Liesbeth (1988) is a journalist, author, and podcast maker. As the daughter of a magazine editor and a film producer, she grew up surrounded by storytelling and documenting. After completing VWO, she studied Dutch Language & Culture at the University of Amsterdam while also completing an internship at ELLE for over a year. This marked the beginning of her passion for magazines in general and storytelling in particular. As a member of her generation, she has never been employed by an organization and started working as a freelancer immediately after her internship. She has written for almost every women's magazine in the Netherlands, including Glamour, Grazia, Cosmopolitan, Libelle, and Flair, and has been a columnist for ELLE, Viva, Lonely Planet Magazine, and Flow. She knows the female audience well and enjoys taking seemingly light-hearted—or, according to some, superficial—topics such as dating, love, and relationships seriously, without taking herself too seriously. After all, “we’re all just figuring it out.”
Author
In addition to her magazine work, Liesbeth has written two books, both about travel, her great passion. Pinnen in Mongolië en andere oplosbare reisongemakken (2018, Nijgh & Van Ditmar) is a guide for first-time world travellers. A year later, in 2019, Solo reizen (Kosmos) was published: an argument for why everyone should travel alone at least once, as well as practical advice on how to do so. Solo reizen in particular has inspired thousands of people to take the step towards travelling alone for the first time, encouraging greater independence and autonomy in their lives. Both are core values in Liesbeth’s life and work.
Podcast Maker
In addition to writing, Liesbeth has been active in the world of podcasts for several years. In 2020, she produced, hosted, and edited her first own production, Dag voor Dag, a series of conversations about grief and death. She created the podcast after experiencing a profound personal loss herself. The podcast, which now has two seasons, reached hundreds of thousands of people, remained at number one in the charts for an extended period, and continues to be discovered by people who need it. It makes grief more open for discussion and easier to understand, which is important for a subject that many people would rather avoid.
Following the success of Dag voor Dag, she is also regularly commissioned by other organizations. She produced the podcast for Moët et Chandon, Waar komen bubbels vandaan, and is the host of Diplomatie Raakt, the podcast of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and De Dienst, the podcast of the General Intelligence and Security Service (AIVD). In both series, she takes on the role of the interested outsider. She is not afraid to ask follow-up questions or to ask “stupid” questions, making complex topics understandable to a broad audience.
TV Experience
For years, she appeared at the desk of RTL Boulevard to discuss the latest news from the travel world and has regularly appeared on programs such as Op1, Beau, Koffietijd, and 5 Uur Live. On Instagram, she shares her life with around 60,000 followers, with the weekly highlight being her segment Kroegpraat, in which she talks to her followers every Monday evening about almost anything, just as they might in a traditional Dutch pub. The result is direct communication with around 30,000 people, predominantly women between the ages of 25 and 45, giving her unique insight into what currently matters to this audience.
Themes that are important in her life include feminism, emancipation, independence, choosing your own path, and social developments. Thanks to her broad interests and curiosity, there is hardly a subject she is unwilling to explore. For the second season of De Dienst, she immersed herself in cybersecurity through self-study, and for a podcast for Act4Respect about preventing gender-based violence, she thoroughly researched the subject.
