Journey Black Home
Journey Black Home emerged in 2021 as a Black travel storytelling platform and quickly became a widely recognized cultural reference point for Black-owned Airbnb stays and Black travel narratives. What began as a personal travel project grew into a story-rich brand that helped make Black travel more visible, searchable, and celebrated across digital spaces. Coverage from outlets including Conde Nast Traveler, Essence, Apartment Therapy, Because of Them We Can, and Travel Noire helped introduce the work to broader audiences and positioned Journey Black Home as one of the most talked-about Black travel brands of its time.
At its peak, Journey Black Home’s combined reach likely extended into the hundreds of thousands, and potentially millions of impressions and views when accounting for media coverage, social shares, and the brand’s fast-growing social media presence.
In 2026, Journey Black Home is preparing for a new pivot and reboot, returning to its roots in storytelling while building toward its next chapter with greater cultural reach.
“I connected with Jessica and Journey Black Home during my tenure as Global Lead for Airbnb’s Black ERG, Black@Airbnb. She demonstrated remarkable creativity, strategic thinking, and foresight in creating the Black-owned Airbnb list during her travels as a digital nomad, and it quickly became a valuable resource for both internal stakeholders and external customers.
Jessica has a strong pulse on culture, and her work helped shift the narrative around customer confidence on Airbnb and broader conversations about racial discrimination on the platform. We were glad to engage Journey Black Home for brand partnerships and to amplify the impact of her work through Black@, as well as across Airbnb’s main social channels and the Airbnb Newsroom. I look forward to seeing what Jessica and Journey Black Home do next!”
SIMONE HARVEY
Former Global Black ERG Co-Lead
Airbnb
EARNED MEDIA
Essence (August 2023): 10 Black-Owned Travel Businesses Making It Easier To See The World →
Essence (December 2022): 11 Stunning Black-Owned Airbnbs To Book For Your Next Holiday Trip →
Condé Nast Traveler (September 2022): This Website Makes It Easier to Find and Book Black-Owned Airbnbs in the U.S. →
Matador Network (June 2022): How Two Digital Nomads Founded a Directory for Black-Owned Airbnbs →
Airbnb (March 2022): Living anywhere is more popular than ever for US Black and Hispanic communities →
Travel Noire (February 2022): This Black Traveling Couple Just Created The Largest Black-Owned Airbnb List →
Because Of Them We Can (March 2022): The Digital Nomad Couple Behind the Largest Black-Owned Airbnb List →
BET (February 2022): Couple Creates Directory For Black-Owned Airbnb Hosts →
Apartment Therapy (February 2022): This Couple Created a Comprehensive List of Black-Owned Airbnbs →
International African American Museum x #HipHop50
Two months after its 23-years-awaited grand opening in June 2023, the International African American Museum circled an opportunity to stake its place in the global conversation on the 50th Anniversary of Hip Hop. While other outlets and institutions celebrated with high-budget concerts and celebrity-driven campaigns, I conceptualized and creative produced a lean three-part, social-first rap cypher featuring influential, yet unexpected voices from across the museum’s host city of Charleston, South Carolina.
Reach extended to over 4 million through organic shares, with positive cross-generational and cross-cultural brand sentiment reflected in comments across the series. The campaign not only kept the museum top-of-mind in the early honeymoon phase following grand opening, it also affirmed the museum’s mission to honor untold stories of the past alongside living history being made today.
SOCIAL COPY
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SELECTED COMMENTS
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“While [Communications Manager] was her title, Jessica was truly so much more. She was a trusted thought partner, creative strategist, and an integral part of bringing our vision to life. She has a rare ability to balance big-picture strategic thinking with flawless execution, all while bringing creativity, calm, and positivity to every challenge. She was an absolute dream teammate.”
NATACHA MCLEOD
Former Senior Director of Marketing
International African American Museum
International African American Museum - Special Exhibitions & New Programs Digital Content
Special exhibitions and programs are key drivers for reaching new audiences, growing repeat museum visits, and increasing new and renewed museum memberships.
In my role as Communications Manager at IAAM, I talent sourced and led production teams of videographers and photographers to capture special exhibition promotional content and edited short-form videos for real-time/quick-turnaround social media posting. These efforts grew awareness of ongoing museum engagement opportunities beyond the permanent collection.
“Jessica led within a very small marketing and communications team to make IAAM shine through various social campaigns, the creation of important brand assets for internal use, as well as supporting the entire institution with needs from copywriting, to signage needs to high quality video production. The depth of her work could hardly be explained—her passion for the work allowed the institution to gain invaluable strategic detail in the way the brand showed up everywhere. It is because of that IAAM went on to have successful programming, capture new audiences, and win various awards and acknowledgements. Jessica represents the highest level of creative work come alive.”
KEIONA EADY
Special Events & Rental Sales Manager
International African American Museum
