Pavia Rosati, Fathom, Travel Maven, Woman Entrepreneur

I first met Pavia the day of the Royal Wedding at the Breslin while I was having breakfast with Dana Cowin.  Dana and I had already decided we were the oldest people at the event and had been obsessed with the Royals for awhile and way before anyone else in the room.  After the event, Dana and I were done and breakfast was in order and it was there that I met Pavia.

it is amazing that Pavia and I had never crossed paths before.  She has been involved with new media since media had a new in front of it.   What I love is that she has taken all of her interesting experiences and business acumen and launched Fathom.  Fathom (away) is a new travel site with the clever tag line, I travel for the...and then you can click on the variety of options.  There are postcards and guides reflecting the lives of global minded travelers who can be spontaneous as well as plan in advance.  But let's get back to story behind Pavia before she launched Fathom.

She grew up in the Italian section of Trenton, NJ where she still has family.  Her Grandfather has a restaurant there called The Homestead Inn, old school Italian.  Even though there was this family restaurant, they ate home.  Her father, who was the first generation Italian was pushed to be a doctor although he hated the sight of blood and ended up as a lawyer instead.  Another story of the first generation is pushed to be a doctor or a lawyer and then their kids (second generation) ends up in the family business although the restaurant business was not for Pavia.

After graduating from a prep school in Princeton she ended up at Georgetown University in DC.  Didn't love it and found herself, a nice liberal girl, with a feeling of culture shock.  She never transferred because of timing but did find herself going to Berkeley for one semester which was a great experience.  After graduation she returned to the NY area.

Her first job was working for Mirabella.  Can I take a moment and lament about how much I loved Mirabella and how utterly upset I was when they closed the magazine.  Pavia brought me a paper pad that has Mirabella written across the top that I hide in my desk drawer.  It really was a wonderful women's magazine that was obviously geared to me but there must have not been enough of me at the time for them to exist.  She wore many hats there from fashion to photo. One woman saw the potential in her and whisked her away to work in the editorial department which she loved.  It was 1994. 

The woman Pavia was working for left and she went with her to iGuide.  IGuide was a joint venture between MCi and Newscorp.  It was a portal before there was one.  She ran the fashion site inside iGuide.  They were working online and creating a magazine at the same time.  It was around this time that bloggers found the Internet and journalism changed. 

Pavia left to work with an electronic newstand for a year.  It was fun because she herself was a magazine media fanatic.  Then onward to AOL to create the Influence Channel to create blogging and culture cliff-notes.  That channel lasted a year and she went on to run the entertainment channel. She enjoyed all the start-up feels of each job she has took but was still looking to land something with staying power.  At this point Pavia was working at AOL and things started to change.  It was 97.  You could seriously move the needle if you were creative.  Live chats were happening and you could partner with people and companies while aggregating content.  It was fun but then it became corporate. 

Along comes Daily Candy which shook up the newsletter world.  Pavia was hired as the first editor.  It was here where she really used her knowledge to create change.  Launching every city by hiring editors and brainstorming on the content.  It was a great job and she is still close with the people at Daily Candy and even does freelance work on occasion.

Pavia's mom got sick and everything changed.   She met her future husband right before that happened.  It really made her take a step back and look at the life she wants to lead going forward.  Her feeling was the Internet makes your life easier but fails when it comes to to travel.  Why hadn't anyone built the travel site she wanted?  So, she built it herself. 

Fathom was just recently launched.  I hope to use it during my travels this summer.  Jeralyn Gerba is her partner, another former Daily Candy girl, and they are off to the races.  Recently being highlighted as one of the 11 best new travel sites to come out this year.   I am really glad that Pavia and I connected as now her name comes up with a variety of people we both know.  Having her own thing based on her history of being in the Internet world of new media as it grew makes complete sense that Pavia would eventually find something she was passionate about and build to be her own.  Bravo!