About Us

Yani, who co-wrote a book Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America with Lori Tharps, spends her days editing at Glamour, her nights sipping a nice glass of wine and not feeling bad that she didn’t make it to the gym. She met Akiba because she lived with her sister as an undergrad at Barnard. She thought being friends with one Solomon was great and never thought she’d be lucky enough to count two as her best friends. When she’s not watching bad reality TV, good premium cable TV or plotting her next vacation on a threadbare budget, she is dreaming of moving back to Barcelona, where she slept ’til 10, napped at least an hour a day and went to the beach whenever she felt like it. To put it simply, she procrastinates as much as Akiba (see below). It gives her a lot of time to ponder deep things like, “How did J Lo’s butt get so much smaller in El Cantante compared to Out of Sight, when the rest of her looks the same size?” She wonders if her own butt could pull off such a task.

Ak is a writer and editor by trade. She’s been published in lots of magazines, from Essence to Glamour to Vibe to King to POZ to ColorLines. For more than a decade, Ak has been in a serious relationship with hip-hop. (Sadly, hip-hop has refused to undergo couples counseling so Ak is seriously considering a legal separation.) In another life Ak was a political editor at The Source. That was lots of fun until it wasn’t. She was also health editor at Essence and senior editor for Vibe Vixen, a fine, innocent magazine that was bludgeoned to death before its prime. Ak is a singer who procrastinates a lot about her music. She dreams vividly when she can actually get to sleep.