Meet HelloSociety Pinterest Influencer Shayla Moller from Provo, Utah! She was born in South Africa but moved to the US as a young girl. She graduated from BYU with a degree in graphic design and is now a full-time designer at Skullcandy, a photographer, and runs a small print shop. She’s married to a California native and they’re expecting their first baby boy this September!
When Shayla isn’t working or pinning she likes drawing, playing with puppies, reading, eating waffles, camping, thrifting and taking photos. “We like to travel whenever we have the chance! Most of our long weekends involve camping or going on a road trip to visit friends or family or the ocean.” Shayla’s passion for travel, style, design, photography, and music has earned her over 2.7 million Pinterest followers!
When did you start using Pinterest and what inspired you to make an account?
A friend told me about Pinterest when it first launched, and I thought it sounded kind of strange and confusing… but it only took me about ten minutes of actually trying it before I was hooked! I used to fill up my hard drive with saved photos and quotes from blogs and Tumblr pre-Pinterest and now I just save everything I like to Pinterest! It’s made for a much faster computer and a much happier user.
Why do you like Pinterest?
I could scour Pinterest for hours. I love it. And it’s usually the first place I go when I hit any sort of creative block and it never fails in getting those creative juices flowing again!
You have gained over 2.7 million Pinterest followers! That’s so amazing! What makes your Pinterest unique?
It’s true – I have! Thank you! That’s a good question… it’s still strange to me to think I have that many followers or that many people who could like what I like. And I guess something that might make it unique is how I treat it as more of a Tumblr page. As in, I like to only pin aesthetically pleasing images and to keep it looking really pretty. Or at least what I think is pretty. So when I’m going back through it, I find it inspiring and nice to look at.
Are you from Provo, Utah originally? What do you like about it there?
I was born in South Africa, but I moved to Provo, Utah when I was two years old. I had a love/hate relationship with it through my teen years, but looking back I think that was just unnecessary teen angst and longing to live somewhere considered a little “cooler” than Provo… which seems so silly now because I really did love growing up here and the people I grew up with. And it really is a beautiful town and state to live in and with so much to do. If you like to go outside, then I think it’s safe to say that you would find it easy to stay busy in Utah. Plus the restaurant scene has really stepped it up a notch in the last five years or so!
What are your favorite places you’ve traveled to?
Probably my all-time favorite trips have been to South Africa, Australia and Denmark. I’ve gone to South Africa and Australia a handful of times to visit family over there. And to Denmark just once, last year, as my graduation trip and to meet my husband’s extended family who live there. I really love visiting places with family because extended family time only happens once about every 1-2 years for me, and because they double as local tour guides!
What are your favorite Pinterest boards to pin onto and why?
I don’t really make an effort to pin more to certain boards than others, but my home, style, and design boards seem to get a bit more love than some of the others. There are so many beautiful, swoon-worthy homes all over Pinterest! I have high hopes of one day decorating a house that would blend in on my home board, once we’re living somewhere more permanently.
Your style. board is so gorgeous! We also love your music and its makers. board. Tell us more about these boards and why you made them!
Thank you! Style and music are both interests of mine, especially music. I love discovering it, listening to it and going to shows, but I am horrible at creating it. I have no clue how to write a song, I can’t sing a single note in key and am not inclined to learning instruments. So I really admire people who can and I love all the good music out there for people like me to enjoy.
What is your Pinterest style?
I’ve never really thought about what defines my Pinterest style… I just pin anything that I’m drawn to! I do think I’m interested and intrigued by a lot of different styles, but then I always love seeing how they still seem to flow when I see all of my pins together.
Tell us more about your website! What inspired you to start it?
I started my blog for the same reason I think every other 20-something-year-old girl starts one… for documentation’s sake. I have this fear of forgetting my life and all the good moments in it, so blogging helps ease that fear. I really love being able to look back through all the photos and stories and knowing they’re all stowed away and organized somewhere. I always say that no one loves stalking my blog like I love stalking my blog. Haha, and I always think how cool it would have been if my parents had had a blog when they were a young, married couple for me to stalk! Sometimes I actually get embarrassed thinking of other people reading it, but so far I’ve only experienced positivity from the blogging world. I’ve made connections with such sweet, inspirational ladies that I would never have known of otherwise.
Tell us more about your online portfolio and passion for design and photography!
Oh man, that’s a site that needs some love and attention. I’ve been really bad about keeping that up to date since I’ve been working full-time, but I figure having something out there is better than nothing! And I loved studying graphic design and working as a graphic designer, and photography seems to overlap so much with design principles that I’ve also found a love for it.
What are your other passions and interests?
Honestly, I feel like I’m really, really busy a lot of the time and one of my favorite things to do is take a totally lazy, no-commitment kind of day for myself. A day to recharge and take a long bath and watch a really good movie. I love movies and sometimes wish I had studied film. Then I’d go out to sushi with Nicolaus (the no sushi thing has been killing me slowly during pregnancy). If I’m really lucky, there would also be a massage and pedicure involved or some sort of pampering on a day like this.
What are your plans and hopes for the future?
I’m really excited and really terrified to see what the future holds! There are going to have to be quite a few adjustments this fall with baby coming, but my hope is that Nicolaus and I won’t have to completely say goodbye to life as we know it. I want our baby to grow up being immersed in design and travel and all the things that we love and be our little sidekick in all of our adventures to come!
Connect with Shayla!
Pinterest – Online Portfolio – Website – Instagram
