When I boarded a flight from South Africa back to Israel in 2019, I had no grand plan. I’d spent almost a year as a digital nomad, testing whether I could run my web design studio from anywhere in the world. And after a chance client meeting in Tel Aviv the summer before, one that kept me in Israel an extra month and a half, I had my answer: I think I can do this here.

What I didn’t have? Any real idea of what “this” would look like.

I’d run Awaken Studio for years in New York. I knew how to find clients, close deals, and deliver websites people loved. What I didn’t know was that moving a business to Israel isn’t just a logistical shift, it’s a full transformation. Some of it humbling, some of it surprisingly beautiful, and all of it nothing like I expected.

Nobody warned me that my first Israeli client would change everything

It started with a referral. A past client from New York connected me with a Tel Aviv startup with a small, scrappy team of about 20 people who had just finished working with a top New York branding agency and needed a website. This was the “chance client meeting” I mentioned at the top. I was still mid‑digital‑nomad at the time, passing through Israel on what was meant to be a quick stop before Croatia. Instead, I walked into their office less than two weeks into my intended month-long stay and ended up staying longer than I anticipated.

I closed the deal. And then something completely unexpected happened: they invited me to come in twice a week. To work alongside the team. To be part of something.

In New York, client........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)