Lola Akerstrom

Lola Akinmade Åkerström

Visual Storyteller and Bestselling Author

Lola Akinmade Åkerström is an award-winning visual storyteller, international bestselling author, and travel entrepreneur. She has dispatched from over 70+ countries, and her work has been featured in National Geographic, New York Times, The Guardian, BBC, CNN, Travel Channel, Travel + Leisure, Lonely Planet, Forbes, and many more. She has collaborated with commercial brands such as Dove, Mercedes Benz, Intrepid Travel, Electrolux, and National Geographic Channel, to name a few.

As a storyteller, Lola was recently named a 2022 Hasselblad Heroine and is the 2018 Bill Muster Travel Photographer of the Year.

As a business owner and entrepreneur, she runs Stockholm-based travel consultancy, Geotraveler Media, co-founded the travel influencer marketing collective, NordicTB, and recently co-founded Local Purse, which supports travel guides and local artisans through live video shopping.

Her book, Due North, received the Lowell Thomas Gold Award for Best Travel Book, and she is also the author of international bestselling LAGOM: The Swedish Secret of Living Well, available in 18 foreign language editions. Her latest internationally-acclaimed novel, In Every Mirror She’s Black is a Good Morning America (GMA) Buzz Pick, Amazon Editor’s Pick,  an Independent UK “Best Thought-provoking Story” and was shortlisted for the Bad Form Review Book of the Year and published as a lead hardcover around the world. Film/TV rights are represented by UTA.

 In 2018, she was recognized as one of the Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) in media and as a mentor. She runs her own online academy, Geotraveler Media Academy, which is dedicated to visual storytelling and helping the next generation of travel storytellers put the heart back into the craft.