Leadership Conference 2018
CLOSING GENERAL SESSION
3:15 a.m. to 4:30 a.m.
STORIES OF RESILIENCE
Chef Lee Anne Wong, Chef & Owner, Koko Head Café
Lee Anne Wong is the chef and owner of Koko Head Cafe in Honolulu, Hawaii. A native of Troy, New York, Wong graduated from the International Culinary Center (ICC), formerly known as the French Culinary Institute, and began her culinary training at Marcus Samuelsson’s Aquavit before playing an integral role in the opening of Jean Georges Vongrichten’s Chinese concept, Restaurant 66. Wong went on to work as the Executive Chef of Event Operations at ICC, during which time she was prominently featured on Season One of Bravo’s Flagship Series “Top Chef”, and subsequently was hired as the series’ Supervising Culinary Producer for the next 6 seasons, helping to build the show into the powerhouse it is today. Chef Lee Anne has traveled the world, bringing her knives, cooking in far off locales such as Mexico, Japan, Spain, and Malaysia. Wong has also been featured on numerous food television series such a Iron Chef America, Chopped, Chopped Junior, and as a regular commentator on the series Unique Eats, in addition to starring in her own web series The Wong Way to Cook on bravotv.com and the Food Network one hour special Food Crawl with Lee Anne Wong.
In late 2013, Wong moved from New York City to Honolulu where in 2014, she debuted Koko Head Cafe – an island style brunch house in the Kaimuki neighborhood – to popular acclaim, with Wong recognized on the cover of Honolulu Magazine, as well as in Bon Appétit, Food and Wine Magazine, Honolulu Star-Advertiser and Huffington Post. Wong released her first cookbook, Dumplings All Day Wong, in August 2014. Chef Wong continues to expand her brand across the globe, joining the culinary team for Hawaiian Airlines in 2015, and debuting Sweetcatch Poke in NYC in the fall of 2016. Chef Wong was most recently named Hawaiian Airline’s new Executive Chef, with her menus set to debut in June 2018.
Mark Towill, Co-Founder & Principal, 55 South
As a Hawaiian native, the ocean was Mark’s playground where he naturally gained a tremendous amount of experience across multiple facets of professional sailing. After graduating from Brown University with a degree in Business and Environmental Studies, he and his longtime friend Charlie Enright co-founded 55 South with the goal of one day sailing around the world. Mark was integral in the sponsorship acquisition process leading up to, and managing many of the business and team aspects throughout the race.
On board, Mark is a co-skipper with Charlie leading the team through both achievements and challenges. Building upon the experience of his first Volvo Ocean Race as Team Alvimedica in 2014-15 and his passion for environmental conservation, they sought sustainable partners who could help leverage their platform to spread a larger message of ocean health. Competing as Vestas 11th Hour Racing in the 2017-18 edition – a team with the goal of being the most sustainable team in the race through operations, logistics, and outreach education, Mark hopes to continue to build upon the successes of running a sustainable campaign to inspire future sports teams to also lead sustainable practices.
