Hailing from Baltimore, Maryland, Hilary Phelps is the oldest of three children born to Michael Fred and Debbie Phelps. From early childhood, she was always a trailblazer and was the first to jump into the water and later into the world of competitive swimming. As her sister Whitney and her brother Michael followed suit in the years to come, Hilary's passion and ability took her to the University of Richmond where she studied Criminal Justice and Sociology, while competing on a swimming scholorship.
Upon graduating, she relocated to Washington, DC where she began a career in Public Relations and Event Planning for a non-profit organization. Ever the competitor, Hilary continued her athletic journey by earning her yoga certification in 2009, under the direction of Shri Yogi Hari, in Miami, Florida. Soon thereafter, she registered for her first Ironman Triathlon, and after nearly a decade out of the water -- dating back to her graduation from Richmond -- Hilary resumed her swimming regiment, this time adding the progressive cycling and running miles necessary to complete the daunting 140.6 mile three-discipline Ironman.
Soon after completing the Ironman Lake Placid in July 2010, Hilary embarked on yet another journey: the launch of an eponymous interactive lifestyle website, aptly titled HilaryPhelps.com. As a decorated athlete, an accomplished baker, and a regular at New York Fashion Week, she applied her diverse experience and interest base to the growing website. As her online following expanded, so too did her diversity of content, ranging from fashion, to food, to fitness, to geo-cultural issues. She began to delve even deeper into the overarching concept of her website: the well-rounded woman, defined by life experiences, refined by travel and exposure, unafraid of new challenges, recipes, designers or deadlines. It was, in effect, the sheer happiness that comes with being the modern 21st century woman, a concept she describes as "the process of finding genuine joy in all that we do."
Now, with readers spanning across four continents, HilaryPhelps.com has seen explosive growth over the last 16 months. As creative director, Hilary remains the trailblazer amoung the Phelps children, more recently expanding into regular TV pieces covering an array of lifestyle issues including fitness, fashion, and culinary nuances.
As her journey continues, Hilary invites you to take each step with her. Read the website. Watch her TV segments. Check out her blogs and vlogs, and as always, you can follow her on both Twitter (_ HilaryPhelps ) and on Facebook ( GenuineJoy ) .
Until then, see you on the road --
"Domesticated" used to mean inferior or less than educated. Julia Child was a genious, but somehow seen as a lesser-than according to post-modern feminist theory of the time. Now, as we roll into 2012, the culinary industry and its out-growth is a billion dollar industry comprised of television, magazines, and online tutorials. In short, the once second-tier lifestyle of a 'domesticated' Julia Child or Donna Reed, has given way to the new power maverick, as faces like Rachael Ray, Emeril, Tom Colicchio Nigella Lawson and Wolfgang Puck, have turned a talent into a career, a career into a business, a business into a brand and a brand into an empire. In short, domesticated has become sophisticated. In the culinary vain, Hilary has an appreciation for the techniques behind the meals and traditions gracing dinner tables and cable channels today.... all while happily wearing her heels, pearls and hand-made aprons.
In the diverse society that we live in today, the term culture has come to mean a lot of things. It is the blood in our veins, the flag over our head and the very ground under our feet. It is this diversity of heritage, lineage and tradition that make us who we are and charts the path that lies before us. For Hilary, culture represents family, travel, tradition, etiquette, economy, and a litany of topics, themes and intersecting interests.
Fashion and style are not the same things. One is comprised of personal perspective and individualized preference, while the other is a multi-billion dollar international leviathan in the global economic landscape. Fashion is comprised of millions of moving parts, which like gears in a machine, seamlessly fit together to form one overwhelming mechanism of creative and commercial impact. As an astute student of the history and evolution of shapes, patterns, prints, commercial, couture, and cutting-edge creativity, Hilary is now a regular attendee at New York Fashion Week. Her interest in the history of the garment itself and the inner-workings of the global fashion industry as a while, distinguish Hilary from other "would be" Fashionistas. She appreciates the creative forces behind the curtain and has a well-developed understanding of the international interlocking gears, all of which work in unison to bring a garment from the fields to the factory to the barge to the train to the runway to the consumer. For Hilary, fashion is less about expertise and more about having an appreciation and understanding of the historical relevance of the garments on the rack as well as having the courage and self-confidence to continuously experiment, reshape and redefine our aesthetic as only fashion can do.
For a word that can be used as both a verb and a noun, fitness has somehow lost its meaning in American society. At a time where one-third of all children in the United States are clinically obese and roughly one in four are malnourished and/or go to bed hungry; physical irregularities have somehow become the norm. Excess defeats moderation, lethargy defests energy and somewhere along the way, the exception became the rule when it comes to physical fitness. As a lifelong competitive swimmer, a certified yoga instructor and an accomplished Ironman triathlete, Hilary sees American fitness standards as less a dilemma and more a puzzle to solve. Whether healthy cooking, consistent exercise or simply a more balanced, regulated lifestyle, she frequently speaks and writes on the topic with qualified compassion.
A picture is worth a thousand words... genuine joy
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