Why I Chose the Hardest Possible Way to Launch a Blog
(It's Very On Brand)
(Mobile readers: I spent January obsessing over design details that really only shine on a bigger screen. If you want the full maximalist experience, check it out on your computer later.)
Fair warning: go big or go home isn’t a motivational poster in my world. It’s just Tuesday.
So, here's the truth: I've been hesitating to start this platform for months. Not because I didn't want to do it, but because I knew exactly what would happen once I began.
I'd be consumed.
(For the record: I was right.)
Actually, if I'm being completely honest? I've been hesitating for years. This blog has technically existed in some form since 2019. I set it up. I had the domain. I had ideas.
But 2019 was already over a decade into transforming Forteza Luce. I'd been working on this house, creating these extraordinary spaces, living in this increasingly maximalist Victorian wonderland... and not sharing any of it. Not really.
So when I finally got around to setting up a blog in 2019, what did I do? Nothing. Just let it sit there. Another framework, another intention, gathering digital dust.
Hesitation upon hesitation upon hesitation.
But this time, I knew I had to actually do it. Not just set up the infrastructure and walk away for another five years.
A quick note: this is Process Post No. 1 — the beginning of the story of the ongoing, sometimes humbling, occasionally triumphant and entirely public chronicle of building NeoGothic Rebellion from scratch. If you want to follow the whole journey, Part 2 is here — but this one stands on its own. The missteps are self-explanatory.
The Pattern of Creative Obsession
Early on, people asked why I wasn't just using Patreon. It would be easier, right? Everything's already built. Just set up tiers and start posting.
And yes. It would have been easier.
But have you ever looked at Patreon pages? They all look... the same. Same layout, same structure, same aesthetic. And my entire ethos - everything NeoGothic Rebellion is about - centers on extraordinary design. On banishing the beige. On creating spaces that are unapologetically, maximally unique and striking.
How could I build a platform about extraordinary creative courage on a template that looked like everyone else's?
So I chose to host everything myself. I went with MemberPress for membership functionality and ConvertKit for email, integrated into my WordPress site. Which meant complete design control.
It also meant it was a LOT more work.
So many Details, So many Decisions
colors
fonts
new pages
Of Course I Chose the Harder Path...
Anyone who knows me already knows what I did next. Easy and generic? Or complicated and extraordinary? I chose complicated. Every single time, I choose complicated. Because this wasn't just a membership platform. It was another design project. Another chance to create something that looked like nothing else out there.
But here's the thing: I didn't really know how to do any of this when I started. Custom coding to get MemberPress working properly with my WordPress theme? Integrating ConvertKit forms that actually looked good? Making sure the login process was smooth and intuitive?
Not things I knew how to do.
But—and this is the whole point of everything I'm trying to teach—it's not that I know how to do everything I set out to do. It's that I've learned how to look for answers. How to research. How to ask for help. How to persist through the frustrating parts.
If you’re reading this nodding — welcome. You’re among your people.
The Technical Stuff was only Part of It
Hours—sometimes entire days—spent problem-solving what seemed like simple things. Making sure people could log in smoothly without error messages. Figuring out why the membership levels weren't displaying correctly. Troubleshooting why email confirmations were going to spam folders.
The kind of tedious, technical, absolutely unglamorous work that nobody talks about when they launch something new.
It was frustrating. There were moments I wanted to throw my computer out a window. Moments I questioned why I didn't just use Patreon like a normal person.
But the technical building was actually just half of it. The other half was figuring out what this thing even was. What was I actually offering?
I've spent years having conversations with people about Forteza Luce. Strangers who stop by while I'm gardening to tell me they specifically choose my street because my house makes them smile. Friends and friends of friends who visit and confess how intensely curious they are about how I did all this. The peacock bathroom. The 13-color marbleized living room. The sheer audacity of it all.
Those conversations made it clear: people wanted to know the how. Not just the finished results, but the actual process. The learning curve. The mistakes and the triumphs.
So how do you translate years of porch conversations and house tours into a platform? How do you share that process in a way that gives people permission to begin their own extraordinary things? That strategic work - figuring out what to share and how to share it—was just as consuming as the technical problem-solving.
That stopped me cold the first time I really heard it. Fifteen years of creating something extraordinary — and what people wanted wasn’t just to admire it. They wanted permission. Permission to try something that ambitious themselves. Permission to believe that the messy, uncertain, figure-it-out-as-you-go process was something they could do too. That’s when I understood what this platform was actually for.
The faces of Ultimate Suffering
The Deadline
I gave myself a deadline: the last day of January. And improbably, impossibly, I made it.
The Price
As always with all-consuming projects, there was a price to pay. I spent the first week of February week recovering—sleeping, attending to all the "real" work that had been somewhat neglected while I was building this thing. Revival Clothing orders that needed finishing. Emails that needed answering. Long walks with very patient wolfhounds. The regular life stuff that doesn't stop just because you're building a creative empire. (Current population: me, 2 wolfhounds, and 17 very patient early believers, one of whom is my Mom.)
This is the part nobody shows you. The aftermath. The recovery period. The messy reality that creative projects don't happen in a vacuum - they happen alongside everything else you're trying to juggle – everything you HAVE to do to keep the bills paid.
Plot Twist:
You Just Became My Accountability Partner
Because this is what it actually looks like to begin something new. It's not confident. It's not polished. It's consuming and frustrating and exhausting and you question your choices and you do it anyway.
And if I'm going to invite you into my creative process - if I'm going to document the journey of transforming Forteza Luce and building this platform - then I need to show you this part too. The part where I didn't know what I was doing but figured it out. The part where I chose the harder path because it mattered. The part where I paid the price and recovered and kept going.
But there's another reason I'm sharing this publicly: accountability.
I've spent over a decade working on this house without really sharing it. Then I let a blog sit dormant from 2019 until now. I've hesitated too many times, let too many creative projects slip back into the shadows.
But now that I've started - now that you're here reading this—you'll keep me at it.
That's the power of making it public. You become my accountability partners, whether you meant to or not. I can't let this disappear into another five years of silence. Every time I think about stepping back into hesitation, I'll remember that someone out there is waiting to see what happens next.
This is what creative courage looks like. Not fearless. Not confident. Just... beginning anyway. And then staying with it because you made it public.
Welcome to the messy middle. I'm glad you're here.
What part of this process resonates with you? The all-consuming obsession? The technical frustration? The "why didn't I just do this the easy way" moments?
What have you been building, creating, or starting — and what’s been getting in the way? Leave a comment below or send me a message. I read and answer every one.
The Chatelaine
P.S. This is first of a series of posts I've committed to — an ongoing series documenting the messy middle of building NeoGothic Rebellion in public. Part 2 - how I turned a 14.5-second video into a three-week existential crisis — is here.
Same energy. More Premiere Pro. Equally on brand.