photography | DEOGRACIAS LERMA
KYLE WOLFF | SHOP OWNER, PHOTOGRAPHER, MAMA | CINCINNATI, OH
What was your first job?
I started working at the Skyline Chili when I was 14 years old. At first, I ran the register and bussed tables. The smell of Skyline lived in my hair. I ate an obnoxious amount of shredded cheese straight off the block. Lots of Mountain Dew. I worked there for a handful of years. It was the hangout in high school, so a lot of parking-lot debauchery happening on the sidelines. Great tips. I ate enough Skyline in those years to carry me through this lifetime.
If you weren’t a ________, what would you be doing?
If I wasn’t a (shop owner/photographer/mama), I’d be rolling through backroads of foreign countries with my camera on my neck, no cell phone on body, taking in the smells, sounds, and the culture. I’d find a vibrant café to take notes in a small notebook that fits in my back pocket, scribbled in pencil. I love traveling and documenting everything around me and miss it dearly. So I’d probably a be a photojournalist or a travel writer. Maybe question 11 will come true. Know any editors?
Or a berry farmer in Maine or Oregon. Also nice.
What did you eat today?
Bfast: Snowville Creamery Yogurt (addicted) w/ peaches, blueberries, seeds, chocolate chips & cinnamon.
Snack (not much of a luncher): Grit tots from Proud Hound with the mustard aioli (truly incredible). Tomatoes from the garden. Pistachios. A meat stick. Apple slices.
Dinner: Picnic spread at Washington Park with my family and buds under swaying tree branches, paired with a light breeze and Willy Tea Taylor in overalls slinging story songs.
What is your favorite place to grab a bite?
My parent’s house. Mom’s cooking. Buffet style. Surrounded by family. Cousins running around. Tripping over the tall dog. Finished with a selection of pints from Golden Gelato on the back porch as the sun falls over the hill.
What is a skill or talent that you’ve always wanted to learn?
I want/need to relearn how to sew. It’s been a minute. I’ve made curtains and little things. But I have so many projects/ideas I want to do for the shops. It’s always on the backburner. Maybe, maybe this winter when life slows down.
What inspires you to create?
Being around other creatives. Community is such an important factor for creation, and perhaps that’s why I haven’t been very creative in a while. Motherhood is a beast in ways I never anticipated. It’s incredibly fulfilling in so many ways, but very isolating and hard to find time for creative endeavors. But I’m coming out of the trenches. I had a good mama friend tell me you kind of lose yourself the first two/three years creatively, and then you come out stronger on the other side. I feel like we’re getting there. And I’m excited to see what’s in store.
Also, just faces. There are so many good faces out there. People are quietly poetic in their day-to-day grit–sitting on a stoop in good light smoking a cig. That’ll slow me down when I’m driving.
What are you reading at the moment?
Too many books at once. I am the person who checks out a stack of books at the library every week or two. There are piles of books around our tiny, little house. The book I return to every year is The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yuknavitch. That book smacked me on the face and gave me permission to do things with words that I didn’t think were legal.
Any movies or shows you’d recommend?
Honestly, not much of a movie/show person. When I’m sick, I tend to binge 90’s suspense movies. The Fugitive and Speed are my top two. The 90s did it right in the suspense department. I love learning, so documentaries are always what I gravitate toward when I can’t make a decision.
We just finished The Bear. I love the way it’s shot. Extreme close-ups, nervous tension, city grit, immaculate food that makes me hungry…and want to be a better cook.
What are you currently working on or have recently completed?
Sounds crazy, but I’ve started to write a novel. Mostly in my head. Some on paper. It’s a fascinating thing…I’ve never written fiction before, but the character almost crashed into me one sunny day in Covington. Her face hung out the window into midafternoon rays, perfectly framed, surrounded in smoke. I swear she winked at me. She sparked a character. We shall see where she goes.
What is something you’re passionate about?
Sustainability in the clothing industry. (In all industries really). That’s why we have the shops. It’s really hard for me to buy anything new besides underwear and socks. There is so much shit on this planet. I could spit out some gross and annoying facts about the ridiculous amount of clothes that already exist but I won’t. Most modern garments are crap. Buy items that will last more than a year (a decade) and return to them often.
When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?
We used to have those question cards at dinner with our family friends, and I remember getting asked this when I was about nine or eight and saying I wanted to be a travel writer…there’s still time right?
What are your music go tos?
I’ve been on a Nina Simone kick again lately. Usually happens when the weather changes. Jeffery Martin is my favorite songwriter, his record Dogs in the Daylight lives on our player. It’s so damn good. He was an English school teacher, so he gets it. His songs are four minutes stories that take you places. Also, my guy, Ray Vietti, is pretty wonderful—my favorite songs are the ones he makes up sitting on the couch in the morning with messy hair while our daughter plays on the floor or dances around. I call them just-for-yous because he has this lovely talent of making up beautiful songs on the spot. Sometimes I secretly record them and listen to them when I’m sad. Or happy.
Know any good podcasts?
I always wanted to be a podcast person, but I can never truly commit. I do like On Being with Krista Tippett. I was into S-town and Serial (I guess I have a thing for suspense). I am a sucker for learning about health-related things—I love Dr. Aviva Romm and her podcast on women’s health; I think it’s called On Health. Always open to recs.
How do you define success in your creative pursuits?
Diving into an idea that has been floating around in the brain space for a while is success to me. This place is full of distractions. Life is busy. Time is sacred. Just starting a creative pursuit is a beautiful adventure and a big feat! When you splash into the unknown, that’s when the truth spills out in so many unanticipated directions. Start and then keep going.
Describe your best day ever?
I love the feeling of being on the open road with no agenda. No stress. Snacks and an old country station. I’m picturing my family in an 80’s Toyota RV, stopping at small- town thrifts loaded with shopping carts of vintage, meandering dusty streets and taking portraits of strangers, eating at a hole-in-the-wall diner with surprisingly good coffee and dried chilis hanging on the wall. The landscape I’m picturing is Southwestern–New Mexico maybe. Dusty pink. The rock formations out the window that make you think you belong to a different place.
