The LA Process

The LA Process

“In Los Angeles, your eye keeps reaching for an end point and never finds it, because it doesn’t exist.” — Susan Orlean

Los Angeles has always felt like my second home.

I grew up on the East Coast and was fortunate enough to be able to travel to many amazing places while growing up, but I didn’t get to experience LA until I was 25 years old.

From then on, I couldn’t stop going back. I met some of the greatest people, forever friends, and was introduced to the world of wellness and healing. I remember going to the Elixir Bar at Erewhon on Beverly Boulevard in West Hollywood and being asked, “How do you feel? How do you want to feel?” It was as if no one had ever asked me that.

This was my first foray into the world of tinctures and herbal concoctions. It was a time before wellness-as-a-commodity; it was still more of a lifestyle.

I learned so much about myself through the many people I met in Los Angeles—healers, skin experts, farmers, creators, you name it, I researched it. It was really when my healing journey began. I used to go to Bodhi Tree on Melrose for books and just to hang out, and I remember when my boss took me to the Inn of the Seventh Ray in Topanga. It seemed like a whole new world. She had been going there regularly since the late ‘80s and it was such a specific vibe.

Fifteen years ago, I thought I was finally going to move to LA. After all, that had been the plan since five years before, when I quit my job, went to Bali to get yoga certified and then expected to make my way to the West Coast. I even tested it out, living there for sporadic six-month stints.

But life never happens as you expect. Instead, my friend who I traveled there with ended up moving, but I stayed in NYC and wound up starting Live The Process. And the rest is history.

Still, from the beginning, I knew I would only be willing to produce the collection in California. It was really the epicenter for manufacturing and yoga at the time, a moment before the word “athleisure” had ever been coined. My partner and I figured out how to make it happen, creating everything from the fabrics to the cut and sew of the clothing in LA. To this day, we reside in Los Angeles while producing our collection.

Most recently, we felt it was time to focus on the world of Live The Process and the community we had already created through all of our interviews and stories for The Journal. How could we bring these to life, hold small gatherings and have people come and shop and experience the collection and ethos?

We decided to plant roots and see what would happen, establishing our Venice Beach House as an LA destination for likeminded seekers on the West Coast, the community that we love. As always, it’s been a process that continues to evolve.

We’re so grateful to the world of Los Angles—and California, in general—for contributing invaluably to our vision and identity, so we decided to spend the month of December highlighting the people we know, love and are still discovering in the city. (It’s not just because we’re dreaming of sun while freezing in NYC, either!)

At Live The Process, December is a love letter to LA. Life always has a way of coming full circle, as is this complicated year. My process began back in 2003 with my introduction to a city that would bring a lifetime of meaning, and here we are now.

 

x Robyn

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