Clickbait
be damned.
Something was missing. We both knew it. Maybe you do, too. We could spend hours surfing the internet and end up feeling empty.
But something was tugging at us. Maybe it’s tugging at you, too. Don’t be afraid. Let it pull you where it wants you to go: North. South. East. West. Down the rabbit hole …
What are you heading towards?
How will you know when you’ve arrived?
… you’re already here.
Welcome to Hidden Compass.
Where we challenge the notion that readers only want mindless, clickable content.
Hidden Compass is for the journalist chasing big questions, complex connections, and meaningful exploration. It is for the reader hunting profound stories that immerse, inspire, and inform. It is for anyone aching for substance and longing to celebrate collective human endeavor.
Here, the nuance of the world is within reach. Hold on to it …
Hidden Compass is the antidote to clickbait.
Our Philosophies
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“One thing I really appreciated about working with Hidden Compass is that it is a space where there is time for nuance and complexity. By donating, that is also what you’re supporting…”
-Anna Polonyi , Author of “Proving the Love of Rosa Bonheur”
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“I have found as a freelance writer that it is getting harder to tell these stories that aren’t about the topics that people are talking about all the time…”
-Allison Torres Burtka , Author of “Beyond the Waves”
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“The money is one thing but really thank you for feeling that the story is important enough that you wanted to contribute.”
-Mike Bernhardt , Author of “The Tides of War”
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Ally Testimonials
“Hidden Compass continues to deliver intriguing, thought provoking content with every issue. Their commitment to primary research coupled with creative storytelling is not easily found today.”
Evan
Ally
“In an industry full of hot takes, quick hits, and roundups, it’s refreshing to have an organization like Hidden Compass support adventurous journalism and exploration.”
Jill
Ally
“I don’t just go to Hidden Compass to hop around and glance at a few things. I plan my time to go and sit down and read and digest and think about what that writing says and how it makes me feel. It’s a very intentional, deliberate, time-intensive act and that’s really pleasurable.”
Anonymous
Ally
Awards & Recognition
Our Contributors Are Also Featured In
November 2024:
Two Hidden Compass stories and our first Pathfinder Issue won Lowell Thomas Awards from the Society of American Travel Writers. The Tides of War by Mike Bernhardt won gold while Robin Catalano took home an honorable mention for Race Against Tide. And our 2023 Pathfinder Issue, which celebrated the work of inaugural Pathfinders Lola Akinmade, Noo Saro-Wiwa, and Erik Jaråker, was honored in its entirety, winning bronze.
March 2024:
In a Hidden Compass first, our inaugural Pathfinder Prize team’s short documentary, In Tété’s Footsteps, was nominated for Best Documentary Short at the Cannes World Film Festival! It is also an official selection at the New York International Film Awards and the North Film Festival.
In the 2024 Solas Awards competition, presented by “Best Travel Writing” publishing house Travelers’ Tales, four Hidden Compass stories won gold and bronze awards. Winners included “The Tides of War” by Mike Bernhardt, “The Time of the Painters” by Craig K. Collins, “A Tempest of Dread at the End of the World” by Ellen Murray, “Mayday at the Bottom of the World” by Jane Ellen Stevens.
March 2023:
In the 2023 Solas Awards competition, presented by “Best Travel Writing” publishing house Travelers’ Tales, nine Hidden Compass stories won gold, silver, and bronze awards, including the grand prize. The winning stories represented 45% of the stories we published during the award year and more than 80% of eligible stories (stories must be written by U.S. residents to be considered). Cherene Sherrard took home grand prize gold for her story, “The Weight of Paradise.” Winners also included “The New Ascensionists” by Kang-Chun Cheng, “Pteropods in the Balance” by Laine Gonzales, “Lines of Duty” by Lauren Napier, “Enduring the Promised Land” by Shoshi Parks, “Beyond the Lid of the World” by Amanda Castleman, “Finding Valentina” by Melinda Misuraca, “Only the Stones Remain” by Rebecca Deurlein, and “Roots in Motion” by Megan Taylor Morrison.
December 2022:
Paul Fischer’s story, “Gazawood Dreams” was selected by Longreads as one of the five Best Features of 2022. His story was named alongside stories from The New Yorker, the Walrus, Los Angeles Magazine, and Esquire.
March 2022:
In the 2022 Solas Awards competition, presented by “Best Travel Writing” publishing house Travelers’ Tales, seven Hidden Compass stories won gold, silver, and bronze awards. The winning stories represented 35% of the stories we published during the award year and more than 40% of eligible stories (stories must be written by U.S. residents to be considered). Winners included, “Honor and the Sea” by Janna Brancolini, “The Medusa of Time” by Daniel Hudon, “Eroded Myths” by Robert Annis, “Blue in Toulouse” by Moriah Costa, “A Spark of Hope” by Michele Bigley, “The Alchemy That Binds” by Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee, and “No Dog Is an Island” by Richard Pallardy.
October 2021:
“When the World is Withdrawn” by Sivani Babu was listed as a Notable Mentions in the 2021 edition of the Best American Travel Writing. The story took its place alongside pieces from the Atlantic, the New Yorker, Smithsonian Magazine, and the New York Times Magazine.
August 2021:
Hidden Compass was named a finalist in Newsweek magazine’s Future of Travel Awards, which “highlight those who are creating a travel industry for the future—one that’s more adaptable, sustainable, responsible, innovative and inclusive.”
March 2021:
In the 2021 Solas Awards competition, presented by “Best Travel Writing” publishing house Travelers’ Tales, eight Hidden Compass stories won gold, silver, and bronze awards. The winning stories represented 40% of the stories we published during the award year. Winners included, Alexandria Scott’s “Wade in the Water,” Hayli Nicole’s “People of the Forest,” Sivani Babu’s “When the World is Withdrawn,” Sabine K. Bergmann’s “Awakening the Canopy,” Jacqueline Kehoe’s “The First and Final Days of Denali,” Martha Ezell’s “Journey of a Golden Soul,” Kelsey Camacho’s “Old Clocks,” and Sonya Pevzner’s “Sweet as Challah.”
December 2020:
Two Hidden Compass stories were listed as Notable Mentions in the 2020 edition of the Best American Travel Writing. Hayli Nicole‘s “People of the Forest,” and Chase Nelson‘s “Dark Train to Cusco” were listed alongside stories from the New Yorker, Smithsonian Magazine, and the New York Times Magazine.
Ocotber 2020:
“Love in a Time of Abundance” by Amanda Castleman won a silver Lowell Thomas Award from the Society of American Travel Writers. Amanda and her story took their places alongside legendary travel writer Pico Iyer and stories from the New York Times, BBC, and Smithsonian Magazine.
Two of our stories were selected for volume 12 of the Best Women’s Travel Writing. “Wade in the Water” by Alexandria Scott and “Our Ravaged Lady” by Erin Byrne were published in the anthology alongside stories from Vice, Sierra, AFAR, and Smithsonian Magazine.
March 2020:
In the 2020 Solas Awards competition, awarded by “Best Travel Writing” publishing house Travelers’ Tales, our stories won Grand Prize Gold, Silver, and Bronze for best travel stories of the year — as well as three category awards and one honorable mention. An honorable mention also went to a story that first made its appearance in one of our workshops.
August 2019:
In 2019, our first year of consideration, two of our stories were recognized as Notable Mentions in the Best American Travel Writing series! Sivani Babu’s “Ice Bear” and Annelise Jolley’s “Trick of the Light” took their places alongside stories from the New Yorker, National Geographic Traveler, Outside, and the New York Times.
March 2019:
In the Solas Awards competition alone we won Gold, Silver, and Bronze prizes — as well as three Honorable Mentions — for our stories.
2018:
30% of our stories won travel writing awards.
About Our Founders
Powerful storytelling and oral traditions meet nuanced ideas and boundless exploration.
Sabine was once stranded in the Bolivian Andes during a period of political unrest. She discovered the power of storytelling by seeking out keepers of the oral traditions passed down through millennia of indigenous Quechua history.
Sivani tabled a career as a public defender to sail across the most brutal sea on earth. She spent weeks exploring Antarctica by boat and on foot, all the while writing, photographing, and pursuing stories to bring home.
They met one day at a bookstore and connected over the lack of substance in travel media. Where was the nuance? Where were the challenging ideas? They weren’t interested in the mass-produced content that bombards us daily and they knew they weren’t alone.
That’s why they founded Hidden Compass, a place for stories of exploration — stories that make us question what we think we know, transport us to places we’ve never been, and kindle a fire for us to stoke.
Meet Our Team
Sivani Babu
Co-founder / CEO
Sivani Babu is the co-founder and CEO of Hidden Compass. She is an award-winning journalist and nature photographer who has contributed to BBC Travel, CNN, Backpacker, Outdoor Photographer, Iron Horse Literary Review, and numerous other publications. Her work has been recognized in the Best American Travel Writing series and has appeared in exhibits from San Diego to the Sorbonne. Sivani graduated from the University of Chicago with three majors — economics, public policy studies, and political science — and one Lazarused newspaper, the Chicago Weekly News. At the University of Pennsylvania Law School, she taught high schoolers about their constitutional rights. As a Teach for America corps member, she taught eighth-graders about the tangency of math and literacy. After working on a Supreme Court case and representing hundreds of indigent criminal defendants, Sivani left her career as a federal public defender to sail across the most brutal sea on earth. Since then, she has chased storms through Tornado Alley, searched for polar bears in the Arctic Circle, and survived serious injury while celestially navigating the Bermuda Triangle. Sivani is working on her first book, Saving the Night: Shedding Light on the Importance of Darkness.
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Sabine K. Bergmann
Co-founder / COO
Sabine K. Bergmann is the co-founder and COO of Hidden Compass. As an award-winning travel, science, and nature writer, she has contributed stories to dozens of publications — including WIRED, Sierra Magazine, and The Best Travel Writing book series — with a collective readership of tens of millions of readers. Her writing has been featured in exhibitions throughout Europe, North Africa, and North America. As an editor, she has managed content for travel companies valued at more than $500 million.
Sabine is a Stanford University-trained environmental researcher and community coordinator who has worked on conservation projects from the Amazon Basin to the Great Barrier Reef. In 2009, she represented Stanford University climate researchers at the United Nations. From 2011-2013, she was the co-host of a live-broadcast environmental radio show in Spanish with an audience of 100,000. She has interviewed sources at sea in a tropical storm, escaped political unrest in the Andes, and discovered cocaine-smuggling coverups in the Caribbean. She has also interviewed earthquake survivors and astrophysicists, mountain biked from the Andes to the Amazon, and chronicled oral traditions passed down through millennia of indigenous history. Headshot by In Her Image Photography. Learn more at www.sabinekbergmann.com.
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Nicolette Holmes
Alliance Relations Manager + Digital Marketing Manager
Nicolette Holmes is the Alliance Relations Manager and the Digital Marketing Manager at Hidden Compass. As a dual citizen of the US and Ireland, Nicolette recalls being curious about different cultures, and the way they experience the world, from a young age. After graduating from the University of Colorado Boulder with a degree in Psychology and double-minors in Business and Religious Studies, she leaped at the opportunity to pursue a marketing career in Portugal. In her previous role at a Lisbon-based digital marketing firm, Nicolette was responsible for managing the agency’s international client portfolio and worked directly with brands from Denmark to Russia to Kuwait. When she’s not on her laptop crafting a digital marketing strategy or plotting her next international adventure, you can find her practicing yoga, studying yoga philosophy, or admiring an ocean sunset in one of the two place she calls home — Portugal and California.
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Katie Knorovsky
Editor at Large
Katie Knorovsky is Editor at Large at Hidden Compass. Previously, she was the magazine’s first Managing Editor.
Katie forged her journalism career at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. As an editor of the now defunct print edition of National Geographic Traveler, she championed the expertise of the Society’s constellation of global explorers, from space archaeologists to glaciologists, and shaped stories on places ranging from the Ozarks to the Azores.
Her writing credits include bylines for such publications as National Geographic Magazine, the Washington Post, the Washingtonian, the Local Palate, and as a contributor to an array of travel books published by National Geographic and Wildsam Field Guides.
She holds a magazine journalism degree from Drake University in her native Iowa and studied language and culture at a French learning institute in Cannes, France.
Katie lives in Asheville, North Carolina, where she manipulates words and threads as a writer and fiber artist. She also shares her love of language and cultural exchange as an English literacy tutor for the local immigrant and refugee community.
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Pier Nirandara
Storyteller in Residence
Pier Nirandara is the Storyteller in Residence at Hidden Compass. Pier began her career as Thailand’s youngest author of three bestselling novels, multiple graphic novels, and short stories with over 200,000 copies sold in multiple languages. Since then, she has represented literary clients at ICM Partners, served as Director of Development at Sony Columbia Pictures, and as VP of Film & TV at A-Major Media, Hollywood’s first Asian American-driven production company.
A TEDx speaker and literary ambassador for the Bangkok Metropolitan/UNESCO, Pier has won two Solas Awards for Best Travel Writing of the Year, two Lowell Thomas Awards from the Society of American Travel Writers, and Gold at the Book Passage Travel Writers & Photographers Conference 2023.
Pier is also a PADI AmbassaDiver™ and the founder of Immersiv Expeditions, where she leads trips to swim with marine wildlife. Her photography has been recognized by competitions including Ocean Photographer of the Year, and she was awarded the 2023 Ocean Storytelling Photography Grant by the Save Our Seas Foundation. An advocate for solo female travel, she has visited over 100 countries across seven continents, and can be found in Los Angeles, Cape Town, and on Instagram @piersgreatperhaps.
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Marisa Larson
Fact-Checker
Marisa Larson is the fact-checker at Hidden Compass. Her lifelong love of learning and travel has fueled her career as a journalist and fact-checker, working for television, radio and magazine outlets, including as a senior editorial researcher and the Middle East regional editor at National Geographic.
Marisa’s first international experience was representing Kansas youth through the People-to-People American Soviet Youth Exchange in 1988. That experience sparked her desire to explore and learn about cultures firsthand. She graduated from Kansas State University with degrees in political science and journalism and a master’s in youth development. As a Peace Corps volunteer in Morocco, Marisa worked with women in the Anti-Atlas Mountains to improve their lives through animal husbandry — knowledge she’d gained raising cattle in Kansas. After years of living abroad and in Washington, D.C., Marisa is now back in her home state of Kansas, living with her son, her mother, two
dogs, and three cats.
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Vivian Randall
Submissions Manager
Vivian Walman-Randall is the Submissions Manager at Hidden Compass. Her fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction have been published in The Catalyst Literary Arts Magazine and Spectrum Summer Editions, and she was awarded the Richardson Poetry Prize in 2021. She’s had the privilege of presenting her scholarly research and creative work at the UCSB’s 2020 Research and Creative Activities Conference, the CCCC Undergraduate Poster Session, and The Richard Macksey National Undergraduate Humanities Research Symposium. Her creative work and research focus on the intersections between gender and nature, as well as addressing climate change and climate catastrophe while exploring new possibilities for relationships between people and the environment. Her research is also concerned with creative writing pedagogy and the development of generative workshop models. She graduated with her B.A. in Creative Writing and Literature from The College of Creative Studies at UCSB in 2022, and is currently pursuing her MFA in Creative Writing with a Fiction Emphasis at Emerson College. Alongside working for Hidden Compass, she is also the Chief of Staff at Emerson College’s graduate journal, Redivider, and teaches undergraduate composition.
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Liz Shemaria
Founding Editor
Liz Shemaria is Founding Editor at Hidden Compass. She is an award-winning journalist who has contributed to dozens of publications and organizations including BBC Travel, AFAR, Human Rights Watch, and Fodor’s Essential Italy guidebooks. Liz graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with an undergraduate degree in art history and a master’s degree in journalism. In 2008, she won a fellowship to produce a multimedia series about artistic censorship in military-ruled Burma — traveling undercover between the Thai-Burma border while smuggling rolled-up paintings in her backpack. She launched AOL’s first hyperlocal news startup in California in 2010 and was an on-camera spokesperson for the American Red Cross from 2011-2013. She has trekked solo to an 8,000-ft peak in the Himalaya, traveled through Egypt on a night train, and spent 36 hours crossing the Aegean Sea on a boat, so she could take a picture of her family’s name on a building on the island of Rhodes. She lives in Italy, where she has learned to never order a cappuccino after breakfast.
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Job Openings
Closed
Digital Marketing Manager
Foster an online community of badass nerds by building and managing the social media presence of Hidden Compass.
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Editorial Director — Full Time
Helm our quarterly, award-winning magazine on exploration — our pride and joy — which is the doorway through which we invite tens of thousands of readers each year to step and join our movement.
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Membership Coordinator — Part Time (10 hrs/wk)
Support pioneering members of Hidden Compass’s modern society of exploration — The Alliance — as we build a community that celebrates discovery.
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Managing Editor — Part Time (20 hrs/wk)
Shepherd stories from concept to completion for our award-winning quarterly magazine on exploration.
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