Meet Nicole Prokes of Blackheart Studio in Lincoln Heights

Today we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Prokes.

Nicole, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I’ve always been really interested in the arts and the entertainment industry. I moved to LA from my hometown in Michigan when I was 21. I remember my parents laughing with me about it, I really had no plan but knew I wanted to be involved and trusted myself to land on my feet.

With zero experience but by bombarding them with emails, I got the opportunity to interview at Milk Studios for an internship. My internship quickly turned into a full-time job, where I learned and soaked up everything I could for two and a half years. It was a real crash-course in how this world functioned and I was so lucky to be exposed to it in a really intimate way.

After my time at Milk, I started freelancing for any position I was asked to, I really became a “yes” person. I was shooting weddings on the weekends, working as a video editor, on set as a production assistant. I began production coordinating and after a year I grew into production managing. I’ve worked on everything from editorials, to music videos, commercial campaigns, films, I did a stint for two years in New York working on fashion week shows with Bureau Betak for incredible clients like Calvin Klein and Longchamp.

Christopher Swainston, who is my now business partner, and I have always had a shared dream of having our own photo studio. We thought we had a solid duo to make the dream a reality. We started seriously looking into locations in Summer 2018.

Our friends Tim Black and Janna Hart (who ended up being our company’s namesake), lived and ran their companies in a building off of Broadway in Lincoln Heights that became our ideal. When Tim and Janna moved, we asked to secure it for a studio but were beat out.

The last time I was in New York, in summer 2019, we got a call that the location next door to Tim and Janna’s old place was available and put a deposit down the next week. A month later we opened up Blackheart Studio, a joint photo studio and production company.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The hardest part through this whole process comes back to the phrase “you don’t know what you don’t know.” I had never run a company before, and the first few months I was so deep in the learning process I don’t know if I ever took a breath. When I realize I’m lacking in knowledge somewhere, I make it my priority to learn everything I can about it and be as well-versed in it as possible. When it comes to a company, there are a million nuances to take into account with every single decision or move you make. In the first few months, I would find myself feeling underwater or questioning our decision. I worked really hard to embrace the challenge and work my way to where we are now.

Please tell us about Blackheart Studio.
Our company is Blackheart Studio. We’re a photo studio and production company.

The studio is a beautiful 1,800 square foot daylight space in Lincoln Heights. It’s been there for over 100 years and has an entire wall of original brick to show for it. Our photo studio is really meant to be a home for any and every idea or project. We wanted to create a space that made you feel luxurious but was still accessible for everybody. We’ve spent a lot of time into putting our focus into the details and our full energy into our clients to make that happen. When we say everything, we mean everything. We’ve hosted birthday parties, weddings (!!!!), photoshoots, films, music videos, and everything in-between, and we do everything we can to make sure each and every person feels just as welcome and taken care of as the next. Our client list includes the likes of Marilyn Manson, Esquire, Warner Records, and The Gap, and the mother who finds us and wants to host a birthday party for her 5-year old (we’ve done it) is going to get their same level of service.

An important lesson Milk taught me, is in an industry that makes you feel like you need to be the coolest person in the room, that hierarchy and ego serves no one. You’re not going to get anywhere without your community, and that’s something really important to us that we work really hard to manifest.

This same idea carries to the production company side of the business. Before we were an LLC, I would get asked to help produce projects for friends and up and coming talent but I didn’t have any infrastructure to support it. Further than that, I learned a lot of these projects didn’t get off the ground because of that reason. In my life, I’ve had a lot of things become accessible to me because I put my nose down to do the work. I thought if I can give someone the access and the platform to put their work in, what’s better than that? We get the chance to work with some of the biggest clients in the industry while being able to support the next generation. It’s a really proud feeling.

Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
Having dinner every night with my family.

Contact Info:

• Address: 2211 N Broadway Avenue
  Los Angeles, CA 90031
• Website: www.blackheartstudio.com
• Phone: 248 444 5285
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: @studioblackheart

Image Credit:
Photos of Nicole Prokes shot by Alexander Gay. Photos of Blackheart Studio shot by co-owner Christopher Swainston.

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