Brooklyn Decker, actress, philanthropist, entrepreneur and Austinite, dishes on motherhood, her career and why keeping balance is just a myth.
When I spoke to Brooklyn Decker, she had just landed in Austin from Los Angeles—her home for the last 10 years—for the Texas Film Awards, where she was presented the Rising Star Award. Soon, she was back in L.A. shooting season six of Grace and Frankie. “It’s worth it for me to get on a flight for two nights if it means that my kids can run around in a backyard,” says the mother of two about choosing to make her home in Texas’ capital versus New York or L.A. In spite of the elevated commute, the Hill Country fits like a glove on the North Carolina native: “Austin is this incredible oasis of creativity, but it still feels down-home. There is a comfort and normalcy to it that I just really need growing up in the South,” she says. After all, it was in Austin that she created her first successful startup, Finery, with New York-based Whitney Casey. If you haven’t heard of Finery, you will. It’s a wardrobe operating system that creates a digital pin board of the clothes that are already in your closet—and makes getting ready a breeze. The platform has given Decker the desire and capital to invest in other brands she believes in (such as Jane Club, Tiff’s Treats), many of them women-founded. “Women have been so underrepresented in business forever. I feel really lucky to be in a place where I can invest, advise and support these brands and companies that are doing a lot of good,” she says. “And I’m a customer!” When asked how she balances it all, Decker admits, plainly, that she doesn’t: “It’s OK for a moment and time to be really chaotic,” she says. “We just figure it out, and somehow it works.”
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