About Lustre
Why We Founded Lustre
When we retired from our decades-long careers, overnight the world treated us differently. Before we retired, we were relevant, vibrant, and valuable. After we retired, we were seen as irrelevant, done … and old. The career women of our generation were hidden behind outdated stereotypes of retirement and age.
We launched Lustre to showcase retired career women as we really are. Lustre women are not old and not done. We are smart, relevant, visible, and fun. We are approaching the retirement journey with a new attitude and new expectations. Lustre captures that fresh and edgy approach.
We remade the world once. Let's do it again.
Our Story
We have known each other for a long time. We are both lawyers who married and had children while we worked. From the beginning, we knew we were kindred souls — in those early years, nobody else was wearing leather or neon to work.
We loved the lives we chose, as career women, and we loved being part of that large group of women who worked until retirement. When we realized we were both retiring, we were excited. How would we use our careers to pivot to something new?
That excitement did not last. We couldn’t see any attractive role models. Indeed, retirement looked dismal, and people looked at us as if we were dismal too.
That made no sense. And so we founded Lustre to redesign retirement for women like us.
Lustre Founders
Erica Baird​
I am a mother, wife (second marriage), lawyer and the eldest of six siblings. My life and career have exceeded my wildest expectations. Undoubtedly a lot of luck was involved. However it happened, I am grateful.
After law school at NYU, working as a litigator at a mid-sized Park Avenue law firm, and giving birth to my daughter, it was time for another change. I was the first woman hired in the General Counsel's office of one of the then Big 8 accounting firms. I became the first female partner in that office and the Deputy General Counsel. I worked for the same firm three decades.
I loved my job, the people I worked with, the extremely talented women I mentored and helped to promote. I loved networking, connecting people around the world, solving problems big and small, at home and abroad. I ran to fires, not away from them.
We worked as a team, did some bold things, and lost a lot of sleep, but we laughed, didn't take ourselves too seriously and had a really good time. I wore 3+ inch heels, red and black leather, orange suits, short(ish) skirts, high boots — they made life at work even more interesting.
My work was consuming and important; my family was and is equally consuming and even more important. Family always won when the choice was clear.
So that brings me to now. I have created a portfolio, combining work and passion. But Lustre — changing the way we think about ourselves and the way the world thinks about us — is my priority. It's foundational, rewarding, and fun. There's a whole new world out there. Let's do this.
Karen E. Wagner​
My parents were diplomats. I grew up in exotic countries and sailed back home every few years to New York City, my shining city on the hill. My goal, from childhood, was to live here, in the tallest building I could find.
I came to the City as soon as I could, to NYU Law School, and I have lived here ever since.
To my own great surprise, I became a corporate litigator. I could not have asked for a better career. I was in courtrooms and boardrooms on matters involving international finance, fraud, baseball, aerospace, steel, construction, and more.
I became the first woman litigation partner at a global law firm with historic roots — likely in part because I worked in color. My neon suits and splashy high heels made me visible in a sea of blue and gray men.
After four decades of practice, I retired at the end of 2014. After learning to fly, a long-held ambition, I started working with Erica to create a retirement that would be as purposeful and fun as my working life. Lustre has been more fun — and more meaningful — than we ever imagined.
I look forward to seeing where we all go as we change the world, again.