One Two Lash inventor, Katy Stoka, adds artful touches to her casually chic oasis in Miami Beach

In the whirlwind life of the Stokas, you can find them traveling up and down both Florida coasts on many weekends to their eldest son’s soccer games, riding their bikes around Miami Beach then jumping in the pool, having an impromptu sit down dinner or during the quarantine, holding a blood drive and delivering meals to the needy. “We divide and conquer,” says Katy with a laugh. “Dario takes the boys to work and they learn about real estate and if I’m on a business call in the car, I put it on speaker so they can hear and later, I ask their opinions.” With Katy’s out-of-the-box thinking, she barely blinked as she found herself suddenly pivoting from high-end real estate sales director to magnetic lash mogul.

After a decade selling luxury buildings like the ICON South Beach, the W and Surf Club Four Seasons, their daily, hectic pace led Katy to create a game-changing category in the beauty industry. “We had a work event and I wanted to spend some time with our boys before going out, but we were running late,” she recalls. “I was in the shower trying to decide between putting on eye makeup and false lashes -- or doing my hair.” Her next thought was, “I shouldn’t have to choose one or the other! Eyes should be easy, like putting on a ring.”

After two years of research development and obtaining patents, One Two Cosmetics launched in 2016 with One Two Lash: the first false eyelashes that attach with tiny magnets instead of glue. Within that year came dizzying success. One Two Lash won the Allure magazine ‘Best of Beauty Breakthrough’ award. Then O Magazine chose the lashes as one of ‘Oprah’s Favorite Things.’ Katy’s appearance on the NBC Today Show resulted in $1 million in sales that day, which led to Sephora calling for a meeting. “It’s usually the other way around,” she confesses, not realizing the impact her groundbreaking invention was having. “I was clueless, but grateful!” “Even in college,” recalls Dario, “she always knew she was going to create something big!” Some estimates put One Two Lash sales in the tens of millions of dollars.

A SUBTROPICAL ESCAPE

The stylish couple met while at Marquette University, where Nebraska-born Katy was on a journalism scholarship and Argentina native Dario, who was raised in Chicago, was getting an MBA in finance. The lure of warm weather prompted their move to South Beach 18 years ago after stating careers in Chicago. Katy switched gears from retail consulting into real estate, managing over $1.5 billion in sales for the international elite. Dario also made a career move from management consulting for Ernst & Young to luxury real estate where he’s now Executive Director of Luxury Sales of the top producing Vecchi+Stoka Team at Douglas Elliman in Miami.

After five years of living the South Beach condo and club lifestyle, they were ready for a change and in need of more space for son Massimo, now 13, who was about to be born. “We loved the tranquil setting of the house set back from the street and the privacy offered by 12-foot-tall hedges,” says Dario of their Miami Beach home. However, the house, which was built in 1977, needed rescuing from past design errors. “Every wall in the house was painted in alternating loud, ‘tropical’ colors like mango, raspberry, orange and lime green, with drop ceilings that had fluorescent lighting inside.” And Katy adds, “It was a perfect storm of tacky. There was tragic, speckled, tan tile trying to be terrazzo and several different levels throughout so all the floors had to be ripped out.”

The five-bedroom home was completely reinterpreted for the needs of a young, active family, which soon included son Enzo, now 11. “The design was inspired by the modern real estate we’ve sold but we added Italian oak floors,” says Dario. “We wanted a warm contemporary feel.” While the interiors are subdued and minimal with crisp white walls, they’re not afraid of making a bold, dramatic statement with vibrant, contemporary art. As Katy explains, “I like pieces that make us smile as we pass by them every day.”