Meet Isabel Gates

We recently connected with Isabel Gates and have shared our conversation below.

Isabel, thrilled to have you on the platform as I think our readers can really benefit from your insights and experiences. In particular, we’d love to hear about how you think about burnout, avoiding or overcoming burnout, etc.

I think I’ve been facing burnout my whole life, and I’m just now getting out of it.

Growing up, I was always the kid with big ambitions and a work ethic to match it. I was always working multiple jobs, always expecting perfection from myself, always going a million miles an hour.

But last year, I looked up and realized that I was missing out on my twenties. I had built my dream life – moving to New York City, deeply in love in a heaven of a marriage, running a creative business like I always wanted – but I was missing it.

And I realized that this was affecting my work. Yes, I still delivered for my clients and I’m really proud of the work I did. But I knew I couldn’t push myself that hard much longer.

I wanted to spend time with my clients’ projects and really put my heart into them. I didn’t want my clients to get “survival Isabel,” because I knew that “happy and healthy Isabel” would bring them such better results. I not only owed it to myself to stop and breathe, but I owed it to my clients.

So I set boundaries, I hired more help, I got more organized, and I took some risks, as I started to shape my business into something that was sustainable. I wanted to build a business that didn’t rely on me breaking my back and missing my life, because what’s the good in that?

I know it’s controversial. Lots of people take pride in the endless grind. I do think that there are seasons in building a business where that is necessary. There are times when you kind of lose your mind and burn the midnight oil. But you don’t get a gold star for having no work/life balance. There’s a difference between running a business and letting the business run you.

I am choosing to believe that rest is essential to productivity. That boundaries are necessary to sustainable creativity. That I am smart and capable enough to get the right help, to know when to push and when to breathe, and to build the best business I can for me and my clients.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

Our couples come to us when they are tired of every invitation they’ve seen looking basic, boring, and repetitive. They hate the idea of wasting so much money on something their guests will instantly forget and throw away.

Because wedding invitations are more than just a piece of paper. In this day and age of social media and the only thing you get in the mail being junk and phone bills, we want to wow your guests with a piece of art at the mailbox. We want the first impression of your wedding to echo the love and care that you’re putting in to the day itself. We want your invitations to be a gift and a teaser for what’s to come.

We see our designs as the branding of your wedding day. Just like Glossier, Nike, or Apple convey who they are via colors, fonts, and design, we want to tell your love story through a cohesive creative direction that is undeniably “you” and is carried out through your Save the Dates, custom wedding website, Invitations, and Day-Of Paper goods.

We don’t just ask what your favorite colors are and slap it on some florals and call it a day. We dig deeper, getting to know our couples on a personal level, getting to know their intentions for the day, and translating that into a piece of art that you will treasure forever.

We are featured in VOGUE, TATLER, GLAMOUR, and more. We serve couples around the globe, creating handcrafted, original designs from New York City.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

1. Realizing that what makes me different is my strength.

Honestly, I feel very out of place in the wedding industry. Not only do I look different as a young woman of color, but my philosophies and values don’t align with most of the industry, which was built on a lot of tradition and old fashioned beliefs I don’t ascribe to.

But in the last year, I’ve leaned into what makes me different. I realized that there are so many couples who feel similarly and have trouble finding vendors that they align with. I realized that I’m perfect for the unconventional couples who don’t care about the traditions of a ceremony but care about making memories with the people they love and celebrating their unique love. This has resulted in me finding my ideal couples more and more and creating better and better work.

2. Learning how to learn.

A big factor in my growth has been learning where to get information, what advice to take, and who to copy and when.

Entrepreneurship is all about learning to problem solve. You can’t expect to be spoon fed all the answers, and you can’t expect any online course to teach you everything you need to know. You have to learn how to try things, how to research, and how to figure things out for yourself.

I am all for listening to podcasts, reading books, taking courses, getting mentorship. But the key is to know when a piece of advice works for you, and when it doesn’t.

3. Knowing when to let go.

Boundaries are huge in a job where you’re working with clients all the time. And guess what? The projects where I’ve been the most firm in my boundaries and communication have always resulted in the best looking work and the happiest customers. Boundaries are both for you and the client.

I learned when to learn from my mistakes and when to not internalize someone else’s stress. There’s a difference between constructive criticism (which is always welcome and noted), and a client taking out their frustrations from unreasonable expectations on to you.

I’ve only ever had a couple clients be upset with me, but I’ve learned that when I’ve done everything I could do and said I would do, there comes a time when I just need to let go. To learn from it if there’s a lesson to gain, but not to internalize it.

How would you describe your ideal client?

My ideal clients are couples who kind of hate the average wedding. They hate the thought of anything cut and paste, basic, or boring. They don’t care about the things you “should” do, but want their wedding to feel like them. They want to see their invitation suite and feel like it’s them on paper. They can’t find an invitation template that works for them because they can’t be put in a box. They care about beauty and design but want it to come from a place that’s authentic and personal and not just from what’s trending.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://gatespaperco.com
• Instagram: @gatespaperco
• Other: Tiktok: @iz.gates

Image Credits

Most of them are taken by me, @gatespaperco. The 1st image is by @danielroaart (Daniel Roa), and the 5th image is by @sarah____lawless (Sarah Lawless).