Lesley
Photographed by Allan Holmes
Lesley Burr is the co-founder, web developer, and writer of Rusted Revolution. She is a city gal, born and raised in Chicago, where she developed an interest in street culture, fashion, music, and arts. Lesley was independent and creative even as a child, engaging in a wide range of athletic and cultural activities from competitive figure skating, to classical piano playing, running, ballet, and ethnic Filipino dance. Growing up in a bi-racial and multicultural household (Lesley is a proud Chinese-Filipino, German, Croatian, Hungarian, Austrian mix) has given her wanderlust for global foods and travel.
Her schooling at Chicago’s St. Ignatius College Preparatory was instrumental both in instilling a love of literature and writing, and a sense of pride in her individual style — dress codes were the bane of her existence as a teen — and she continued to pursue these interests at university. Lesley graduated from Boston College in May 2011 where she received a BA in English, and also completed minors in French and History. Language, history, and fashion are her passions. She believes all three of these subjects are different ways of self-expression, and of telling a story. Stories to Lesley are one of the most important aspects of life – they help teach about the past, communicate, entertain, and also look to the future.
Lesley’s career path has mirrored her passions — she has work experience in various aspects of publishing and fashion. In college, Lesley held simultaneous internships as the Fashion Intern and a Contributing Writer at Venus Zine, and as Publications Intern at the Chicago History Museum. During senior year, she acted as a Contributing Blogger for Her Campus BC due to the partnership between the site and Rusted Revolution, and spent a year and a half at Topshop’s Chicago flagship store, where she was able to directly influence consumer taste through her fashion styling talent.
Now she works full time in publications at the Chicago History Museum as the Multimedia Assistant and Social Media Specialist, where she has been instrumental in developing and managing their social media strategy in addition to assisting with the development of the Museum’s many multimedia components. And as if those things weren’t enough, Lesley enjoys forgoing sleep in favor of blogging, creating jewelry and altering vintage clothing, wandering around museums, adding to her nail polish collection, going to music festivals, and exploring the city night life with her friends.
*Though Lesley is an enthusiastic and dedicated employee at the Chicago History Museum, she is not a spokesperson for the place. Her opinions are solely her own, and should not be attributed to this organizations, nor to any previous organizations at which she has worked.
