Welcome!
My name is Rachael and I'm a professional storyteller who presents imagination expanding community centered folktale performances and workshops for all ages in theater/arts spaces, museums, festivals, community groups, schools, and as a guest lecturer at Rutgers University.
I believe that what our world needs right now is vibrant imagination. With imagination comes the ability to envision a brighter future and the creative solutions to get us there. When we grow imagination together we shake off the every day and we get playful, which allows us to deepen our human connection and learning.
I am passionate about breathing new life into old tales, and the unique ability that traditional oral storytelling has to strengthen hearts, minds, and communities.
With warmth & Stories,
Rachael
Ready to transform your life & community with
play & imagination?
Gather round!
It's story time...
After graduating from Pratt Institute with a BFA in Art Education/Concentration Illustration, I became a published illustrator and middle school art teacher.
Stepping away from full-time teaching, I discovered a love of improv/sketch comedy acting, writing, and directing-- which is when my librarian mother encouraged me to explore storytelling.
I started my storytelling journey in my mom's library, telling folktales and teaching storytelling and communication skills to the English Language Learners classes. From there, I began telling in more and more schools, arts venues, festivals, national conferences, and at Rutgers University. I also launched a "Storytelling & Music" series of performances at the best coffee shop ever, Buunni Coffee, and began coaching small business owners in story crafting and presentation skills.
Woven into all of this, I was also teaching process art classes for Scribble Art and co-founding a teaching artist non-profit project called Essubi Arts that worked in partnership with New Hope Uganda to provide arts education classes for students and staff.
When Covid hit my work shut down overnight, but I took my art education and storytelling experiences and rolled them together to create "Morning Circle: A Storytelling and Art Making Livestream". I also collaborated with Salesforce to create a storytelling and invitation-to-play livestream for employees who were working with young kids at home.
I loved creating these online spaces of story and creativity, and it has inspired me to begin developing more resources, recordings, and offerings online.
I now spend my days creating and collaborating on storytelling, story-making, and story-training projects while raising three kids and a garden in NYC!
My two youngest kids, front row for a storytelling show at Buunni Coffee Inwood 💖
Let's Get Creative - Together!
I love collaborating with organizations and people looking to imagine more through storytelling. Drop me a note, and let's dream up the possibilities together!