Geelong young guns: Hugh Jeffreys, Taylor Henderson, Art Simone, Chloe Hayden among our top influencers

Whether they’re producing must-watch YouTube content, leading advocacy of important causes or entertaining thousands, Geelong boasts plenty of young guns who are really going places. Here’s how they’re launching into success.

From hugely successful businesswomen to advocates and influencers, Geelong is brimming with young talent. Here are a few young guns whose stars are still on the rise.

Hugh Jeffreys

While not yet in his 20s, Geelong YouTuber Hugh Jeffreys has already made a name for himself online.

The tech guru restores older model phones, tablets and laptops to an audience of over 720k people each week.

“Before I was making YouTube videos, I was taking things apart on the back veranda,” he told the Geelong Advertiser last year.

YouTuber Hugh Jeffreys restores and repairs iPhones, computers and other old gadgets to an online audience of almost half a million people. PHOTO: Hugh Jeffreys

His most viewed video – an assessment of the iPhone 12’s “anti repair design” has amassed over 11 million views and counting.

“In making videos, I hope to convince people to fix things instead of going out and getting a brand new one,” he said last year.

“There’s a lot of push from companies to get the latest model, but not everyone needs the latest camera. The last one might have been perfectly adequate for their needs.”

Nicole and Lisa Mitrov

With years of experience, sibling duo model Nicole and make-up artist Lisa Mitrov were no strangers to the modelling world.

Last year amid the Covid-19 pandemic, they launched a modelling agency in the hopes of filling a local gap in the market and representing young talent.

“Last year because of COVID-19 Lisa moved back home so it was a chance for us to be creative again,” Nicole told GT magazine in February.

Lisa and Nicole Mitrov

“Lisa’s makeup had paused, my gym work had paused, and I was modelling every now and then locally but I wasn’t going to Melbourne and we finally had time to put our heads together.

The pair officially debuted Duo Management last year, and began scouting local talent in mid-October.

“I grew a lot working for Blush Bar in Newtown. In the end I was holding masterclasses, teaching makeup, and thought it’s time to take a leap and back myself,” Lisa said.

“Now I work on set full-time for clothing brands like Cotton On as their in-house makeup artist, which was my end goal.”

Taylor Henderson

The Ceres born-and-raised talent first rose to fame on the fourth series of Australia’s Got Talent in 2010 before placing runner up on X-Factor Australia in 2013.

Since then, he has released two chart topping albums and continues to perform, release music and tour both locally and across the country.

Boasting 250k Instagram followers, Henderson has experimented with virtual performances during Victoria’s Covid lockdowns and performed at the Geelong’s Night of Lights Christmas broadcast last year.

Art Simone

While she burst onto the main stage of RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under earlier this year, Art Simone had been a celebrated staple of the Melbourne and Geelong drag scenes for many years.

NGV

Such recognition has included the title of Drag Performer of the Year, guest-starring in Matt Agnew’s season of the Bachelor Australia and headline her own WOW Entertainment series, Highway to Heel.

“I started drag being very self-indulgent,” she told the Addy earlier this year.

“I did drag because it made me feel good and it made me feel powerful and it let me express myself in ways I hadn’t been able to growing up. And then something switched and the reason I do drag now is because I love making people feel good. That is what inspires me.”

The Piano Bar Geelong mainstay will hit the road with a Drag Race Down Under tour this summer, before representing Australia at RuPaul’s DragCon next year.

Chloe Hayden

Chloe Hayden, 23, is an actor, singer, musician, public speaker and advocate with an online audience in the hundreds of thousands.

Hayden’s videos regularly shine a light on life with autism and ADHD, raising awareness and educating about the condition.

Local woman Chloe Hayden is fronting an autism campaign called Change Your Reactions. Picture: Peter Ristevski

With a YouTube audience of 42,800 subscribers and 328,000 followers on TikTok, her content has reached a global audience.

Offline, Hayden has starred in the film Jeremy The Dud and several autism campaigns, as well as working as an ambassador for Autism non-profits.

Dan Babic

Geelong-raised TV presenter Dan Babic turned heads last year after signing a three-year show deal with the CW network interviewing some of Tinseltown’s biggest stars.

In recent years he worked on a hit Facebook panel show, FaceFive, and was a host and judge on US show Design Genius.

Babic most recently starred in an episode of Vanderpump Dogs on US streaming service Peacock, chronicling the rescue of his four-legged friend Gizmo.

Having interviewed stars the world over, Babic told the Addy last year his attitude to his career had evolved over time.

“My relationship with success has completely changed … I had a very superficial life and career whereas now I am doing it to be a vessel to really tell people’s stories,” he said..

Maddison Temelkovski

Already one of Geelong’s foremost beauty clinic entrepreneurs, Maddison Temelkovski continues to build an impressive empire.

The Western Heights College alumni was just 24 when she started The Aesthetic Skin Clinic a few doors down from Westfield Geelong, and expanded to a second shopfront last year in the middle of the Covid pandemic.

Maddison Temelkovski of The Aesthetic Skin Clinic

Temelkovski — who is mum to a beautiful two-year-old boy — spent her weekends in year 12 gaining experience at a Melbourne clinic before commencing her formal training after leaving school, revealing her bad skin experiences as a youth as part of her motivation.

“I love helping women feel good about themselves and I love the challenges that having a business brings – that is what motivates me,” she told the Geelong Advertiser last year.

Part of her success is her social media savvy with the clinic boasting more than 26,000 followers on Instagram (@theaestheticskinclinic_), while her own following has risen to over 10,000 accounts.

Originally published as Geelong young guns: Hugh Jeffreys, Taylor Henderson, Art Simone, Chloe Hayden among our top influencers