Em Semmel, professional organizer.

I’m Em Semmel—also known as Emily Semmel—the owner of That Detail Devil, a professional organizing business serving Philadelphia.

Find me and That Detail Devil on Instagram at @thatdetaildevil.

I’ll be honest: I haven’t always been organized. Then life happened, and creating order became a kind of therapy.

I grew up between design and hands-on problem-solving. My mother runs a lifestyle magazine, and my father was a handyman when I was growing up—I was his assistant. Between them, I learned to see both the style a space could have and the practical, resourceful way to make it function.

I started in my own space and quickly branched out—organizing and creating flow at work, in friends’ offices and garages, designing a showroom for a collector of designer shoes, and tackling the basement of a 30-year-old restaurant.

The turning point came in Florida, where my mom, a friend, and I completed a full turnover of my grandmother’s home in three days, preparing it for a fully furnished, as-ready sale. It sold in two weeks. Her neighbors and realtor all offered me jobs.

That was the final push I needed to start the business I had been telling myself for years I would create.