About
The best recommendations rarely come from advertisements. They come from a friend leaning across a table and saying, "You need to try this."
Trove Collections grew out of those conversations. Over time, our family and friends developed a habit of collecting the things we kept recommending to one another — travel gear, books, gifts, home goods, skincare, keepsakes, and practical tools that quietly made life better. Eventually, we realized we had built a trove.
Today it's a small editorial shop run by my mom Micki and me. The rest of our curator circle — Auntie Kristen, Auntie Angie, and our friends Cheryl Lynne and Tanya — bring in items from their own travels. Their work takes them all over the world. We see what they bring back.
The rule
Every item on this site is one that someone in our circle has personally used. Not "looked at on a trip." Not "saw on Instagram." Used. The Travelpro Crew 5 my mom flies with on every trip. The bayu cream Auntie Angie keeps in her toiletry kit. The polenta pan the restaurant in Argentina sold to Auntie Kristen after she finished the dish they cooked her in it. The Erborian primer my mom and I both keep in our makeup bags.
If a trend hits and none of us have actually tried it, it doesn't go here. That's the whole point.
Some of our favorite things are one of a kind — a hand-carved cuckoo clock, a market find, a souvenir from a single trip — and can't be bought as the exact item. When that's the case, we say so plainly and point you to a similar one you can shop. We never present a look-alike as the original.
Why we do this
Two reasons. The first is that we kept getting asked. People would see what my mom packed for a trip and ask "where did you get that?" often enough that writing it down made sense.
The second is gift-shopping. Specifically: the kind where you're trying to find something for a college-age girl, or your hard-to-shop-for sister-in-law, or a friend who already has everything. Online shopping is loud and the algorithms surface the same trending items to everyone. We have a different list — one made by people who've actually used the things.
Who's in the circle
The circle starts with family, but it extends well beyond a family tree.
Mom (Micki) curates many of the collections inspired by her years of flying and teaching — Tokyo, Korea, the Levant, travel gear, and many of the items that have earned a permanent place in her life on the road.
Auntie Kristen contributes Germany (through a longtime German art-dealer friend), Brazil, Argentina, Panama, Australia, and some of the site's most memorable travel stories. If an object has a particularly good "how this came home" story attached to it, there's a fair chance Kristen found it.
Auntie Angie contributes to East Asia, skincare, and the practical discoveries that somehow end up improving everyone's daily routine.
Cheryl Lynne — my godmother, airline pilot, and one of our three fairy godmothers — brings in many of our Japanese and UK finds. Cheryl's oldest son, Jack, is my mom's godson and now a pilot himself. Her second son, Max, is Tanya's godson and also flies professionally. Her youngest son, Ben, chose a different path through aviation and serves as an aircraft mechanic in the Marines.
Tanya lived in Italy for years and recently returned for another visit, so Italy is naturally her territory. She also happens to be one of the three fairy godmothers who have helped shape this family for decades.
And then there's me — Eris. I'm Micki's daughter, currently in college and hoping to earn a military commission after graduation. I run Eris's Picks: beauty, jewelry, gifts, college-life favorites, and the things that survive daily life on a student budget.
The regions reflect where each of us tends to travel most often, but the boundaries aren't fixed. If Auntie Angie comes home from Lisbon with something she loves, it goes into Europe right alongside Tanya's Lake Como finds. If Cheryl Lynne discovers something wonderful in Germany, it doesn't matter whose "territory" it is.
The circle is the circle. The collections simply show where our paths happen to cross.
We make a small commission when you buy through our links. We never feature anything just because we could earn from it. Full disclosure here.
Read more: where this comes from → · stories from the road →