
How Founder Shannon Maldonado Carved Out A Multi-Hyphenate Concept Store In South Philly

Black Woman Owned is a limited series highlighting black woman business owners who are change-makers and risk-takers in their respective realms. As founders, these women dare to be bold, have courage in being the change they wish to see in the world, and are unapologetic when it comes to their vision. These black women aren't waiting for a seat, they are owning the table.
In order to understand what YOWIE is, you must note that this multi-hyphenate space is just as its motto implies: it's "a lot of things." The part-retail shop, part-design studio, and whole-adult playground were birthed out of what Shannon imagined her perfect workplace to be. What started out as a Pinterest mood board and side project, has since grown into something much greater with a community-centric purpose that ripples throughout its Philly home base.
Much like her brainchild, Shannon has never been the type to limit her creativity when it begs to expand. For more than a decade, Shannon worked within the corporate fashion sector for legacy brands like Tommy Hilfiger, American Eagle, and Ralph Lauren. Each work experience imparted valuable lessons that she would then apply to her own business, sharing that it's "really important before you start your own thing: to see how others do it." But like any great student of their craft understands, there's just as much to learn from others' mistakes as there is from their wins.
That's why Shannon was determined "to do the opposite" of what she saw in these spaces once she got her wings to launch YOWIE in 2016.
Courtesy of Shannon Maldonado
Photo by: Caro Ramirez
Shannon's pivot from the corporate world was marked by a need for more, a call that would push her into something greater, "I had social anxiety, financial anxiety [in New York]. There was just so much bubbling under the surface that once I hit that wall, it became way easier to leave. I was ready for a change." She was looking to pursue something that would challenge her both professionally and personally, and YOWIE did just that.
In the five years since YOWIE's inception, the shop has experienced a great deal of local support, but nothing would match that influx of visibility that would come in 2020. Wedged between the onslaught of small business support brought on by COVID-19, along with the hypervisibility of Black-owned businesses that followed the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter uprisings, Shannon's once intimate neighborhood corner store, began to grow in brand recognition. "It made me feel more comfortable about speaking out on injustices. That's who I am. I want to be a good neighbor and a civically-minded human being, and that should be a part of our brand as well."
YOWIE is an extension of Shannon and the community that raised her. It's a noun, an adjective, and even a verb. Home-grown and community-centric. It speaks to her genius to never be boxed in by one product, space, or idea. But most of all, YOWIE is yours and belongs to the community of South Philadelphia.
YOWIE is the future.
What prompted the transition from your corporate job to taking the leap into entrepreneurship? Were there any challenges you had to face in this transition?
One of the challenges was how for the entire time I'd been in corporate, I've been an anonymous designer. So unless I told you that these were jeans that I designed, you would have no idea who made them. To stand in front of a group of people [when I launched YOWIE] and say these are all of the things that I love, these are artists that I think you should believe in, that was very scary. I felt very naked because YOWIE is such a personal brand and such an extension of me.
In the beginning, you're really just trying to find your voice and your audience. I think there's this misconception that the world is just waiting for you to finish your website and then they're all just going to run and buy everything, but that's not true; it's actually very anticlimactic. But every step of the way, I would get a small affirmation, whether it was a purchase, press, or someone saying, "This is really special." I would hold on to those things. It's never lost on me when someone compliments the brand or I see someone wearing our tote on the street. I'm very proud that people resonate with the brand, it definitely helps me out on the harder days when I'm like, 'What the hell am I doing?!'
You left New York and headed home to Philly to start what is now YOWIE. Sometimes there can be resistance or even pride in returning home, how were you able to adjust to this move?
For many reasons, I didn't want to do the brand in New York. It felt like it would just be one of many in New York, and it would be very financially challenging to do YOWIE there. I wanted it to be the opposite of what I was used to, I wanted YOWIE to be based on emotion, feelings, the love of design, and not worry about money. I felt like I should open it in a lower-cost city like Philly that I know, but it also is unfamiliar to me because I had been gone for so long.
I was looking for a challenge and space where I would make mistakes; a mistake in Philly is not the same cost as a mistake in New York, so it felt a lot more comfortable to me. After that much time [in New York], I didn't hate my job, but I wasn't learning anymore. I'm a life-long student, I love to learn, I like being uncomfortable. I wanted to do something that was going to challenge me professionally and personally and boy, did it!
"To stand in front of a group of people and say, these are all of the things that I love, these are artists that I think you should believe in, that was very scary. I felt very naked because YOWIE is such a personal brand and such an extension of me."
Courtesy of Shannon Maldonado
Photo by: Caro Ramirez
Have you seen the benefits of sticking to your gut in building YOWIE in your hometown of Philly?
I think the biggest thing with your gut is that it's like a muscle you have to work at and grow over time and get comfortable listening to. In the beginning, when you start a business, a lot of the people who you love and care about will come out of the woodwork to give you advice. They want to tell you, "One time my friend started a business and this is what they did wrong." All of a sudden, everyone's an expert in small business. So you're going to hear a lot of noise, and I was, in the first six months or so, susceptible to that noise. I've always been someone who trusts my gut and instincts, so I was like, "Wait, I can't get sucked into this now, this is not who I am."
Over time, I built up this group of friends who I call my "frientors sounding board" and those are the people who I take the things that I'm truly unsure about with YOWIE to. But it's not an open forum for every random person to come in and tell me what I should do with the brand.
That door closed a very long time ago because I think at the end of the day, people can look at your brand from the outside and dissect it and think they know what's what, but only you know your goals and intentions and you have to feel comfortable with that. I don't think that's something that comes overnight, but once I locked into what I wanted YOWIE to be, there's no person who can steer me from that direction.
YOWIE experienced a great deal of growth through the hypervisibility of last summer’s events with COVID and the BLM movement. How has life and business changed since then?
That whole time was interesting. It was affirming because I had been working on YOWIE for so long and had very humble goals for it. I wasn't chasing rapid growth, just slow and steady strategy, so I was like, "Wow, this is exciting that we're finally getting all this attention!" But then, it's wrapped in: we're getting all this attention because someone has died. Or because finally, people are deciding that they should support Black businesses after an obscene amount of time of us being here. It was really complicated. I didn't know what else to do but galvanize that attention into raising funds and sharing resources because it just didn't feel right to just take it all for ourselves.
I have a younger brother who's had run-ins with the police, and it struck a nerve with me to see how many times we heard these stories and something broke in me. For a long time as a Black founder, I was unsure if I could weave some of the experience that I've had about race into our brand and narrative. I wasn't sure how that would be received. But after that time in June [2020], I didn't care anymore. This is something that's important to me and if this alienates some of our customers, then they weren't our people anyway.
It was very empowering in that way, but it was also very strange. In the aftermath, I feared that it would all be taken away, I thought this is all just fleeting, a moment, and it would fizzle out. I'm very proud to say that hasn't been the case for us. We've grown exponentially, but there was definitely this fear of they're only here for a moment.
"Once I locked into what I wanted YOWIE to be, there's no person who can steer me from that direction."
Courtesy of Shannon Maldonado
Photo by: Caro Ramirez
How have you been able to align yourself with opportunities that speak to you and your brand and not fall into the “once in a lifetime opportunities” myth?
It's been a lot of trial and error on my end. In June, we got a lot more inquiries about collaborations than we ever had in the five years that we've been in business. Some were so obviously copy-and-pasted, no recognition of who we are, it was just like they called an all-hands meeting and said, "Find a Black person! Find a Black business!" I was once such a people-pleaser, but that was the first time in my life where I started saying "no" to things. Professionally and politely.
Now, my first thing is: I need to feel something. When I get an email, it's like the same process as when I order products: I want to feel excited. I wanted to feel an immediate visceral reaction. For me now, nothing is an immediate "yes" anymore. I have to ask questions.
You have to do your due diligence now because so many people are trying to tokenize us and to look like they're not crazy or doing terrible things and I will not be that person. Money is not the only success of YOWIE, what we've built, the community we have is better than that.
In what ways have you learned to be gentle with yourself in the process of entrepreneurship?
That's something that's still a work-in-progress for me. One of the biggest things I've done in the last two years is not comparing myself and what I'm doing with YOWIE to what other entrepreneurs are doing with their brands. I think that was a big unlock for me because you can lose so much time feeling insecure or jealous about what someone else is doing that you could use creating or trying new things.
When you're starting out, it's hard to not do that, but once I got in the mindset of "I know where I want YOWIE to go," it cleared a lot of space for me to be creative again. I think a lot of that is because I'm a lot older than the people I interact with. I know who I am, I'm sure of myself, I'm not trying to find myself anymore as a person. Coming into my late 30s, I know where I want to be, what kind of leader I want to become, and what kind of brand that I want to create.
"I know who I am, I'm sure of myself, I'm not trying to find myself anymore as a person. Coming into my late 30s, I know where I want to be, what kind of leader I want to become, and what kind of brand that I want to create."
Courtesy of Shannon Maldonado
Photo by: Caro Ramirez
What does a “safe space” mean to you?
Safe space, in our regard, means a place where you can not only be yourself but a place where you feel a sense of ownership. There's something about feeling like something is yours or that it's a part of your community that makes it feel safe. One of the things that I love and gets me choked up is when people talk about YOWIE and how proud they are that it's in Philly and that it's their space. That makes me feel really proud that they feel like they own part of the space.
Having this pride and ownership over a space. Not in a way that's exclusive, but in a way that you really love it, and you want to bring all your friends into it and you can't wait to tell everyone about it.
To learn more about YOWIE and Shannon Maldonado's community-centric endeavors, follow her here.
Featured image courtesy by Caro Ramirez
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Aley Arion is a writer and digital storyteller from the South, currently living in sunny Los Angeles. Her site, yagirlaley.com, serves as a digital diary to document personal essays, cultural commentary, and her insights into the Black Millennial experience. Follow her at @yagirlaley on all platforms!
Claudia Jordan, Demetria McKinney & Jill Marie Jones On 'Games Women Play' & Dating Over 40
What do you get when you mix unfiltered truths, high-stakes romance, and a few well-timed one-liners? You get Games Women Play—the sizzling new stage play by Je’Caryous Johnson that’s part relationship rollercoaster, part grown-woman group chat.
With a powerhouse cast that includes Claudia Jordan, Demetria McKinney, Jill Marie Jones, Carl Payne, Chico Bean, and Brian J. White, the play dives headfirst into the messy, hilarious, and heart-wrenching games people play for love, power, and peace of mind. And the women leading this story? They’re bringing their whole selves to the stage—and leaving nothing behind.
From Script to Spotlight
The road to Games Women Play started over 20 years ago—literally.
“This script was written 20 years ago,” Jill Marie Jones said with a smile. “It was originally called Men, Money & Gold Diggers, and I was in the film version. So when Je’Caryous called me to bring it to the stage, I was like, ‘Let’s go.’” Now reimagined for 2025, the play is updated with sharp dialogue and modern relationship dynamics that feel all too real.
Demetria McKinney, no stranger to Je’Caryous Johnson’s productions, jumped at the opportunity to join the cast once again. “This is my third time working with him,” she shared. “It was an opportunity to stretch. I’d never been directed by Carl Payne before, and the chance to work with talent I admire—Jill, Claudia, Chico—it was a no-brainer.”
Claudia Jordan joked that she originally saw the role as just another check. “I didn’t take it that seriously at first,” she admitted. “But this is my first full-on tour—and now I’ve got a whole new respect for how hard people work in theater. This ain’t easy.”
Modern Love, Stage Left
The play doesn’t hold back when it comes to the messier parts of love. One jaw-dropping moment comes when a live podcast proposal flips into a prenup bombshell—leaving the audience (and the characters) gasping.
Demetria broke it down with honesty. “People don’t ask the real questions when they date. Like, ‘Do you want kids? How do you feel about money?’ These convos aren’t happening, and then everyone’s confused. That moment in the play—it’s real. That happens all the time.”
Jill chimed in, noting how the play speaks to emotional disconnect. “We’re giving each other different tokens of love. Men might offer security and money. Women, we’re giving our hearts. But there’s a disconnect—and that’s where things fall apart.”
And then Claudia, of course, took it all the way there. “These men don’t even want to sign our prenups now!” she laughed. “They want to live the soft life, too. Wearing units, gloss, getting their brows done. We can’t have nothing! Y’all want to be like us? Then get a damn period and go through menopause.”
Dating Over 40: “You Better Come Correct”
When the conversation turned to real-life relationships, all three women lit up. Their experiences dating in their 40s and 50s have given them both clarity—and zero tolerance for games.
“I feel sexier than I’ve ever felt,” said Jill, who proudly turned 50 in January. “I say what I want. I mean what I say. I’m inside my woman, and I’m not apologizing for it.”
Demetria added that dating now comes with deeper self-awareness. “Anybody in my life is there because I want them there. I’ve worked hard to need nobody. But I’m open to love—as long as you keep doing what got me there in the first place.”
For Claudia, the bar is high—and the peace is priceless. “I’ve worked hard for my peace,” she said. “I’m not dating for food. I’m dating because I want to spend time with you. And honestly, if being with you isn’t better than being alone with my candles and fountains and cats? Then no thanks.”
Channeling Strength & Icon Status
Each actress brings something different to the play—but all of them deliver.
“I actually wish I could be messier on stage,” Claudia joked. “But I think about my grandmother—she was born in 1929, couldn’t even vote or buy a house without a man, and didn’t give a damn. She was fearless. That’s where my strength comes from.”
For Jill, the comparisons to her iconic Girlfriends character Toni Childs aren’t far off—but this role gave her a chance to dig deeper. “If you really understood Toni, you’d see how layered she was. And Paisley is the same—misunderstood, but strong. There’s more to her than people see at first glance.”
Demetria, who juggles singing and acting seamlessly, shared that live theater pushes her in a new way. “Every moment on stage counts. You can’t redo anything. It’s a different kind of love and discipline. You have to give the performance away—live, in the moment—and trust that it lands.”
Laughter, Lessons & Black Girl Gems
The show has plenty of laugh-out-loud moments—and the cast isn’t shy about who steals scenes.
“Chico Bean gets a lot of gasps and laughs,” Claudia said. “And Naomi Booker? Every scene she’s in—she’s hilarious.”
But the play isn’t just about humor. It leaves space for reflection—especially for Black women.
“I hope we get back to the foundation of love and communication,” said Demetria. “A lot of us are in protector mode. But that’s turned into survival mode. We’ve lost softness. We’ve lost connection.”
Claudia agreed. “We’re doing it all—but it’s not because we want to be strong all the time. It’s because we have to be. And I just want women to know: You can have peace, you can be soft. But stop bringing your old pain into new love. Don’t let past heartbreak build walls so high that the right person can’t climb over.”
Final Act: Pack the House
If there’s one thing this cast agrees on, it’s that this play isn’t just entertainment—it’s necessary.
“Atlanta is the Black entertainment hub,” Claudia said. “We need y’all to show up for this play. Support the arts. Support each other. Because when we pack the house, we make space for more stories like this.”
Games Women Play is more than a play—it’s a mirror. You’ll see yourself, your friends, your exes, and maybe even your next chapter. So get ready to laugh, reflect, and maybe even heal—because the games are on.
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It’s officially Miss Keri, Baby season again—and if you ask us, it’s been a long time coming. After 15 years away from the music scene, Keri Hilson has returned not only with a brand-new album, but also a captivating new role in Lifetime’s Fame—the latest installment in The Temptations film franchise.
Between the album We Need to Talk: Love and her leading role in Fame, this isn’t just a comeback—it’s a rebirth. The Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter turned actress is letting us into her world like never before, unpacking themes of vulnerability, healing, and inner strength with grace, grit, and raw artistry.
Now streaming on Lifetime, Fame follows two superstar sisters—played by Keri and singer/actress Keshia Chanté—as they navigate the cost of stardom, sibling rivalry, and the dark side of desire. The film also stars Romeo Miller, Ecstasia Sanders, Nathan Witte, and Sophie Carriere, and is executive produced by Derrick Williams and Adriane Hopper Williams of the Seven Deadly Sins franchise.
As for the music? We Need to Talk: Love is a three-part album (Love, Drama, Redemption) that tells the story of a woman who’s been through it—and has risen from the ashes. “It was time to speak for myself,” Keri says.
We sat down with Keri to talk about her return to music, her passion for acting, the emotional depth of Fame, and how she’s learning to care for herself amidst the chaos.
From R&B Queen to Drama Star: Keri Gets Into Character
“Even though she’s famous—as am I—it was really her humanity that I wanted to portray.”
Keri plays Cherish, one half of a superstar sibling duo who must confront their fractured relationship in the wake of a traumatic robbery. For Keri, the role was more than a character—it was a psychological study.
“I enjoy departures from reality. That’s why I love acting,” she shares. “Psychology is one of my favorite things in life. I became a writer because I’m an observer of human nature, emotion, and behavior. I think I did a good job showing her humanity.”
The Fame Isn’t Always Worth the Price
“Keep the main thing the main thing.”
Keri doesn’t sugarcoat the industry. When asked about what Fame reveals about the dark side of celebrity culture, her answer is clear:
“It’s a cautionary tale. It reminds you to keep your family close and not allow anything to come between them—especially in pursuit of success. Keep the main thing the main thing. For me, that’s family, love, spirituality, and values.”
Three Chapters, One Story: Love. Drama. Redemption.
“I’ve shed the fear. It was time to tell my own story.”
Released April 18th, We Need to Talk: Love is Keri’s first album in 15 years—and a deeply personal one at that. The three-part project (Love, Drama, Redemption) represents a timeline of healing and growth.
“I’m finally in a place where I’m able and willing to open up more,” she says. “For a while, I became really guarded—shell-shocked, even—after making mistakes in the public eye. Whether it’s all your fault or not, the scrutiny takes its toll. But now, I’ve shed that fear. It’s time to tell my story.”
Cooking, Walks, and Recalibrating in the Chaos
“I’m not doing the best job—but I’m doing what I can.”
Between eight-hour rehearsals, press runs, and music releases, Hilson admits she hasn’t quite figured out the balance yet—but she’s trying. For her, the key is carving out small rituals of normalcy.
“I enjoy cooking. That’s my sanctity,” she says. “I’ll go home, take my makeup off, put on my rehearsal clothes, and cook a meal. I take walks. I run. These little things help me feel like myself again.”
Art Imitates Life (and Album Tracklists)
“Cherish goes from Love… to Drama… to Redemption.”
Asked which album chapter her Fame character would fall into, Keri doesn’t hesitate. “She fits into all three,” she says. “You see her go from love, to drama, to redemption. That arc mirrors the journey of so many women who’ve had to navigate pain and find their way back to themselves.”
No Pressure, Just Art: Keri Wants You to Feel Something
“Just enjoy the art. That’s it.”
After all the time, patience, and healing, Keri isn’t asking for much. She just wants fans to press play—and feel something.
“I just want people to enjoy what they’re seeing and hearing. Enjoy me on screen. Enjoy me through their ears. People have waited, and I feel blessed by that. That helps me keep it all pure and simple.”
As Keri Hilson steps boldly back into the spotlight, it’s clear this era is all about alignment, artistry, and authenticity. With Fame airing on Lifetime and the first chapter of We Need to Talk: Love setting the tone, we’re more than excited to see what’s next.
As she continues to unfold the album’s next two chapters—Drama and Redemption—one thing’s for sure: this isn’t just a comeback. It’s a reintroduction. And we’ll be watching, listening, and cheering her on every step of the way.
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