Michelle Phan

I glance through the pages of all the top magazines every month just to see if there are any colors that are trending. I'll also go on Instagram and look at the 'popular' page to see what people are liking, what's cool. I'll check it at different times of the day; for example, if it's really late in L.A., you'll see a lot of posts in Asia.

Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never thought I would be doing anything else. I had enough encouragement.

At one point, my house was a school for autistic children. I opened up my doors to about 30 kids and their families at the time. I was turning into Mary Poppins because I had to do something for these kids who have nowhere to go. So my house was the school for two years.