
Well, everyone plays it as a kid, and then after listening to so much music and just being like, I wish I could play this, I finally broke down went to Guitar Center one day and bought a piano. I also bought some "teach yourself" books that are surprisingly easy. So there's that. I've also been traveling a lot lately. I think everything about Scandinavia — the design, the food, the landscape — is really getting to me. And once you go there, (we did Stockholm, Copenhagen, and Reykjavik) it's inspiring and overwhelming at the same time because nothing looks like that here.
In what way?
Well landscape-wise, it's either these rolling green pastures, or flat, dry, brown, looks-like-you're-on-Mars landscape. Like from the Keflavik airport to Reykjavik. And the food is just amazing - fresh and more seafood-based.
So the food is still very regional?
Yes, definitely. You can still find whale on most menus. That and fermented shark and puffin. They eat some weird stuff.
Did you try any of that while you were out there?
No — pickled herring was the only thing I would do. But the rest I was like, no, I'm good. They have enough smoked salmon to go around. I'll just stick with that — that's approachable.
I also wanted to ask you about your personal style, because I love this jumpsuit!
Thanks! I actually got this at Anthropologie a while ago — it's Splendid. They're like pajamas, so I can wear it to work on casual Friday and it's OK.
It's really nice! Your sandals are really cute too.
These are actually old Steve Madden!
No way! They go really well with the jumpsuit. And those two-tone sunglasses!
These are House of Harlow, I think.
Yeah, I like the olive green shade.
It was an interesting color. I've always liked cat-eye glasses, and it's a nice blend of wayfarer & cat-eye. Plus the two-tone! I was like, these are sweet.