When Cynthia and Lauren Russell packed up their New York lives for a pandemic-era escape, the mother-daughter duo changed their lives forever. With a 12-acre vineyard, their company, Dancing, has planted the seeds for a sensory-driven brand that’s rewriting the rules of wine.(Perhaps you know their popular fragrance line sold at Revolve?)
Despite résumés that span Harvard, Wall Street, and more than a couple major companies, the Russells had zero winemaking experience, but with intention-rooted passion, they’ve successfully expanded their vision.
We sat down with the duo to talk inspiration, reinvention, creative rituals, and how sometimes, the best ideas come when you least expect them.
As a mother-daughter duo and first-time co-founders, how has building Dancing together shaped your relationship?
Like many mother-daughter duos, our relationship has evolved over the years. It’s a closeness that’s not replicable. We intuitively understand one another and our strengths and weaknesses. We are committed to not letting each other down. We have shared values and tastes, but we challenge each other and learn from one another.
Can you share the story behind your name and how dance ties into your creative process?
We’re called Dancing because each season we create our own sensory compositions that are enjoyed in the moment—and bring out your inner dance. We love that everyone can dance and do so in their own unique rhythms, yet together you can create a really fun harmony. Wine and fragrance are both experienced similarly. Everyone will have a distinct experience with the product, yet they’re vehicles to bring people together for enjoyment, reverie, and personal expression.
What sparked the pivot from wine to fragrance?
We don’t like to follow rules or be boxed in. Whether we’re exploring the world through the tip of our tongue, the tip of our nose or the tip of our finger, it’s all a sensory experience. The concept for our fragrances comes from the same place as our wines—the earth under our feet. We found that the wine was just one dimension of how to experience our terroir and the magic of the land. The processes of winemaking and fragrance formulation also have interesting parallels. Both are very storied and traditional, and often male-dominated. The experience of aromas, notes, emotion, and memory are all very closely tied and linked between wine and fragrance.
Has living and working among the vines changed your day-to-day mindset or lifestyle in ways you didn’t expect?
We love the buzz [of the city]—the culture, the art, the food. But the serenity and respite of the vineyard has changed our lives. Producing a product that takes a year-long cycle of farming and cultivation, and comes directly from the earth, is not something we’d ever experienced working before in the corporate world and at tech companies like Uber and Amazon. It also allows you to relinquish control over everything.
What advice would you give to women dreaming of a major life pivot, especially one that feels totally out of left field?
We come from a very entrepreneurial family and I’ll say that the men in our lives didn’t blink when taking the risk to start a new business. They didn’t think, “Oh, I need more experience in this industry, I better wait.” We get the, “Oh, what a cute project!” look all the time, and it just fuels our fire. My advice would be [that] there’s no better time than now. There's never a perfect time to start over. But the imperfection is what makes it crazy fun.
