In Her Shoes: Rent the Runway’s Dorothy Creaven on skincare, Salthill and her Vespa

Early start

I get up about 6.30am.  I get up earlier in the summer than I do in the winter and I’m in bed by 10pm. To me, sleep is really precious. At the weekend, I will be a lot later and then I’ll sleep in a little bit more. Monday to Friday, I can be kind of regimented, but the weekend, all bets are off.

More often than not, in the morning, I reach for a big cup of coffee, and then I’ll head out for a run. I maybe do that three or four days a week.

I’m one of the those annoying chirpy people after a run.

I got into running at the start of the pandemic, I just really wanted to get outside of my kitchen, where I was spending the majority of my time as I was working from the kitchen table. It was a way to get just a bit of fresh air, so I’ve gradually built it up.

Runner’s high

Running gives me headspace – I make decisions better when I’m active. I’ll always listen to a podcast, it’s a bit of a distraction technique because I don’t love running but I make myself run. I feel amazing after I run and I’m one of the those annoying chirpy people after a run because it’s partial exhilaration from the run and then partial ‘oh my god, I’m so glad that’s over’.

I’ve started more on the audiobooks lately. I’ve downloaded Dave Grohl’s book at the moment. I do listen to Adrian Weckler’s tech podcast and Jess Kelly as well – Kara Swisher in the US and the Business of Fashion podcasts are really good too.

Skin habits

I use a lot of SkinCeuticals products. When we were young, my mother got all of the girls into the routine of cleansing and moisturising our skin. We were really small when we started doing this, five or six, and she made us do it every evening to get into the habit. My mum has the most amazing skin. Thanks to her she really taught us the value of needing to clean your skin.

Office time

I get to the office anywhere between 9-9.30am. Technically I could walk to the office but, because I generally do my exercise in the morning, I just hop on my Vespa scooter to the office. It’s five minutes and it’s so handy. It’s not great during the winter – I’m in all my raingear and my giant helmet and battling all the wind.

My working days are structured enough, with my meetings normally start at 10am. More often than not most of my meetings are finished about 6pm which is great.

At Rent the Runway we host lunch and learns, that’s when we’ll do a tech talk and get lunch in. We really like to source a lot of stuff locally when it comes to our office suppliers – we partner with a few different restaurants around the place.

I’d love to say I prepare my own salads every day at home to take with me but I don’t. I just grab something on the go. Sometimes just a sandwich somewhere close to the job. In the evening I’ll have something a bit more nutritious. 

Green drink

I do start my day off with a green drink – at least I know if I am grabbing a quick sandwich I’ve already had some good stuff in the morning. I take all my vitamins, fish oils and probiotics. I rely on supplements to help me with a more balanced diet and I generally practice intermittent fasting four days a week too.

I find it hard to switch off in general – that’s why the running helps.

The US is still online for another five or six hours when I get home from work, so I do check my slack messages and my emails up until I go to bed. People talk about work life balance, I don’t really see it like that – they are not two separate things, they are all part of the same day.

I find it hard to switch off in general – that’s why the running helps.

We like spending time at home. We lived in town for years and years in Galway’s city centre and in Dublin and we always really enjoyed that, but then when we bought our place in Salthill we wanted a place where we actually wanted to spend time. It’s so quiet which I love.

Own oasis

I like spending time with people but I love retreating and having some quiet time, it really works for me. Our home, for us, is a little oasis from everything. I got into gardening and I’m at the phase in my life where I’m going to garden centres and spending an absolute fortune.

We’ve really been enjoying settling into the house and figuring out styling for it – all through the pandemic it was a project for us. I got really into paint…me and everybody else in Ireland – it was kind of interesting to learn about something completely different.

I also ended up accidently getting into vintage furniture, because when we bought the house there was no stock coming into Ireland. So, we ended up buying vintage furniture. I started trawling Adverts.ie for mid-century furniture.

The one thing that’s important to me daily is getting fresh air – it’s something I always feel better for, otherwise I have a tendency to keep the head down and realise I have not left my chair and that’s just not good for anyone.

This article was originally published in April 2023.