Maybe a copy of Birmingham Lifestyle magically lands in your mailbox each month. Or maybe you snagged a copy from your local coffee shop when the cover caught your eye. Either way, chances are you don’t know the story of how it got there. That’s because we’ve never told it.
This month, to celebrate our fifth anniversary, we’re pulling back the curtain on the small, passionate team of Birmingham-loving creatives who tell stories that celebrate our city in these pages.
Kali McNutt, Publisher
Five years ago, Birmingham Lifestyle wasn’t anywhere on Kali McNutt’s radar. She’d spent years in Washington, D.C., first shaping messaging campaigns for Fortune 500 companies at a major public affairs firm, then running external affairs for a foreign-policy think tank—producing major events, stewarding donors, and moving big ideas into the world. She was the person you called when heads of state, four-star generals, dissidents, and marquee journalists were flying in and the stakes were high.
Her work took her across the globe—living and working in India and France, logging trips to Nepal, Japan, and Israel, and ultimately back home to Birmingham. Here, she chaired the Birmingham Committee on Foreign Relations, curating conversations that brought global voices to the city, and served as Chief Marketing Officer for a Birmingham-based startup. Then, one spring afternoon, an unexpected LinkedIn message from the corporate office of City Lifestyle changed everything.
“It was May 2021,” she recalls. “I’d never pictured running a magazine.” But the more she thought about it, the more it fit. She had, after all, run a neighborhood “zine” as a kid—where missing a deadline could get you fired, even if you were her best friend. Later, at the University of Alabama, she served as editor of a campus publication, sharpening the same storytelling instincts she uses now. And she’d spent much of her career telling powerful stories on a global stage. Now, she had the chance to shine a light on the stories happening right here at home.
So she took the leap and officially stepped in as publisher in October of 2021—steadying the ship, retaining partners, and building momentum issue by issue. Her vision from the beginning was clear: create a publication that could only exist in Birmingham, one that celebrates the vast, layered, surprising stories this city holds.
“The covers I love most are the ones that could only exist here—not in New York, not in L.A.—they’re unmistakably Birmingham,” she says.
An avid traveler, bon vivant, and lover of art and design, Kali sees Birmingham as a city that constantly surprises. “Birmingham isn’t the biggest city, but if you want it, you can find it here,” she says. “Great Indian food. A French-speaking meetup. A blackwater diving group. The food scene alone rivals places three times our size. If it weren’t this good, I’m not sure I’d have moved back,” she adds with a laugh.
With a keen editorial eye and endless ideas, Kali has built a publication that feels vibrant, grounded, and full of possibility. “I always have more ideas than pages,” she admits. Under her leadership, the magazine has become a trusted reflection of Birmingham’s creative energy—curated with intention, elevated but never out of touch.
The magazine itself is funded entirely by community partners, many of whom have been with her from the beginning. “When they partner with us, they’re not just buying space,” Kali says. “They’re helping us tell the city’s stories.” Many of those champions are people who found her. “A lot of our best supporters were strangers who caught the vision and got excited about what we’re doing.”
Between meetings with community leaders, potential partners, and the creative team she’s built, free time is rare (though she does like that she can do her job from anywhere in the world). When she finds it, she spends it with her French Spaniel, Choupinette—better known as Nettie—and planning her next travel adventure with her Greek husband, Theo.
The magic of Birmingham Lifestyle, she’ll tell you, happens behind the lens and on the page—with the help of the team that brings the city's stories to life. One of the first photographers who helped shape the magazine's signature style is Mary Fehr.
Mary Fehr, Photographer
Mary Fehr sees life through a lens of love—both when there’s a camera in her hands and when there’s not. She calls herself a romantic—not in the narrow sense, but in the way she loves the world and the people in it. “I believe in really loving people,” she says. “Not out of expectation. Just loving them for who they are.”
In every session, she seeks to discover who someone is—not just what they look like. “The best moments are when I show up to a shoot and the person I’m photographing is completely open—when they let me in. Not just to the surface of what the visual story is, but to the deeper part of it,” she says.
She remembers one shoot in particular with a fourth-generation cotton farmer in Huntsville. She’d driven up expecting to photograph a sweatshirt made from cotton grown on his family’s farm. Instead, she spent four hours riding around the property, listening to stories about his life and work. “It was incredible,” she says. “When he asked me to stay for lunch, I hated that I couldn’t. But that’s the kind of moment I love—when you give people room to open up, and suddenly you’re not just taking a picture. You’re photographing them in a more honest way.”
Mary’s instinct for preserving moments started long before she ever held a camera. Her mother carried one everywhere—birthday parties, graduations, even ordinary afternoons. “It used to drive us crazy,” she says. “But later, I realized she was capturing moments we wouldn’t otherwise have.”
A college photography class sealed her path. Artist and mentor Karen Graffeo noticed her gift before she did. “She told me I should keep doing this,” Mary recalls. “She saw a talent I didn’t even know I had.” She’s drawn to the kind of beauty that endures—art history, fashion, and the clean strength of Greek and Roman sculpture. “It’s simple and strong but so full of feeling,” she says. That same emotional current runs through her photographs.
Her style is unmistakable—rich with color, emotional resonance, and raw beauty. Wedding and portrait sessions have carried her across the globe, and her photographs have graced the pages of national publications, including Garden & Gun.
Kali was an admirer of Mary’s work long before she ever reached out. When Mary photographed the cover for her first men’s issue, the creative connection was immediate. Since then, her images have become part of the magazine’s heartbeat.
On the way to a shoot, she cranks up Jimmy Buffett and rolls the windows down. “It’s relaxing and easy listening,” she says. “The kind of music that makes the world feel a little sunnier.” A Springsteen track might follow—a touch of grit to balance the breeze.
Her process is steady and sure. No tethers. No screens. No wasted motion. She sees the shot, lifts the camera, and the moment falls into place. “It’s gut instinct,” she says. “I just know when we have it.”
Back at home, she’s greeted by a loyal crew: two dogs and three cats—Mimi, Reba, Dwight, Lucy, and Bandit—all rescues. Mary’s love for living things stretches far beyond her work. On a trip to Greece with her mom, she watched the sunset from a balcony in Santorini with a stray dog and a few curious cats at her feet. Later, she let one curl up in her bed. “My mom woke up so mad,” she says, laughing.
Etched on her forearm are words from The Secret Life of Walter Mitty: “To see behind walls, draw closer, to find each other, and to feel. That is the purpose of life.” For Mary, it’s not just a quote. It’s how she moves through the world.
Ambre Amari, Photographer
When Ambre Amari steps onto a set, the air in the room shifts. Positive energy surges, shoulders drop, and ideas start multiplying. “I make it fun. I can feel when people are uncomfortable, and I pivot,” she says. She’s the one who shows up with a speaker, dials up Beyoncé, mixes in Madonna, RuPaul, rap, and big-beat dance—“all high energy,” she says—until the room loosens and the pictures get bolder.
Ambre and Kali go back to 2010, before the magazine existed—friends-of-friends who recognized each other’s drive and creativity. When Birmingham Lifestyle launched, Ambre said, “Whatever you need, I’m here. I believe in what you’re building.” From there came fashion covers with teeth and a standout Alabama Ballet feature that turned into Ambre shooting entire seasons. “With the dancers, I got to bring an idea I’d dreamed about for years to life,” she says—an in-studio concept she’d filed away after seeing a Russian photographer’s work.
But Ambre’s story doesn’t begin with high-fashion sets or artful portraits. Her childhood wasn’t idyllic, though she fondly remembers those first “photo shoots”—fashion shows in the living room with friends, a Polaroid camera, and a very patient cat as the star.
By age eleven, the innocence of childhood had evaporated. By fourteen, she spent more time in borrowed spaces than her own—drifting between families, friends, and any place that felt steady for a moment. By seventeen, she was sharing an apartment with a roommate, stretching every dollar and splitting McDonald’s dollar menu meals, learning that survival itself can be a kind of education.
She wouldn’t trade it, though. “I didn’t come from a picture perfect childhood,” she says. “But I’m grateful for it. It made me resourceful. It made me see things differently. It made me who I am.”
The artistry of Ambre’s work is so distinctive you can spot it before reading the byline. Her images are kinetic and magnetic—the kind that pull you closer and make you imagine the life around the frame. There’s a touch of theater in her composition, a painter’s eye in her light, and an almost electric energy that glows through the surface. It’s art that moves.
Her superpower is connection, and it’s grounded in a take-me-as-I-am openness. “I can get along with anybody—super poor, super rich, super famous, not famous,” she says. “Doesn’t matter.” She reads a room in seconds and de-escalates with ease. It’s partly lived experience, partly the way she collects people. “You can get something from every single person you meet,” she says. “I like to collect energy or inspiration from everyone.”
Travel deepened her eye for humanity. In India, she carried a Polaroid into a slum and handed it around. “These women had never even seen a picture of themselves,” she says. “I taught them to take photos of each other, and it was incredible.” Before she left, they covered her hands in henna, held a small ceremony, and one gifted her a sari she’d made. “It makes me want to cry talking about it,” Ambre says. “I don’t know where they are now, but I’ll never forget them.”
Where does she want to point the lens next? “Morocco,” she says without hesitating. She’s booked it three times and had to cancel each one, but the pull hasn’t faded. “I want to go somewhere I feel completely uncomfortable and out of place,” she says. “When I feel that way, the camera gives me a reason to be there. I’m not just a regular tourist. When I’m stepping out of my comfort zone, the camera is where I feel the most alive.”
Ambre has created far more work than anyone has seen. “I hate social media. I hate Pinterest,” she laughs. But if you talk to her, it’s clear: she dreams big. “I want to shoot a big cover one day—Rolling Stone, Harper’s Bazaar, and Vogue,” she says, recalling the opportunity she once had to pass up for schedule reasons. As a wife and mom of four, she’s passionate about women championing women. “I believe women are stronger together — when we collaborate, not criticize, and lift each other higher. It’s not easy to manage all the things and be successful. I want to photograph women who are out there making it.”
When the camera powers down, she grounds herself. “I’m an extroverted introvert,” she says. “I love people, but I feel things so deeply that sometimes I have to get alone and unplug.” That might look like rearranging rooms at midnight (“My creative brain has to do different things”), studying holistic remedies, or standing barefoot in the grass, soaking in the moonlight.
“I’m crazy about the moon,” Ambre says. “It tells us so much about what we’re feeling.” Sometimes her kids join her beneath its silver light. “I call it a moon bath,” she says. “The moon is magical. It resets me.”
And then, the next morning, she picks up her camera and walks back into the world, smiling at whatever adventure awaits on the other side of the lens.
Blair Moore, Writer
And then there’s me—your unlikely storyteller. I didn’t set out to be a writer, and there was a time I’d have told you it was the last thing I wanted. I chose a journalism degree because it came naturally, but what I really wanted was to be a performer or an artist.
In fact, I tried both. I started out studying art at Auburn but quickly realized my love of abstract painting wasn’t going to get me out of realistic drawing. I’ve never drawn anything that looked remotely real, so that dream ended somewhere around the second sketch of a very unfortunate bowl of pears.
Next came performing. I spent a few years in Orlando, singing with a cappella groups and playing a gypsy in the streetmosphere at SeaWorld. It was fun and theatrical and exactly the kind of magic I craved at the time. Then came Nashville. I moved there with music in mind but stumbled into a writing job at Dave Ramsey’s headquarters—the place where I discovered the power of storytelling and the joy that comes from putting someone else’s experience into words. That’s when it clicked for me—everyone has a story, and there’s always a reason it matters.
Then the scene changed. My husband and I had three kids in quick succession, then one more for good measure. I spent the better part of a decade rediscovering the world through their eyes—muddy knees, belly laughs, endless rounds of The Wheels on the Bus. It was sweet and wild and everything I’d hoped motherhood would be… until one day I realized one more sing-along without a creative outlet might turn my brain to Jell-O.
So, I picked up writing again. And this time, I loved it even more.
It was Ambre Amari who introduced me to Kali McNutt. From that first conversation, I could see it—what she was building, and how much I wanted to be a part of it. Since then, I’ve written about divers and designers, chefs and quilters, firefighters and artists. I’ve sat across from people who’ve made me laugh, cry, and rethink what it means to call Birmingham home. Somewhere along the way, I fell in love with this city in a whole new way.
So yes, my story has a happy ending. I still get to perform now and then on a community theater stage—like the time I played a nun in The Sound of Music while eight months pregnant. (The costume hid it pretty well—unless I turned sideways.) But these days, I’d rather be in the audience of my kids’ lives, cheering them on in the big dreams and the little moments.
And that dream of becoming an artist? It came true after all—just not in the way I expected. I may not be a painter (though I’ve had the joy of getting to know some of Birmingham’s finest), but my canvas is a blank page. The subjects are the people I meet. The colors are their voices. The words are my brushstrokes. And their purpose is you—the person reading them.
Because when I write, I feel it—the weight, the wonder, the heartbeat of someone’s story as it takes shape. And if I’ve done my job well, it won’t just be my words you hear. It’ll be theirs.
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Behind every issue of Birmingham Lifestyle is a small team with big hearts for this city. We gather around tables, scribble on napkins, chase golden light, and unearth the stories that shape Birmingham—all so we can share them with you.
Five years in, this magazine is still becoming, just like the city it celebrates. The pages ahead aren’t simply waiting to be filled—they’re calling for the stories still unfolding, the ones that haven’t yet found their way to the page.