The Lehigh Valley just welcomed its newest food publication with the summer launch of Edible Lehigh Valley, where Madeline Marriott ‘24 and Emma Sylvester ‘25 worked as interns in preparation for its first issue.
The magazine, which runs quarterly, is part of a larger franchise known as Edible Communities which, according to its website, is “devoted to telling the local stories and sustaining the efforts of the farmers, chefs, food artisans, fishers, vintners and home cooks who feed us.”
Marriott, who currently serves as the editor-in-chief of The Lafayette, applied to Edible Lehigh Valley for an internship in the spring.
“I had been looking for a summer internship for a long time, in a lot of different fields and then one day something popped into my inbox through the English department,” Marriott said. “I came up through the culture section of the newspaper, so I had done a lot of writing about businesses, food and local cultural stories. So I thought it’d be a good fit.”
Not only was Marriott able to transfer the skills she had built up through writing and editing for The Lafayette, but she also developed a new set of experiences working at a publication with a broader set of writing topics.
“I think that the skill of being able to have a quick turnaround with things and put things together in a short amount of time is really helpful,” Marriott said.
“I must have gotten just a wide range of experiences,” Marriott added. “I did some social media, I’ve done some design, I did the Farmers Market Guide for the magazine … I think the highlight for me was being able to write and interview people which is really, I think, my niche.”
Sylvester, whom Marriott tapped to join the magazine upon learning that it was in need of a photo intern, was also able to develop her skill set during the internship by working with the magazine’s staff photographer and photo editor, Roberto Quezada-Dardón.
“I think it was really interesting to shadow Roberto because he has a ton of experience in the field in general,” Sylvester, who is The Lafayette’s photo editor, said. “I think I learned a lot of skills that I can apply to my own photography for the newspaper, for example, and I also learned that I have a big interest in publications so that might be another field that I can look into having a career in.”
While the internship was an enriching opportunity for both Marriott and Sylvester to develop their skills, they were also a big help to the magazine’s editor, Carrie Havranek, in managing a lot of moving pieces for the magazine.
“It’s everything from assigning photos, assigning stories, editing the stories, introducing my publisher to people he doesn’t know,” Carrie Havranek, editor of the magazine and a former Lafayette English professor, said. “That’s why it’s been really great to have both Maddie and Emma doing those things, because they’re doing valuable things that are very visible and that are going to be great for them going forward, no matter where they take their careers.”
Foodies can subscribe to receive a copy of the magazine at ediblelehighvalley.com.
Disclaimer: Editor-in-Chief Madeline Marriott and Photo Editor Emma Sylvester did not contribute writing or reporting.
