Marki & Jarod

Photography by Jacob Pritchard

Both born and raised in California Marki and Jarod have a keen sense of aesthetic and architecture. Together they are the creatives behind Wash & Fold NYC.

TWP: How did you two meet?

JAROD: This is the funniest answer but the best way to describe it is that we’re a product of our generation. We met on Tinder. You can tell how people met based on what app it is. You can tell when people are MySpace people or Facebook people, even though now everyone is a Facebook person. The funny thing is Marki was my first and only Tinder date.

MARKI: He was like whatever.

JAROD: I didn’t even swipe right. My friend was curating my Tinder account.

MARKI: We met here in New York but we're both from California. Which is really funny, it made it like ‘oh I really like you, you’re from my home.’

JAROD: Legitimately home. I came from Oakland and she grew up in Oakland.

MARKI: I got out here after school because it felt like the right thing to do. We came out here within three months of each other.

JAROD: They call Oakland ‘Brooklyn’s little sister.’

MARKI: It’s so chill. It is a lot safer than it was and there are really good things going on. When we go back it is great. We realized that we hung out at all the same spots just not at the same time. It’s weird because I was at school when he was in Oakland so we didn’t have any overlap.

JAROD: We were just completely passing each other and missing each other. I lived in San Francisco and then Oakland for four years. I owned a gallery with a friend and then I knew at some point I wanted to go to NY. I knew that if I didn’t leave Oakland I wasn’t going to. I identify with the Bay area.

Career wise

MARKI: I studied architecture. It’s a 5 year thing and it’s really gnarly. My dad’s an architect and I didn’t want to do anything that my parents did. They both went to Cal Poly, which I also went to but I didn’t want to. So I then pompously thought in order to not get into Cal Poly I would apply to the hardest program to get into, which is architecture. Then I wound up getting in and felt obligated to go. I decided to try it for a year and I wound up loving it. It was the best experience ever. It is kind of cult like and weird and you never sleep and you just spend all of your time building models and hanging out with your studio. You’re really in it. By the time I was done I was so over it and wanted to come to New York and do something else. I did my year abroad in Paris. I wound up working in fashion doing set design for Hermes doing runway shows and parties and I met my now mentor, Antoine. That was the point where I realized I want to do a bunch of things. When I came to New York I started working in set design; doing runway shows here. Side project wise, when we met, Jarod started a doing music video with a friend and I came on doing set design. We work well together. He’s much more organized than I am. I have so many ideas that I’m just like ‘I don’t know.’

We work well together. He’s much more organized than I am.

JAROD: Our backgrounds as far as studies go are so different. I did 5 years not because my program was hard but because I went to City College and did photography. I was already into it because I grew up making skate films. It’s a huge part of my life. Skateboarding is what led me into everything. There are a lot of skateboarders doing really creative things. But I was definitely not the student. I met a friend randomly off of wanting to do this Donate Your Skate show, this low key charity event for getting skates for kids in Oakland. Some of my favorite photographers came. Then we started curating shows for two years. School played a back seat. Moving to New York I want to get involved in less skateboarding and more design stuff. We’re still establishing our own community but it’s been nice being together. We bring two different types of people together but we collectively attract a third party that are people who neither of us knew before.

Collaborating

MARKI: The first project we worked on was the music video Jarod mentioned. Jarod had a friend from Marlow and Sons who works there and is a musician. I’ve done a lot of video work in the past but for my brothers. Jarod asked if I wanted to do the set design for this one. We planned it for a month but designed it in a week. We had friends build pieces, we built pieces. It was so easy.

JAROD: I delegate the tasks. It was also the first video I worked on where I wanted a specific set.

MARKI: We’ve thrown a couple parties together which has been fun. I’ve been working on this project in Oakland for a really long time. It’s this park in Oakland that has been designed and permitted and Jarod has been helping me with it. We need to raise money so we threw a party when we went to Oakland. It turned out super cool. We are going to work together on a skateboarding film festival too.

JAROD: I'm the one who is okay with doing the paperwork. I get anxiety when shit isn’t getting done. Marki pushes me to calm the fuck down and I push her to step it up.

MARKI: The way that I get things done is I’m sitting there and am like ‘oh I’m going to sew something now.’ I’m not task oriented. It’s a balance. We’ve been working on a lot on a skateboarding in architecture theme. They’re both very spatial things. Jarod and I perceive space in similar ways, he's taught me to see things that weren’t necessarily designed through skateboarding.

Marki pushes me to calm the fuck down and I push her to step it up.

Favorite moments

MARKI: I was at work. It was a torrential downpour and Jarod’s phone had died. I was about to walk away and was rounding the corner. I saw him and I sprinted and ran into his arms in the rain. Everyone was disgusted. So PDA heavy.

JAROD: That’s my favorite personally. Also pretty recently we went to the Saint Laurent runway show together. It was a total shit show. We flew to LA for a night.

MARKI: He met my parents, my brothers, my ex, and we flew together for the first time. It was a lot.

TWP: Who said I love you first?

JAROD: I definitely did.

MARKI: The sappy one over here.

JAROD: I’m definitely the emotional one. I think we were just laying in bed one night.

MARKI: He was like I’m going to say it now and I won’t say it again until you’re ready.

JAROD: Being in a relationship together pretty much fell into our lap unexpectedly. I wasn’t looking for anything and I wasn’t curating my Tinder. Then we met. We met up during the day and then met later that night and hung out that entire night.

MARKI: We walked from deep Bushwick to Williamsburg underneath the subway tracks.

JAROD: At 5am. Sober as shit.

MARKI: Then he got on a plane at 6 am to go to Chicago and I flew to California for a month. We stayed in contact by Snapchat.

JAROD: I definitely did not go on Tinder after that.

I wasn’t looking for anything and I wasn’t curating my Tinder. Then we met.

TWP: When did you move in together?

MARKI: It kind of just happened.

JAROD: You spend time with someone for so long and you’re with each other all of the time staying over. Now it works out nicely having one place and we stay out at each other’s way.

MARKI: The most interesting thing is that when we both started dating, neither of us had started the jobs that we wanted to be doing. We hadn’t hit career mode yet. I spent 2 years just floating around and not really paying my dues.

Wash and Fold

JAROD: I had worked with a friend who is a painter when I was in Oakland. His style was very Bay. We’re more fashion/design oriented here in New York. Wash and Fold started as an uncoined creative agency of sorts.

MARKI: We have this whole arsenal of things in the works. We have this music video we’re suppose to shoot in July. Jarod and his friend Ethan had their thing and then I butted in with too many opinions and sort of became a part of it.

JAROD: Overall Wash and Fold is our project together taking the digital things that we do and taking them out of the internet and putting them back in the physical space. You get more out of showing a video in a physical space. You’re meeting new friends and new collaborators and you’re hearing peoples’ opinions live.

MARKI: We want to create spaces for people.

JAROD: You have to play into it but play with it at the same time. That’s our creative culture today.

MARKI: Every time we do something we do it a different way to see if we can make it sustainable. It feels really lucky to be able to do that here in New York together.

JAROD: Since I was super young, I’ve always been working. I have that mentality of turning things into a business. Marki has allowed me to pull away from that and make something of myself.

MARKI: We're working towards a creation of a community not a business per se.

JAROD: The goal is to still be picky. Keeping this as fun and creative as possible is our personal goal.

MARKI: We have exterior jobs, I’m at an internship at an architecture firm and the work environment is gnarly. I love it, I think it’s amazing. I also really believe in a work-life balance. I know having this job as an experience opens so many opportunities and there are friends I am meeting that I’ll know forever. You have to do it.

Sharing space

MARKI: I come from a family of four kids and we’re really used to talking about our feelings. We never go to bed angry and you always have to have a conversation and move through it.

JAROD: I’m an only child with a single mom. So I’m like deuces, I’m out.

MARKI: We’ve gotten a lot better. Our main rule is that whenever we’re talking about something serious we need to be moving, we can’t be sitting down in bed. We’ve been learning from each other.

JAROD: Taking space and making time are both important. Remembering that you have friends too, and making sure that you get in those friend times in solo. And we were both in serious relationships before so we know the ups and downs.

JAROD: When we first started seeing each other, I was so intimidated by her. I don’t come from a super scholarly background, I’m intelligent in a street smart way. When you’re trying to kick it with somebody who you really like and who you’re inspired by and who is intellectual, I was like, fuck I can't keep up. She's next level. I think my favorite part about Marki is how she inspires me to be better and think more about the things that I do...and maybe pick up a book every once in awhile.

MARKI: I love how Jarod moves through space and all of the people he surrounds himself with. I’ve never been around somebody who is so good at being part of a community and bringing communities together. I definitely love talking to people but more one on one. He goes about the world in a very dreamy way. It's easy to hang together, we'll pop into something and then keep strolling.

JAROD: We have good times together and want to continue to create them. I want to go to up to Hudson. We want to go to London, she’s obsessed with Paris.

MARKI: Working together, we have a certain amount of professionalism. But if you go through our texts, you’d be like you guys are disgustingly cute. My name in his phone is Bae Sweetpotato.

JAROD: It used to be Bae with a unicorn. She’s my Tinder unicorn. We’re not overly romantic but it’s a constant ebb and flow. You have to remember the little things. Flowers every couple of weeks.

MARKI: I came home from my first all nighter with flowers and a note on the floor.

JAROD: Not forgetting a kiss or taking for granted everything that you take for granted. I know I get super caught up.

You have to remember the little things. Flowers every couple of weeks.