Sebastian Modak

Sebastian Modak is an award-winning travel writer, editor, and multimedia journalist. He’s currently the Travel Editor for the Wall Street Journal’s lifestyle section, Off Duty. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Condé Nast Traveler, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Lonely Planet, National Geographic, AFAR, BBC Travel, and more.

Sebastian was the 2019 New York Times 52 Places Traveler, spending the year reporting from each of the places on the Times’ 52 Places to Go list. Following that dream assignment, he spent two years as Lonely Planet’s editor-at-large, where he built an award-winning digital longform features vertical and reported from places like Antarctica, the Faroe Islands, and the backwoods of Pennsylvania.

Before the 52 Places project, he worked for three years at Condé Nast Traveler where he was first an editor and then a staff writer. When he’s not somewhere else, he’s usually in New York City.

Other past lives? Sebastian spent a year and a half working as a producer on the MTV World series Rebel Music. Before that, in 2013, he was the recipient of a Fulbright-mtvU Fellowship, which allowed him to travel to Botswana, where he spent a year documenting the local hip-hop scene. He also worked at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts for over two years as a writer and researcher.

Besides Botswana and the U.S., Sebastian has lived in Hong Kong, Australia, India, and Indonesia. He is of mixed Colombian and Indian heritage. “Where are you from?” is a complicated question.

Sebastian has spoken about his travels and his work at universities, conferences and corporate events. He is available for speaking engagements and panel appearances.

He has a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in English and History and minored in Music and African Studies. He also plays the drums and is a big fan of bicycles and board games.

You can follow Sebastian at @sebmodak on Twitter and Instagram.