About Michelle
Michelle is the author of the forthcoming non-fiction book The Art Spy from HarperOne, an imprint of Harper Collins, about WWII Resistance spy Rose Valland. She is the founder of Untapped New York, an online magazine about New York City's secrets and hidden places. She is also the author of Secret Brooklyn, Secret New York: Hidden Bars and Restaurants, and Broadway. Michelle is represented by Peter Steinberg at United Talent Agency (UTA).
She is a graduate of Harvard College in the History of Art and Architecture and holds a master’s degree in urban planning from Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, where she is an Adjunct Professor of Architecture. She is also an instructor at CUNY’s Newmark School of Journalism.
She has bylines in The Guardian, The Forward, Business Insider, Hyperallergic, Wilson Quarterly, Food & Wine Magazine, Metropolis Magazine, Curbed and The Huffington Post. She is a regular contributor to The Forward and Hyperallergic writing on issues of looted art and restitution. She is also a Lowell Thomas Journalist Award winner. Michelle’s photography has been published by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Travel & Leisure, the Venice Architecture Biennale, and The Museum of Modern Art, exhibited at The Museum of the City of New York, and included in numerous books.
Michelle appears regularly on television, in documentaries, and at conferences on journalism and history. She was featured on the History Channel production The Engineering That Built the World, Netflix’s Stay Here, Smithsonian Channel’s Searching for Secrets, PBS’ 10 That Changed America, and National Geographic’s Strange Truths. She was a guest on Tell Me Something I Don’t Know hosted by Stephen Dubner, on Huffington Post Live, and was a primary character in the documentary DÎNER EN BLANC, The World’s Largest Secret Dinner Party. She has spoken at the United Nations and was an organizer of the Rockefeller Foundation conference, “Jane Jacobs Revisited.” Michelle is also a graduate of the Juilliard School of Music Pre-College Division and is a trained classical cellist. In a past life, she was a cellist in an indie-rock band and Mick Jones from the Clash came to her first show.