Serena Guen, founder of Suitcase magazine

I really wanted to create a platform for travel content that was visual, exciting, accurate and easy to consume. I was inspired by National Geographic and Monocle and wanted to create a go-to for travellers in our generation.

Print is a fantastic medium – we can only spend so long at our screens and there's a reason why book sales increased massively during coronavirus, however as a starting point, digital is much easier and cheaper to make mistakes! I'd suggest fine-tuning your message and deciding which platform would make sense for where you want to reach your audience (are they Gen-Z? If so, then maybe a TikTok account might be a good place to start). Once you've built your audience to a critical mass on one platform (say over 5,000 followers) then you can start to trial new things with them – maybe it's a newsletter or a newspaper or even a podcast. The best thing you can do is to keep talking to your audience and ask them!

I come from a family of entrepreneurs – my father, mother, brother and grandmother all started their own businesses, which were all very different to one another. We are all go-getters and if we think we can do it better ourselves, we'll at least give it a go! I think the thing that gave me the confidence was that I wasn't afraid of failing – perhaps it was because I was so young and naive!

I like the ‘How I Built This podcast’ but in my job I am lucky enough to also interview and meet interesting people such as Damian Bradfield, the co-founder of Wetransfer, Tim Brown, co-founder of Allbirds and Rosh Mahtani, founder of Alighieri. In terms of leadership and team relations, I am very inspired by the Dalai Lama and his book the Art of Happiness. He teaches that everyone's goal in life is to be happy and once you acknowledge that you become a lot more forgiving of people.

We recently launched our winter issue and have a new season of our podcast, The Upgrade, coming out now. My poor team has been recording in cupboards or under desks during lockdown to make this happen! what sets suitcase apart from other travel magazines? and how has it had to adapt to this current lack of travel?  Our team cares so much about the quality of the content and recommendations. This year has been undoubtedly tough but has taught us that travel is so much more than the physical act of going from one place to another – it is as much about experiencing cultures and immersing yourself in them at home whether that's through reading, languages or cooking.

This year has generated a newfound love of travelling in the UK that I think might stick. I'm excited to visit New Hall Mains, a super cute boutique in the Highlands of Scotland. I'm also really looking forward to finally visiting Sao Lourenco do Barrocal – it's been on my radar since it opened and I'm going to make that a reality very soon!

I am quite minimal with my jewellery, unless I go out and then I love a statement earring! I couldn’t travel without my wedding ring and engagement ring! I also have a charm necklace that my brother and father gave me. I originally had one that I'd collected the charms for years, but I lost it surfing. They very kindly bought me a new chain and have been buying charms for the past few years.

It's not so much as a mantra but the idea that if you make a tiny change every day it adds up – say you make a 1% difference every day for a year. That would be a 365% difference by the end of it! If I had to get it engraved I would write something like: Tiny Steps or Find Your Spirit.

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