Discover FemNEST: A Community-First Platform at the Intersection of Women, Wealth & Wellbeing

Could you share a brief overview of your background and entrepreneurial journey? What inspired the creation of FemNEST, and what key milestones have you achieved so far?

My journey has been paved by life-altering pivots that taught me what financial vulnerability really means.

After years in marketing and events across Australia, London, and Cyprus, I founded Sense & Forum in 2019, a community management agency for female-led and FemTech brands. I won awards, Top 100 Marketers in 2025 and Digital Community Leader in 2023, but the work kept showing me something I couldn’t ignore.

In my early twenties, I was diagnosed with PCOS and needed surgery. In my thirties, corporate burnout led to depression and six months of recovery. While building my agency, I was navigating fertility treatments and unpredictable freelance income. Then my son was born with a medical condition requiring constant care.

I am the living and breathing story that FemNEST is built on: financial stress compounding health challenges. 

FemNEST was born from that gap. Since founding it in 2024, we’ve been bootstrapping whilst pursuing grants and accelerator programmes. Our launch on 13 February 2026 brings together 30 women in Paphos, launching our community platform on Cliq.

You are an alumna of the Academy for Women Entrepreneurs (AWE). What motivated you to join the programme, and how has it supported or influenced your journey in building FemNEST?

I joined AWE in 2024 because, whilst I knew how to build communities, building a scalable business required different muscles. I needed to articulate FemNEST’s value in business terms, not just mission terms. How do you pitch the intersection of health and wealth when most investors only understand one or the other?

I’d also just moved to Cyprus in 2021 and wanted to expand my network. The sense of community here reminded me of my hometown, Adelaide, and AWE demonstrated that beautifully.

What I didn’t expect was how much the network would sustain me. Connecting with other women entrepreneurs who understood the importance of building something mission-driven.

The biggest shift was realising women’s economic empowerment isn’t a “nice-to-have” social impact goal. It’s essential infrastructure for thriving societies. That’s economics, not fluffy language. AWE gave me permission to lead with that confidence and frame FemNEST as the market correction that this fundamentally needed.

FemNEST addresses the intersection of money, health, and major life transitions. What personal experiences shaped this vision, and why do you believe this gap has been largely overlooked by traditional financial systems?

After hitting a wall of corporate burnout, I thought freelancing meant freedom. What I got was a masterclass in financial precarity.

I was diagnosed with PCOS in my early twenties. When I needed surgery, I took a few days off when I should have had two weeks to rest. I didn’t have workplace support or the financial cushion for unpaid leave. I went back to work, body still healing, because the alternative was not paying rent. Years later, reflecting on this experiance I learnt: your body’s needs and financial security rarely coexist.

Then came fertility treatments whilst managing freelance income that disappeared every time I prioritised my health. I was simultaneously trying to conceive and survive financially.

When my son was born with a medical condition requiring my full presence, I watched income evaporate whilst I took on the role as is sole career with the support of my husband as the breadwinner. I realised how quickly a woman’s independence can slip away, not because of bad choices, but because life demanded something the financial system never accounted for.

Through Sense and Forum, I heard hundreds of similar stories. Traditional financial systems overlook this because they’re built on male life trajectories where careers are linear and caregiving is invisible.

Can you walk us through how FemNEST works in practice? What kinds of tools, resources, or support can women expect to access through the platform?

FemNEST operates on four pillars: Community First, Smart Investing, Financial Wellness, and Legislation & Advocacy.

We’re in Phase One, building the foundation. On 13 February, we launch our community platform on Cliq, where money conversations are normalised, not shameful. There are channels for health-wealth connection, crisis points, career growth, and peer support.

At launch, we’re kicking off our “Your Story is Our Story” campaign, recording women’s real experiences. These stories become advocacy evidence and proof that individual struggles are actually systemic.

By winter 2026, we will start development on phase two of our financial wellness hub with workshops for real situations: managing finances during fertility treatments, navigating income loss from chronic illness, planning financially for menopause and caregiving. Not generic financial literacy, actual crisis-point guidance.

We’re developing an AI-powered support agent for those 11pm Googling and AI search moments, trained by verified professionals who understand women’s lived realities.

Phase Three builds our investment platform for women’s non-linear life paths. Phase Four becomes an advocacy body influencing systemic change. We’re also exploring B2B employer partnerships, recognising women’s financial stress impacts workplace productivity.

Community and honest conversations are central to FemNEST’s mission. How do you create safe spaces for women to talk about money, and why is breaking this taboo so important?

Creating safe spaces starts with intentional design rooted in 15 years of building communities, specifically at Sense & Forum, where I developed the DELIA Model™ for regenerative communities.

As a CMO and community strategist, I know trust is currency. In today’s world, where authenticity is rare and scepticism is the default, FemNEST is community-first, not product-first. In financial services, particularly, where women have been burned by predatory products and shame-based messaging, trust must be earned through transparency and genuine care.

This approach comes from what I call a matrifocal lens: cyclical operations instead of constant hustle, regenerative engagement instead of extractive tactics, systems built for how women actually work. It’s reframing traditional business frameworks in favour of regenerative methods that actually sustain the people within them.

I model vulnerability from the top, sharing my financial mistakes and fears. When the founder admits she’s figuring this out too, everyone gets permission to be honest.

We establish clear guidelines: no judgment, no unsolicited advice, no competition about who has it worse. We offer multiple participation levels: some share publicly, others ask anonymously, and others just listen. All valid.

Breaking the money taboo matters because silence perpetuates inequality. When women don’t discuss salaries, the pay gap persists. When we don’t share fertility treatment costs or caregiving expenses, the system isn’t held accountable. Every time a woman speaks openly about money, she makes it easier for the next woman.

What has been some of the most meaningful feedback you’ve received so far from users, community members, or event participants, and how has it shaped the platform?

The most meaningful feedback has been universal: “Yes. That’s me. That’s my mum. We need this.”

Every woman and man I talk to nods with visceral recognition. Not polite interest, but relief when they realise they can finally say it out loud.

Women share stories they’ve never told publicly: 

“I can’t leave my husband because I don’t have the money.” 

“Menopause took me out of work and I thought I was broken.”

“I’m the woman in the family, so I do 80% of caregiving.” 

“I was burnt out but couldn’t afford not to work, so I kept going until I broke.”

These aren’t unique stories. That’s the point. These are systemic patterns experienced as individual failures.

We’re collecting stories properly at our launch through “Your Story is Our Story,” but even informal conversations reveal the same theme: financial insecurity isn’t about poor choices. It’s about life happening whilst operating in systems designed for people whose lives are linear and bodies predictable.

This feedback shaped our decision to launch with community first. Women don’t need another budgeting app. They need to hear “me too” and permission to stop carrying it alone.

Building a mission-driven, gender-focused financial platform comes with unique challenges. What have been some of the biggest obstacles so far, and how have you navigated them?

The biggest obstacle has been my fear of telling my story with full vulnerability. Making yourself that visible means you can’t hide anymore. But I knew something had to change. At some point, comfort becomes complicity.

The other major obstacle is bootstrapping. Money is literally the thing holding this back. There’s profound irony in building a financial empowerment platform whilst struggling to fund it, but that’s also why I understand the problem so intimately. I’m living it and finding free and creative solutions to fund the project. 

Traditional VC funding is challenging when building something mission-driven for women. Female founders receive just 2% of venture capital globally. The funding model struggles to understand platforms prioritising community over quick scale. But I’m grateful for the EU’s strong gender equality agenda. Mechanisms like Women TechEU and gender-focused grants support what we’re building.

And then there’s the practical challenge of balancing motherhood with building a startup. Caring for my son, especially with his medical needs, whilst trying to work, is the exact crisis point FemNEST addresses. Some days, I’m the case study. That’s hard. But it also keeps me grounded in why this matters.

People haven’t told me FemNEST won’t work. But they’ve asked “how will this work?” a lot.

Here’s the truth: I know exactly what we’re building. We have a four-phase roadmap, a clear MVP, and we understand the market gap we’re filling. What I don’t know yet is every detail of how it unfolds, because we’re building this with the community, not for them. We’re building in public.

My answer is honest: “We have a solid plan and clear vision. But the specifics will be shaped by the women who join us, because their needs matter more than my assumptions.”

Every day I’m talking to people, and the vision gets clearer. The mission gets stronger because of these conversations and connections. That’s not uncertainty—that’s building responsibly, transparently, in real time with the people we’re serving. It’s refusing to create another product women don’t actually need just because it fits a neat pitch deck.

What we’re finding now is the right support without the hustle culture. I’m not interested in grinding myself into the ground to build a platform about women’s wellbeing. That contradiction defeats the purpose. We’re building sustainably, deliberately, and with the community leading the way.

Looking ahead, what’s next for FemNEST? Are there any upcoming features, events, partnerships, products, or expansions you’re excited about?

Our immediate focus is 13 February 2026, bringing 30 women together in Paphos and launching our community platform on Cliq in real time. That’s our proof of concept.

What excites me most? Seeing women realise they’re not alone. When shame dissolves because everyone has lived some version of this story. Meeting the people who want to support this mission, partners, sponsors, and founding members.

The next six months: solidifying our platform with regular workshops and forums, building our “Your Story is Our Story” library, pursuing seed funding, and refining based on what founding members actually need. We’re building in real time with the community guiding what comes next.

We’re planning “Kopiaste: Money Lessons from Yia Yia’s Kitchen Table” for the Saturday before Mother’s Day 2026 and developing a global online summit.

The AI agent bridges that gap, and crucially, it will be trained by verified professional contributions from financial advisors, healthcare providers, and experts who understand women’s lived realities. Not just algorithmic guesses. Actual expertise, made accessible 24/7.

Long-term expansion: We’re starting in Cyprus because it’s where I live, where I’ve experienced these barriers personally, and where the community vibe is real. I’ve lived on three islands, Australia, UK, Cyprus and I’ve never felt more at home than I do here. But also strategically, Cyprus has acute systemic barriers making it an ideal proving ground. If we can succeed here, we can succeed anywhere.

Five years from now? I want FemNEST to be an accessible investment platform where women feel safe and empowered to build wealth without worry. I want us to influence policy at the governmental and EU levels. I want “FemNEST” to be synonymous with women’s financial freedom, the same way “Google” means search.

How has being based in Cyprus shaped FemNEST’s philosophy, and what kind of future are you ultimately working towards?

Cyprus isn’t just strategic; it’s given me an actual community. Real people showing up, collaborating, supporting each other’s dreams. I’ve travelled extensively and lived in major cities, but I’ve never experienced this particular collective care. That community-first ethos isn’t just FemNEST’s philosophy; it’s what Cyprus taught me is possible.

What I wish people understood: women need a village. Not motivation or productivity hacks. A village. We need support, time to heal, and systems that work for our lives as they are, not as linear-career, male-bodied financial models imagine them.

What keeps me going? Knowing I don’t need to hustle myself into the ground. Burnout built FemNEST’s mission; it’s not going to fuel its execution.

Success looks like FemNEST going global, influencing policy at governmental and EU levels, building an investment platform where women access financial products designed for our actual lives, and modelling for my son that building something meaningful matters more than conventional success.

This isn’t just my vision. The 30 women attending on 13 February aren’t just attendees, they’re co-creators. FemNEST exists because I lived the gap, but it will succeed because we’re building the bridge together.

Follow FemNEST’s Journey!