Leslie spent her early days in the fashion world as an assistant to Vera Wang, an editor at Vogue Magazine. Following her days at the magazine she worked as a freelance fashion and set stylist in New York and California doing editorial and commercial projects. Working alongside some of the best photographers in the fashion world, Leslie picked up skills to go on to do her own art photography. She had her work featured in the windows of Fendi’s Fifth Avenue store in New York and several other galleries in New York and Connecticut. Creating has been in her blood since a child. She had tenures at Neenah Paper helping to design and market premium papers; created hand crafted greeting cards and products under the Derene Design Photoworks and Anzix Collections labels. Food was always a constant no matter where Leslie was. In 2007, Hope’s Gardens Pesto was created and since then the numerous flavors of their pesto have been enjoyed by customers, restaurants, and passengers on Delta Airlines International flights. When Leslie and her family returned to New York in 2016, she set her sights on finally writing a Pesto cookbook and sharing her belief that Pesto can be personalized and then used to build great recipes and meals. The book Pesto : The Modern Mother Sauce was released in Spring 2019.