SS26 — The Coveted Passport opens applications February 14 Apply →
DAFINA SMITH
VOL · 03 Spring 2026 · Issue No. 11

A life, fully built

Building a life worth coveting.

Three years in. A journal, a school, a passport, a club. Six pillars built into rooms you can walk into. This is what it looks like when influence stops being a metric and starts being a key — to communities, to medicine, to capital, to time.

Read the manifesto →
UPCOMING · Mar 14 · The Future of Inclusive Wealth · Chase Private Client · NYC · UPCOMING · Apr 02 · Aspen Ideas Festival · Panel chair · Aspen, CO · UPCOMING · Apr 21 · Fidelity Wealth Equity Summit · Keynote · Boston · UPCOMING · May 09 · The Coveted Passport — Oaxaca · Hosting · 14 guests · UPCOMING · Jun 03 · Harvard Kennedy School · Visiting Practitioner · Cambridge · UPCOMING · Jun 18 · Vanguard · Inclusive Capital fireside · Philadelphia · UPCOMING · Mar 14 · The Future of Inclusive Wealth · Chase Private Client · NYC · UPCOMING · Apr 02 · Aspen Ideas Festival · Panel chair · Aspen, CO · UPCOMING · Apr 21 · Fidelity Wealth Equity Summit · Keynote · Boston · UPCOMING · May 09 · The Coveted Passport — Oaxaca · Hosting · 14 guests · UPCOMING · Jun 03 · Harvard Kennedy School · Visiting Practitioner · Cambridge · UPCOMING · Jun 18 · Vanguard · Inclusive Capital fireside · Philadelphia ·
AS SEEN IN
Architectural Digest VOGUE The New York Times Town & Country Cup of Jo Bloomberg The Cut
Pillar 01 · The Coveted Passport

Slow tourism, told properly.

A small annual program. Fourteen people, six destinations, 40% of fees redistributed at the source.

Spring 2026 · Now booking

Six days in Oaxaca, with the women who keep the mezcal.

A return to the kind of trip we said we'd built this whole thing to make: small, slow, accountable. Mornings with the maestras of San Dionisio Ocotepec. Afternoons at Pujol's tasting kitchen. One day with no plan at all.

Dates
09 — 14 May 2026
Guests
Twelve, plus Dafina & the photographer
Stay
Casa Antonieta, Centro
With
Mezcaloteca · Pujol · Mujeres del Maguey
Investment
$11,400 · payment plans available
Where the money goes 40% of program fees are paid directly to the women's mezcal cooperatives, the local photographer, and the family who runs the pension. The rest covers travel and a fair fee for the team. We publish the ledger every year.
Apply for May · 4 spots open →
The 2026 Route

Six destinations. One ledger.

View the full ledger →
Influence is just a key. The question is which doors you choose to walk through. — D.S., the manifesto
Pillar 02 · Building, Out Loud

Stages, and what gets said on them.

I talk about three things: how capital actually moves through underserved communities, what it costs to refuse the founder cliché, and the small specific permissions that compound into a life.

14 MAR · 2026 The Future of Inclusive Wealth Chase Private Client Park Avenue · NYC Keynote
02 APR · 2026 Capital, Taste & Patience Aspen Ideas Festival Aspen Meadows · CO Panel chair
21 APR · 2026 Wealth Equity for the Next Generation Fidelity Boston Innovation Labs Keynote
18 JUN · 2026 Inclusive Capital, spoken plainly Vanguard Malvern · Philadelphia Fireside
12 NOV · 2025 On founding the premium version Stripe Sessions San Francisco Played
04 OCT · 2025 Editorial as infrastructure Condé Nast Forum One World Trade · NYC Played
22 SEP · 2025 Banking the second-generation founder JPMorgan · The Negotiating Table Brooklyn Navy Yard Played
CHASEPrivate Client
VanguardInclusive Capital
FIDELITYWealth Equity
ASPENIdeas Festival
BloombergEquality Summit
HARVARDKennedy School
Pillar 03 · The Coveted Body

Health is the only compounding asset.

An executive longevity program. Built around the labs you can only get in Switzerland and the habits you can only get from doing them.

The Verbier Protocol

What I do — and what I learned does the work.

A six-month protocol I run twice a year, with a clinic in Switzerland and a coach in Brooklyn. The full panel — GI, blood, hormone, iron, blood pressure, cardiopulmonary — twice annually. Nothing dramatic. The boring things, done.

Read the full protocol →

01 · Quarterly

Full blood & iron panel

The basic 60-marker panel I ignored for ten years. Done at the Clinique La Prairie standard, twice a year.

02 · Monthly

Three silent mornings

No call, no inbox before 11. Walking, reading, water. Earned its keep within six weeks.

03 · Weekly

Two strength sessions

Heavy and slow. Squats, deadlifts, presses, hangs. Boring on purpose. Tracked.

04 · Daily

Forty minutes of walking

The single most under-prescribed intervention for women in our forties. Outside, weighted, before noon.

05 · Daily

Eight hours protected

No meetings before 9. Lights down by 10. Phone in the kitchen. Not negotiable now.

06 · Annual

One true retreat

One week at a real clinic, one week with no plan. Different weeks. Both required.

Pillar 04 · Strength after 50

The program for women who built things, and would like to keep using their bodies.

A 16-week strength and presence program for executives in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. Heavy lifting, walking, skiing in season. Built with a coach who works with surgeons and judges. No before-and-after photos.

01 · The lifts that compound Weeks 1—4
02 · Walking, weighted & alone Weeks 1—16
03 · Power for the boardroom & the slope Weeks 5—10
04 · A week in the Engadin Week 12 · St. Moritz
05 · Maintenance, forever Weeks 13—16+
Cohort 04 · September 2026 →
Pillar 05 · The Library

A faculty seat, finally — and a syllabus that's mine.

Two terms a year as a Visiting Practitioner at Harvard's Kennedy School and the Graduate School of Design. The course is on building cultural infrastructure with capital that wasn't built for it. We read more than we think.

You teach the way you read. Slowly, with a pencil, and at the kitchen table. — Dafina Smith, faculty letter, ‘26
UNIT 01 On category architecture as a public good Sep · 4 wks
UNIT 02 Capital that doesn't recognise you Oct · 3 wks
UNIT 03 Hospitality as civic infrastructure Nov · 3 wks
UNIT 04 Editorial & the long memory Dec · 2 wks
FIELD Three days in Treasure Beach Jan · with Dafina

Apply for Spring '27 · 18 seats →

Pillar 06 · The Covet List

March — nine objects, three books, one chair.

All months →
The Westport throw
Hermitage Farms · $340
My Year of Rest
Penguin · paperback
The Leuchtturm A5
Plain · ruled · sage
The Muji pen .38
Black ink · two
A ceramic bowl, beige
Tortuga, Oaxaca · $34
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What's been said

The first publisher in a decade to make hospitality, capital, and editorial feel like the same project.

Architectural Digest · Open Door · Mar 2026

A new register for women's wealth coverage — specific, generous, allergic to performance.

Bloomberg · The Equality Summit · Nov 2025

Smith is rebuilding the lifestyle magazine as a small piece of public infrastructure.

The New York Times · T Magazine · Sep 2025
A note, finally

We didn't build this to sell things to people.

We built it to unlock things — the experiences, the medicine, the rooms, the quiet — that you should not have to be famous to have access to. The fact that we can now hand them to other women is, honestly, the whole point.

— Dafina