How I Scaled My Online Business While Travelling The World

So this is the story all about how…

…my life got flipped, turned upside down. I’d like to take a moment, so sit right there — and I’ll tell you how I scaled my online business.

I hope you got the Fresh Prince reference.

But really, this is the story of my 12-month journey (and the backstory): selling almost everything I owned, leaving Toronto on a one-way ticket, and scaling my online business in ways I never imagined.

Let’s get into it.

I’ve begun writing this from a café in Florida, where I’ve found myself at the tail end of the year-long adventure. In the past 12 months, I’ve gone from couch-surfing at a friend’s place, to spending the summer in Croatia, to contemplating a move to Lithuania, with brief stops in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia, and Portugal — before finally chasing the sun to Florida.

So let’s get into the full story and how I ended up here.

My Backstory

I’ve always marched to the beat of my own drum.

Not in an obvious, loud way — but in the subtle way I dreamed, imagined, and saw the world. Around the age of 12, I realized I had a very vivid imagination. That eventually led me to recognize I had a natural talent for interior design.

I’d walk into spaces and immediately see what was off. This became even more obvious when my parents started renovating our childhood home. Despite being obsessed with home improvement, they didn’t exactly have a strong design eye — and somehow, I became the one making all the design decisions. They were constantly amazed at how instinctively things came together for me. Read more on My Story.

So it was never really a question of what I wanted to do. I knew I wanted to run my own interior design business, and that’s exactly what I pursued — in my education, in my mind and eventually in the real world.

After finishing my education at around age 20, I was off to the races. I landed a job at a plumbing supplier as a saleswoman and kitchen and bath designer — a perfect way to build my portfolio.

I stayed there for nearly three years, gaining invaluable experience in custom millwork and the technical side of design. At the same time, I was building my website — yes, the same website you are reading this on.

At that point, I built it using the cheapest site builder I could find. Was it great? No. Was it terrible? Also no. I had no idea what I was doing when it came to web design — and to be fair, unless you’re a web designer, you wouldn’t have a clue.

Anyhow, all this to say, www.spacesbydee.com is not what it is today.

Travel, Freelancing, and Figuring It Out As I Went

This was also when I caught the travel bug. My first big trip was to Costa Rica, and I was hooked. I knew I wanted to keep travelling — a lot.

After leaving my kitchen and bath design job, I wanted to lean further into my own entrepreneurial efforts. The goal was more freedom and more money… or so I thought.

I officially launched Spaces by Dee and began freelancing for local interior designers as a design assistant. I started doing my own thing and posted ads on Kijiji offering design consultations for $60.

You can imagine the type of clientele that attracted.

That said, I got lucky. I landed some incredible clients with great taste who trusted me creatively. During this time, I was working, travelling frequently, and I also started painting — eventually falling in love with portrait work.

My life became a mix of designing, painting, and travelling two to four times a year. I was gaining valuable experience, building my portfolio, and slowly growing my client base — all while trying to figure out how to actually run a business.

Because being a good designer is one thing. Running a business is another.

I was young and naïve about money. I wasn’t tracking finances or worrying about profitability. I wasn’t making much, but I was making enough to fund my lifestyle. I was living at home, and at that stage, that felt like enough.

When Everything Shifted

Then things began to shift — personally, professionally, and globally.

I returned from a trip to Barbados and Trinidad, and a week later, COVID-19 shut the world down. My business activity plummeted (as did most).

Around the same time, I began dealing with a chronic illness — a story for another day. I was suddenly faced with a harsh reality: my business wasn’t where I wanted it to be, my health was suffering, and my personal life wasn’t in a great place either.

It was a season where I had no choice but to focus on myself.

As things stabilized, my business picked up. I started taking on larger renovation projects and learned how to run a more profitable operation. But the bigger my business grew, the more challenges I faced, and the more I questioned whether I actually wanted to expand in that direction.

Life decided for me.

In 2022, I lost my father. From that point on, my personal life unravelled.

I moved downtown Toronto on my own and took a 9-to-5 job designing corporate offices just to make ends meet. And that’s when I began reimagining my life entirely.

My father’s death planted a new seed in me — one that turned tragedy into an opportunity for reinvention. I realized how precious life really is, and that living for your own happiness isn’t optional.

I began imagining a life where I could run my design business online, travel freely, and create my own version of success.

Committing To The Vision

The job I took was a 14-month contract. I moved into a partially furnished rental and lived as if I already had one foot out the door.

I rebuilt my website and launched online interior design services.

My site looked better, worked better — but clients didn’t magically start booking overnight.

So I blogged. Weekly. Purely for the hopes of gaining web traffic.

At first, nothing happened. Small increases in traffic, barely noticeable. Still, I kept working, dreaming, and writing.

When my 9-to-5 contract ended, I considered leaving at that point. But I wasn’t ready. Grief, confusion, and instability held me back.

Instead, I went on a different journey — a spiritual one — searching for meaning, purpose, and clarity. That path led me to another 9-to-5 job in real estate development. It paid six figures, and for a moment, I felt like I’d “made it.”

I settled into security and pushed my dreams aside. I still took the occasional design client. I kept blogging — with little to show for it.

Then I got comfortable. And bored. And honest with myself: the job wasn’t me.

Five months later, I was let go due to economic reasons — cue the early midlife crisis.

So I said, f it.

I booked a trip to Colombia, gave my landlord 60 days’ notice, sold nearly everything I owned, and a few months later, found myself sleeping in a friend’s spare room.

When Things (and People) Finally Clicked

That’s when my blog started getting noticed.

One post — reviewing AI interior design tools — gained traction. Then another. Resulting in, AI and interior design software brands began reaching out, asking me to write about their product.

Years of blogging without pay or recognition suddenly made sense.

Still, I couldn’t stay on my friend’s couch forever. So I booked a one-way ticket to Montreal — the first stop of my adventure.

There, I continued refining my website. With traffic growing, people began booking my online design services. Momentum was building.

After a few months, I flew to Croatia and spent time on my mother’s sofa. And once I arrived, it felt like the stars aligned.

My website traffic boomed. Business followed.

I suddenly became a voice in the interior design tech space, working fully remotely. I left the sofa, got an Airbnb in Zadar, and balanced work with adventure.

I met someone along the way. We travelled to Sarajevo, then to Lithuania, where I settled in the capital, Vilnius, for a couple of months.

In Lithuania, I leaned fully into a niche: AI interior design and tech. Spaces by Dee evolved into a platform — one designed to connect people with the right online tools, online design services, and knowledge.

I worked nonstop. I landed amazing opportunities and started to make more money than ever before.

Eventually, I left Lithuania, travelled to Portugal, then Florida, and finally returned to Toronto.

Where I Am Now

After a year of living out of a suitcase, I’m back where my early midlife crisis began — but with a completely new perspective, and a new condo.

This journey taught me far more than business lessons. The biggest takeaway?

Happiness is self-created.

It was easy to feel successful sipping espresso martinis under the Croatian sun. It was harder during loneliness and heartbreak in Lithuania, working endlessly and praying that momentum wouldn’t disappear.

It wasn’t all sunshine.

But I learned to romanticize the process — the pain, the uncertainty, the unanswered questions.

They say it takes 10 years to become an overnight success.

In my case, that feels painfully accurate.

There were years of feeling lost, underpaid, and invisible. This journey was the experience of a lifetime — and also one of immense challenge.

And yet, even through the lows, I stayed on a high.

Because I chose to trust myself. I took the risk and followed my own rhythm.

And it led me to clarity, reinvention, and a business that finally feels aligned.

The opportunities ahead are exciting — but the personal lessons?
Those are the real rewards.

The Secret to Scaling a Business Online

My secret to scaling my online business isn’t as sexy as most people want a secret to be. There was no hack, no shortcut — just nearly a decade of groundwork, and maybe a little luck after all that effort.

I was relentless. I kept working on my website when it felt like I was completely wasting my time. I went back, tweaked, rebuilt — and I’m still doing it. It took hundreds of blog posts before I was noticed, and now that I have been noticed, I know it will take even more work to maintain that momentum.

There’s no glamorous secret here. Nothing beats consistency — and the willingness to pivot when needed. If you read my story, you’ll see the evolution clearly: from working a 9–5 to build my portfolio, to working under the wing of other interior designers, to starting my own boutique design firm, to juggling more 9-to-5 jobs, to building an online platform and showing up for it year after year until something finally clicked.

And the truth is, I don’t feel like I’ve made it. I feel like I’ve finally gotten my foot in the game, and this is just the beginning.

Read more on my adventure here:

The Life Of A Traveling Online Interior Designer

Chronicles Of A Traveling Interior Designer: Journal Entry One

How to Pivot from Full-Service to Remote Interior Design: My Success Story