The Curamia

From the first phone call, I knew this collaboration was going to be something special.

Dafna Mizrahi launched Curamia Tequila right around the same time I launched CB Grey. Two women, two brand-new brands, both built from scratch in the middle of everything. When we finally got on the phone, we just clicked — the way you click with someone who has also been awake at two in the morning wondering if she's crazy. Somewhere in that first conversation I remember thinking: oh. These are my people.

Dafna wanted elevated merch — not a logo on a t-shirt, something that could stand beside what she'd built. And the story she told me arrived with its own atmosphere. Curamia is named for her abuela. Generations ago, there was a woman born in Jalisco, Mexico, known throughout the region as la mujer más bella — the most beautiful woman. But the story goes that her physical beauty paled in comparison to the size of her heart. Charitable, selfless, magnetic — the kind of woman who made everyone feel like family.

I wove that whole world into the silk. The agave leaves, because every bottle begins with the agave, harvested in Jalisco. The limes — the perfect companion to a good pour, and a nod to Dafna's other life as an award-winning chef. The Curamia bottle, standing tall, shoulders back. An open door, because Curamia's whole philosophy is that the door is always open and there is always a seat at the table. And at the center, traced in one flowing, unbroken line: the face of la mujer más bella herself.

Then there's the text. La mujer más bella — the most beautiful woman — lives on the silk right alongside CB Grey's own words: you are beautiful.

Think about that. Dafna built a tequila brand to honor one woman known as the most beautiful. I built a silk brand to tell every woman she is beautiful. We started the same year. We had never met. And we arrived at the exact same message from two completely different directions.

Two brands, one message. I don't think that was a coincidence. I don't think either of us does.