Deez Interviews: Meet the strategist who’s interviewed Gay Talese for his blog

Happy Friday Deezers! Today’s interview is from another seriously impressive media hustler who’s power multi-tasking between a full-time day job and a long-term passion project. You know those super cool ~artisanal makers~ profiles? Our interviewee today, John Peabody, was on that whole thing with his blog The Hand & Eye before Instagram made it so cool, and he’s here to talk more about that and also that time he showed Gay Talese some VR goggles. Enjoy!

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The interviewee: John Peabody (follow him at @johnpeabody)

The gigs: Creative strategist at The Atlantic, and founder of The Hand & Eye

The hustle: I’m a creative strategist at The Atlantic, which means I help come up with campaigns for advertisers. And then on the side I run a site called The Hand & Eye which is sort of a celebration of creativity, makers, designers, a little bit of travel and anything else I’m interested in at the moment. I’ve been doing it for four years and it’s kind of on low simmer since I started at The Atlantic, so I’m not balancing it too well, but trying!

How did you first get the idea to start The Hand & Eye, and what kind of work does it take to keep it going?

I was the small business editor at Reuters right when the whole “maker movement” was sort of peaking. I got laid off and had this idea to start a site devoted to all the stories of people I wanted to write about, but were not necessarily newsworthy, and I wanted to restart my passion for photography and just get back to writing and creating for the joy it, so it became an outlet for all of that.

In the past, I spent a lot more time on it, but since people are not reading blogs like they used to and since I have a fulltime job, it’s less these days. Now, the major output is a newsletter I try to send every Friday and a post or two every week. It’s really not a ton of work, but if it ever feels like it is, I just let it cool for a while. It’s a passion project, and I do it because I enjoy it, and I never want it to feel like work.

What's been the most surprising part about starting and growing your site?

Hmmm. The newsletter I guess.I started it on a lark and it kind of took off. Pretty much every week people email me really personal responses. I guess I feel a little more candid writing in the newsletter format and people feel like I’m writing right to them, so the result is this surprisingly congenial thing, which is really nice given the rest of what’s happening online.

At this point, you could find "artisan profiles” almost everywhere. How do you make The Hand & Eye stands out?

Heh, yeah. It’s a little played out. I’m not sure I do make it stand out. I really just have always tried to find interesting/creative people to have good conversations with. This is what compels me and what I’m interested in reading, but lately yeah, I’ve been easing up on the maker/artisan profiles because I think we’ve saturated the internet with them.

What posts on The Hand and Eye are you proudest of?

Yeah well definitely the Gay Talese posts. I did two about him. One where I gave him VR goggles to try for the first time (spoiler: he hated them) which really blew up, and another straight interview with him, which also got a lot of traction. I enjoyed taking photos of him and really appreciated his candid interview. I realize he’s a bit controversial, but personally I enjoy/appreciate people who are so unfiltered when they give interviews and I think people universally gravitate towards this. Other than that, I’m really proud of conquering my fear of heights to take photos with Colossal Media.

UM WHAT WAS INTERVIEWING GAY TALESE LIKE????

HA. Well when you interview Gay Talese, he does most of the talking, but it was still one of the best conversations I’ve had since moving to New York. He’s just no bullshit and pulls no punches. Like I said before, I just find that super refreshing, even if I don’t agree with everything he says. But yeah it was a trip going to his townhouse, waiting for him to come down the stairs and then going to his bunker to chat. He offered me a martini but I declined because he wasn’t having one and I didn’t want to drink alone. I probably should have it anyway.

So, where do you go from there? What’s next for 2018?

Well….over the last year or so I’ve been posting more photo-driven travel dispatches. I think I’ve progressed as a photographer and one of my goals for 2018 is to publish some kind of photo book. I figure I’ll self publish it and might do a Kickstarter or something to help get the word out. It might be just the Hand & Eye in book form or it may just focus on travel images, which are some of my favorite. Either way, it kind of fits with the ethos of the site which is to make things that last, so a book seems right. But other than that, I don’t know, I’d love to interview Jim James. Let me know if you have a contact for him.

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LOL, anyone out there got those Jim James digits?? In the meantime, be sure to follow John Peabody on Twitter, but also Instagram, because his Insta stories will make you feel so inept in comparison about the “artsy” shots the rest of us are tryna take out here.

Like Deez Links? Forward to those poor ol’ VR goggles.