Jeremy & Noemie
On the onset of having their own studio together, cutely titled Little Troop, Jeremy Elliot and Noemie Le Coz are both Art Directors and Designers by trade, Austrailian born and Brooklyn based. These two don't take themselves or each other too seriously.
TWP: Were you thinking about the type of person you wanted to date?
NOEMIE: Not at that point. When we met we actually were both very happily single. I had always dated creatives and I think that was always kind of important for me. Creatives and really funny guys… class clowns.
TWP: So long before buying this home two people met each other at some point, what is that story?
NOEMIE: So my best friend Kath invited me to this warehouse party, put on just for young people in advertising. She wanted me to come because we were both recently single, and I had a history of liking guys in advertising… but it was a $30 cover charge, which at the time was a lot! I ended up going to the party kind of begrudgingly, and when we got there realized pretty quickly there might actually not be much potential in the boy situation. So we ended up just drinking quite a lot. And then towards the very end of the night we were on the dance floor and Jeremy stumbles over to me and… it was all very blurry.
JEREMY: It was a doctors and nurses theme, so she was dressed up as a nurse. I had got to the party late and as I was arriving to the party one of the guys I worked with was leaving wearing scrubs so I was like “oh can I wear your scrubs”.
TWP: Were you eying her?!
JEREMY: No, I had been just catching up with work friends. It was a pretty disgusting party. Other than meeting Noemie all I remember is walking on this gross layer of beer that was spread across the warehouse floor.
NOEMIE: He walked over to me and asked me to dance... which doesn’t really happen any more these days, so I think that won me over. Pretty quickly after that we left together. We got chatting about work stuff and realized that my ex boyfriend from a few years back was working at the same place as Jeremy, and they were mates.
JEREMY: Yeah he’s a good guy….
NOEMIE: It made sense to me because their sense of humor is identical, they’re both hilarious.
JEREMY: The following Monday when I went in to work and told him I met Noemie, he didn’t take it well. His face just turned to fuming red, so I told him nothing happened, I’m not gonna see her again.
TWP: LIES!
JEREMY: It was so awkward. My best mate from work was standing there and as soon as I said that he just peeled out of the room and it was just the most awkward moment of my life probably. I went back to my desk and texted Noemie being like “I’m probably not gonna see you again and I think I may have broken some sort of bro code thing.”
NOEMIE: At that point we hadn’t really hung out enough for me to know whether or not this guy was going to be worth breaking a friendship for. So I got that text and I thought fair enough, I mean that’s a shame, but very admirable of you. And then a few days later I was at a friend's house and got a text message which was just a photo of the nurses hat I made that I wore that night.
JEREMY: I think I was just like ‘ah fuck it let’s just go on a date’. If the date’s shit then we’ll never see each other again and if the date’s good I’ll deal with the work thing. And the date was great... so I just told him about it. Then every day I went to work for the next 6 months and he would never make eye contact. And then we worked on the same project together. It was super awkward. Then when we decided to move to New York 6 months after we met. I went back into work and was quitting to my boss and he too, and he was also moving to New York. And I was just like ughhhh.
NOEMIE: Completely just by coincidence he decided to move to New York the same month as us.
JEREMY: But that was kind of a good thing actually because at that point we just needed to be adults about it. Both moving to New York at the same time was a way for us to mutually be cool about it. We tried to hang out once or twice in New York and it was just super awkward so the friendship just naturally ended.
I went back to my desk and texted Noemie being like “I’m probably not gonna see you again and I think I may have broken some sort of bro code thing."
TWP: What was it like making such a major life decision together?
JEREMY: I thought it was easy.
NOEMIE: I came to NYC a few weeks after meeting him just completely on a whim with some girlfriends and then he ended up meeting me for the end of the trip. He was going to a music festival in Montreal and on his way back from that he stopped over in New York. So we had this amazing week together in New York... it was the middle of summer.
JEREMY: I wanted to quit my job and was not really enjoying the work I was doing for the amount of effort I was putting in.
NOEMIE: I was really loving work but I’d been there three and a half years and was starting to feel like I wasn’t learning as much as I had been.
JEREMY: For me it was like, I can either quit my job and find another in Melbourne or just leave cause I’ve got nothing keeping me here, I don’t have any family in Melbourne.
NOEMIE: We were both 24 and definitely had that like naive optimism that you have at 24 where you’re like ‘why the hell not’. We had a friend who is a designer who had already moved over here so he kind of paved the way for us a little bit and could tell us what part of Brooklyn to move to, design studios to look at and things like that.
JEREMY: When we arrived we sort of just hit the ground running, we already had our portfolios done, so when we moved here on day one we were just reaching out to people.
TWP: Has that been nice having each other in the same industry? Helping with portfolios and talking about what sort of studios you would go after?
NOEMIE: Totally.
JEREMY: The entire job hunt was us working as a team in a way.
NOEMIE: I think that was a huge reason why the move went as smoothly as it did because we went through the whole process together. I think from the very beginning we’ve had the same sort of general goals, we’ve been very happy going along with what each other are doing in a lot of ways. I think moving to NY the biggest thing was that I had a lot of trust in Jeremy by the time we moved. We’d moved in together for a few months in Australia and kind of “practiced” that before moving to New York. And we lived pretty well together. There was really never any huge friction, it was never a battle.
JEREMY: In terms of working in the same industry… whenever I’m creating something I’ll Slack it to Noemie before I show anyone. She’s like my first creative director in a way. And if it looks good for her then I know it’ll look good for someone else. I always see it as a secret weapon. If I’m struggling with something I know I can bring it home and work it through with her.
NOEMIE: I do the same. I think what I love so much about Jeremy is he’s such a good bullshit detector. He is the most natural and honest person and he’s never trying to be anyone that he’s not or create anything that doesn’t feel like it comes from an honest place. So I think I do the exact same thing when I’m designing something, to just get a gauge on an honest level whether or not it does what it needs to do. I really like that back and forth with us.
TWP: How long were you together in NY before you were engaged?
JEREMY: Four years.
TWP: Did you guys talk about marriage or planning a life together?
NOEMIE: Jeremy talked about marriage within the first two months of us dating.
JEREMY: Did I?
NOEMIE: Yes! We were very much all in from the beginning. I think we said “I love you” in the first week.
JEREMY: We were very open talking about marriage and kids and stuff for the first few years and then I decided I wanna propose to her. I decided that two years before I actually did and it took me two years to actually get my shit together and do it. The thing that made it happen was Noemie going to Apple in SF for three months, so I had all these weekends where she wasn’t around and went ring shopping. Then as soon as she got back I proposed.
TWP: Will you paint the picture of the upstate weekend?
JEREMY: So, because she’d been away I used that as an excuse to plan a get out of the city weekend away for just the two of us. She didn’t think anything of it and she actually found the place we stayed in.
NOEMIE: I read a lot of reviews for this place and I’m so oblivious... every single review was like “had the weekend of my life, I was proposed to”, every review was about some sort of proposal. I just read those reviews assuming that meant it was an incredible house and nothing clicked, and then Jeremy booked it.
JEREMY: We went for a hike and I had the ring with me, I thought ‘oh we’ll do a picnic and maybe I’ll propose at the top of this hike’. But when we got up there there were too many people, there was an old lady on crutches taking forty minutes to walk past our picnic so I was like I can’t do it here. We ended up just going back to the house. It had a really beautiful view of a valley and we were having drinks. I don’t even remember what I said but I was definitely very nervous. My palms were actually sweating.
NOEMIE: We were sitting on these two chairs overlooking this incredible view that was right outside the house and definitely all the signs were there, I just had no clue. We had champagne, we had picked up oysters on the way home and he had picked up the tool you use to shuck oysters and he was like really excited about it – and it was not really in his character to be like really excited about shucking oysters. We were just chatting but he’d started pacing around for a few minutes and I’d been videoing it and I was like ‘aw this is nice he’s like having a moment with nature’.
JEREMY: I was trying to think about what I was going to say.
NOEMIE: We were just chatting and then all of a sudden he gets on one knee and it was really sweet. But I had absolutely no idea it was happening... my reaction was more laughing and in shock than anything else. I couldn’t believe he’d gone and organized it… and it was just very sweet. I was obviously excited but it was more adorable than anything else.
We were just chatting but he’d started pacing around for a few minutes and I’d been videoing it and I was like ‘aw this is nice he’s like having a moment with nature’.
TWP: Who is the more romantic one?
NOEMIE: I would say Jeremy is more romantic than I am. When we’re in the kitchen cooking dinner, he’ll just randomly grab my hand and start dancing around.
JEREMY: I don’t know, we don’t really do much PDA.
NOEMIE: I think Jeremy has definitely inherited a lot of how he is with me from his parents.
JEREMY: That’s true
NOEMIE: We had very different upbringings. My parents were divorced when I was three and I grew up with a single mum. And Jeremy had, you know, a more classic nuclear family and his parents have always just been so incredibly loving with each other and caring and sweet. So I think they were a really amazing example that Jeremy has paid attention to. I hadn’t really thought I would get married. It was never really a priority for me because I didn’t have that example growing up. I grew up seeing my mom who was always in ‘survival mode’ just being a single mom and I think part of that just passed on to me... I’ve always been a lot more of a stressed person and always so goal-oriented. Whereas Jeremy comes from a more classic family and that has definitely impacted me and calmed me and created this support that I don’t think I ever imagined having. And also brought in this idea of marriage that all of a sudden was a really nice idea.
TWP: Future planning? Having a studio together?
NOEMIE: That’s been something we’ve been discussing recently and are kind of testing right now. We’ve just taken on this new project which definitely plays into both our skill sets perfectly.
JEREMY: So that’s a test run if that works out, if it doesn't and we hate each other then we won't.
NOEMIE: I think that for us it’s generally ‘lets see what happens’. Our whole lives have been like that.
JEREMY: Yeah totally. We’ve never had a 5 year plan.
NOEMIE: We’ve had incremental plans but I don't think we’ve ever planned more than two years in advance. But I do think we also have a lot of trust and we’re constantly having conversations about our futures.
JEREMY: Yeah we’re talking about our future a lot. But it’s never like “in five years time I want to be “blah blah” of this company or in this position. It’s always been what's the next thing immediately in front of us
NOEMIE: I think we’ve always both done that from a very visceral place… like, what’s going to make us the most happy?
JEREMY: True. To go freelance is with the goal of having more flexibility to travel more not to make more money. We both love traveling, like most people. And we both feel like there’s a lot more of the world we want to see that we haven't.
NOEMIE: I think we work really well together on some levels. We are pretty aligned aesthetically, we have very similar taste. But then there are definitely moments where we disagree, I think there’s going to be a moment where we need to figure out what the balance between how much we’re sacrificing and how much we’re getting out of this. We’re always talking about the future but it’s not like an intentional thing. Its never like sitting down and planning. I think it's always just been easy.
JEREMY: We’re pretty honest with each other about stuff that we’re going through, what's on our minds. If something is really troubling me at work I don't really hold onto it and let it wear me down, I just immediately express that to Noemie and she does the same. Whenever she’s dealing with something, whether it’s work, health or friendship, we just talk to each other a lot about those things. I think we just support each other more than anything else.
NOEMIE: Jeremy definitely has more of the child energy (I mean I’m a complete child as well) but he's definitely got more energy than I do.
JEREMY: I do like to run up and down the hall and try to slide in my socks.
NOEMIE: You won't see that side of Jeremy until you have gotten like really really close to him. But he’s a total child. Actually in our vows to each other the way I described it was “he’s a big kid, we’re both big kids just helping each other figure out life and almost pretending to be adults”. And I think that sums up our relationship pretty well. We’ve gotten through life with again this naive optimism and somehow we’ve just figured it out together.
JEREMY: With getting our apartment it happened quickly, now we have a mortgage and it’s a lot of responsibility but we don’t really think about it as that. I don’t think that’s ever really come into our heads. Noemie still takes on the jobs she wants to from a creative standpoint.
NOEMIE: I think that from the very beginning one of the things that attracted me the most was this feeling I had of instant comfort, instantly I just felt I could be myself around him which was something I’d never felt as strong before with anyone. I had this moment actually when we were in NY that first time together and it all of a sudden hit me really strongly that I wasn’t thinking about what I was saying before saying it. It's such a basic thing but every single thought I had was just coming out without any kind of filter. From the very beginning that has been so easy, it’s hard to explain it in words. I don't think either of us have ever really sat down and analyzed it, I think it’s something about it that just clicks and works and most of the time is really effortless. I think we both get very different things from each other.
JEREMY: I like having the friendship side of being together, it’s a big deal for me I think. In terms of character traits I think we compliment each other well.
NOEMIE: There’s a part of my personality which is very much about survival and it has always been like that, but Jeremy has never needed to think like that. He always has calmed me a lot and that playful, calm, very secure side of him is 100% what I need some nights when something’s not going well. He just instantly brings me back down to a much calmer place.
JEREMY: Noemie motivates me professionally. Because I’m more laid back at work I tend to be more content with whatever but Noemie will push me to do more.
NOEMIE: Jeremy is the most natural no bullshit person ever. I think sometimes I have the ability to get swept up in stuff that ultimately isn’t that important and he’s very good at bringing me back down.
JEREMY: We constantly tell each other how lucky we are. Like, we’re lucky as individuals but even as a couple we’re lucky.
NOEMIE: We will tell each other every day how lucky we are. It’s so cliché and smushy but I think it helps snap us back to reality and puts our lives into perspective. I think we both really appreciate how good we’ve got it.
Actually in our vows to each other the way I described it was “he’s a big kid, we’re both big kids just helping each other figure out life and almost pretending to be adults”.