Leandra Medine's Blog, page 100
July 24, 2019
The Unmatched Purity of Vanity Among Friends
(In fact, please know that as I write this, I’m in a flowy, creamy silk top with hummingbirds on it. I look like a glorious bird of paradise and you would love it.)
Usually, my friends are receptive. Not to brag, but I’ve seen many a heart-eye emoji in my online lifetime. And they’ll reply with updates of their own: new lipsticks, old sundresses, their choppy, Fleabag-esque haircuts. I give them hearts and all-caps back. If they are humoring me, I never want to know, but I don’t think so; I think we’re having good and honest fun.
What is this behavior? It’s pure, but not necessarily simple. There are notes of romance, and it feels a lot like flirting, but rendered in the key of platonic friendship. Our exchanges are definitely boastful (I have never once apologized for one of these texts, and I never will), but generative rather than zero-sum. Our enthusiastic self-love creates the fertile conditions for even more enthusiastic self-love. When you reflect your light back to each other like mirrors facing one another, you create an endless hall of mutual admiration.
In other words: I wield my vanity as a tool for bonding. It’s love delivered in the form of self-love. It’s meant to delight and entertain, but also to help create, on the most micro of scales, the social conditions that normalize radical self-acceptance. Our tiny conversations exist in a hermetically sealed mini-utopia where the baseline reality is that we are all impressed with each other. And it feels like an act of mutual generosity.
Maybe that seems like a lot to ascribe to bragging over text, but it’s also just fun. Which is not to say we’re making fun of ourselves—because while the final product looks and feels like sarcasm (e.g., “Good morning, I’m a glittering and benevolent fairy in this silken frock”), the humor originates from exaggeration, not irony. The joke isn’t that we aren’t cute or don’t have good taste or don’t deserve to treat ourselves as special. The joke is in how over-the-top excited we are to perform our belief in those things.
Now that I think of it, this performance might be the quintessence of camp, a sensibility that elevates the artificial and shallow as virtuous. Our platonic flirting is an uncynical mode of being, completely guileless and uncompromising in its affection. And expressing that level of love—especially of things deemed unimportant in a more serious, respectable world—requires vulnerability. It takes guts to pronounce yourself an absolute goddess and dreamboat to another person, because we risk being told we’re not. Camp exaggerates performance to reveal that everything, our whole identities, are performances. So when we allow ourselves to indulge in what we want, and by doing so allow others to do the same, we’re temporarily creating that world. I highly recommend it.
Graphic by Madeline Montoya.
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July 23, 2019
3 Unexpected Ways to Style Bike Shorts
Like a messenger running 30 minutes late on a fixie, the bike shorts trend shows no signs of braking anytime soon. I can certainly see why it has such staying power, the garment, which has been seen everywhere from Chanel to Off-White, offers nostalgic ties to Princess Diana to the kind of comfort not many items of clothing can surpass. They also give lots of opportunities to play with proportions, as the perfect counterpart to baggy sweatshirts and structured blazers alike.
And yet. And yet! I haven’t quite figured out how to wear them. I’m no stranger to experimental style, nor am I afraid of risk when it comes to concocting outfits, but for some reason the secret to incorporating bike shorts in a way that doesn’t feel too “Jane Fonda in the 80s” or too “Kim Kardashian on Instagram” eludes me. I don’t mind sitting out a trend, but I have a vested interest in giving one a go (see: Princess Diana, unparalleled comfort, etc.), so I tapped an expert for assistance.
Lillian Ahenkan, a.k.a. Flex Mami, a.k.a. a DJ, author, MTV Australia host and all-around cool person, is definitely an expert when it comes to styling bike shorts with consistently fresh results. Having admired her approach many, many times, I had no doubt she would be in possession of some helpful tips. Scroll down to read what they are (and see them in action).
1. Lean Preppy
If the word “preppy” conjures images of a pink and green color palette, cardigans, and headbands, then a pair of black bike shorts might seem like the epitome of its stylistic foil. Therein lies the magic of combining them. Intermixed with the aforementioned elements of prep, the stereotypical identity of bike shorts is thrown just enough out of balance to feel surprising. “This look is an homage to me dropping out of uni multiple times,” Lillian told me.
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2. Keep Your Contrast Up Top
Pairing bike shorts with a blazer and strappy high-heels has been done enough (on runways and Instagram alike) to make the obvious contrast of glamour and athleticism feel…well…obvious. Circumvent this cliché by wearing a simple, structured top that isn’t overtly intended for a night on the town, and slipping on your favorite pair of errand-running sneakers. If you have the urge to sprinkle in a beaded bag that would feel equally at home in a bar or on your best friend’s couch, Lillian is all for it.
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3. Think Pink
Bike shorts often appear in minimalist, monochrome looks, which is why I mentally associate them with colors like cream, black, and–on a wild occasion–olive green. Lillian suggests shaking up this connotation by embracing a more saturated look. Pink is a great option, especially since it’s typically reserved for frilly dresses and midi skirts and other things that are very much not in the same style family as bike shorts. “This is what Elle Woods would wear if Legally Blonde came out in 2019,” Lillian told me. I couldn’t have put it better myself.
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What do you think of the bike shorts trend? If you’re a fan, how do you wear them? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
Photos provided by @flex.mami.
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Unconventional Life Hack: Always Offer to Help Your Friends Move
Welcome to Unconventional Life Hacks, a regular feature wherein we propose one surprising, unlikely, or downright absurd idea that just might radically change your approach to life. (Or at least make you *consider* radically changing it.)
A text message I get from a friend at least once a week: “Let’s do dinner or drinks soon!”
A text message I have got exactly once in my entire life: “Don’t get movers, I’ll help you.”
In 2019 it feels like nobody can agree on anything, but I doubt anyone would argue with me when I say that moving sucks. So why, you may ask, am I recommending you offer your knees, back, and patience to a friend who has decided to relocate? Well, it’s to do with adult friendship. And the fact that—sorry to break to you—real friends aren’t made over dinner.
Despite having moved to the U.S. less than two years ago with only a backpack of belongings, the apartment I share with my boyfriend is completely full. So when we recently decided to move to a new neighborhood, I insisted we call in the professionals—this was a job too big for two. That plan would have gone ahead, and I would have at least $300 less to my name, if it weren’t for my friend Isaac. Instead of paying movers, he offered to help my boyfriend and me pack and haul everything we own from one side of lower Manhattan to the other.
An important thing to note is that Isaac doesn’t love moving. He’s just a good friend. And he came to be a good friend, to me and many others, by doing tedious shit with us. He’s the person who has helped me realize that if I want to go from being acquaintances to close friends with someone, we can’t only do fun things together.
In New York, getting dinner or grabbing a drink is one of the easiest things you can do. Whether you want to spend 99 cents or $99 dollars, there will always be somewhere to go and, usually, someone who’s keen to go with you. And maybe that’s the problem: Long-lasting friendships aren’t made over tapas or margaritas or movies or shows, because those are things you can do with pretty much anyone in your phone’s contact list. Moving house on the other hand? That’s something you can only do with a real friend. In this flakey modern world, where we all expect half our plans to get rain-checked at the last minute, the best way to know if someone’s a keeper is to commit to doing the un-cancellable together.
But it’s not just the commitment that sets this kind of friendship apart; it’s what happens next. The best way to build a connection that will last until you both look like the FaceApp versions of yourselves is through a gritty mix of hard work and acts of service. This logic explains why you’re more likely to make a new work friend packing up the chairs together after an event than you are during the cocktail hour. It explains why I’ll always remember the day I helped a best friend literally dig trenches for a goddamn irrigation system in her backyard, but will never be able to tell you the restaurant we went to afterward. Research has found that it takes 234 hours to make a “good friend,” but I can guarantee that five hours spent building IKEA furniture with someone will bring you closer than 20 hours of coffee dates and brunches.
When I think back to some of the most friendship-defining conversations I’ve had, it’s almost funny how few of them took place in a bar or crowded restaurant, given how much time I spend socializing in both. I’ve opened up more on hikes, over puzzles, chopping vegetables, and of course, packing boxes, than I have after any amount of red wine. It might be the concept of a shared goal or the distraction of having something to do with your hands, but there’s just something about physical tasks that makes it easier to skip past the small talk and get to the stuff that matters.
So if you’re looking to make not just friends, but close ones, I suggest ditching your dinner plans and committing to doing something with your bare hands instead.
Feature photo via Getty Images.
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I Thought I’d Be Cool About Aging. I Was Wrong
As my friend and I left to catch the train that night, we quickly debriefed on the moment. “Yikes,” we said to each other. “It’s just aging!” We may have been broke and stressed and unsure of ourselves every hour on the hour, but we knew in broad strokes and gut feelings what our future was going to be like, and it wasn’t that. I have a very casual relationship to my looks as I am a very casual woman, I thought. I will be chill.
Nearly a decade later, I am now, for the first time, not just getting older, but aging—in what feels like the prime of my life. How unjust! Unsure of myself for most of high school and college, I emerged out of my awkward phase at the graceful age of…I dunno, 24? And I’ve just gotten more comfortable with myself since. But just as I felt like I was settling into myself, I started noticing the way my forehead wrinkles when I arch my eyebrows. Or how the grays in my hair have started to congregate in one spot (fingers crossed that they at least do me the solid of turning into a streak, but I’m trying not to get too attached to the idea).
But it’s not just cosmetic! Oh no! My hip hurts all the time. I rarely get carded. I’m haunted by the fact that I have yet to roll over my 401K. At this rate, I’m not saving nearly enough for retirement. I recently added the PBS app to my Roku. More of my friends are married than not. I am wary of eating too many chia seeds. I’m worried that every time I talk to my mom on the phone it may be the last. I’m concerned I’m not getting enough calcium. I’m afraid I may never stop being selfish. I’m afraid I’m going to become an object of pity. I’m afraid I’ll never stop being scared.
Well, would you look at that. It seems as if I am decidedly not chill.
Part of my low-level panic is, when I see wrinkles, I see a physical representation of a loss of time. I was never going to be a wunderkind, I knew that pretty early on. And it took some wandering career-wise to figure out what I wanted—or rather, to gather the courage to go after what I wanted. So while I know that 22-year-old me wouldn’t have been able to handle New York or a job in media, I can’t escape the feeling that my window of youth is closing, and that maybe I waited too long to jump through it. I’m mourning the loss of that space where I didn’t quite feel left behind (though sometimes I do) but didn’t feel locked into anything either (though again, sometimes I do).
So yes, I’m uncomfortable with what the wrinkles represent, but honestly, I’m not thrilled about the wrinkles themselves, either. When it comes down to it, I am pretty vain about the way I look in that I think I can afford to not think about it that much—so the fact that I’m giving this any attention at all is unsettling. Why do I care? As someone who has never really been “cute” or had a youthful glow (I came out of the womb glowering), I don’t think my fall from aesthetic grace will be a large one—probably more like a hop off of a curb. Plus, when I think about the things that truly scare me about my future, my face falls pretty far down the list. But wouldn’t it make dealing with the things I’m worried about easier if I looked younger? Maybe, maybe not. But if I am freaking out about losing time, it seems like the more pressing issue than my wrinkles is getting right with myself. Figuring out what a nice life means to me, what I want beyond surface-level notions of success.
Another woman at my very first job, one who set the mold in my mind for how a woman can lead, once said in a meeting, “At a certain age you wake up and just think, me again?” At the time, it made me sad. I think it still does. Because even though I understand it more now—that living is kind of a slog—I still wake up happy to occupy the body and space that I do, I think in part because getting here was so hard-won. When it comes down to it, I don’t want to give up on liking myself yet. So if my wrinkles and grays and fears are still here, reminding me that I like what I have enough to worry about it slipping away, maybe that’s a good thing. It can light a fire under me to move toward what I want and cherish what I have because, after all, we’re all gonna die, so why wouldn’t I raise these eyebrows with reckless abandon?
Photos provided by Nora Taylor.
The post I Thought I’d Be Cool About Aging. I Was Wrong appeared first on Man Repeller.
Haley and Harling Discuss Their Failed Self-Tanning Experiment
Last week, we tested out a bunch of tanning products with the intention of recommending our favorites in a standard beauty service PSA. Long story short, due to some unforeseen hiccups, we were no longer able to move forward with that angle. Short story long…well, that’s what our conversation below is for. Scroll down to read about the Great Failed Tanstravaganza of 2019, in our own words. –Harling and Haley
Haley: Greetings H. Harling Ross. I’m looking at you across the office right now in your white top and white barrette and I MUST say you’re looking positively swarthy. Which makes me think it’s a great time for us to discuss the Great Failed Tanstravaganza of 2019.
Harling: May she rest in peace.
Haley: We really really wanted to recommend some tanning products. Didn’t we.
Harling: We did! For reasons both professional (we thought it would make a great, service-y story) and personal (we hadn’t used self-tanners in forever and thought it would be interesting to test out some of the newer options).
Haley: Yes! I believe we called it “the next generation of self-tanning products”! Such high hopes!
Harling: Like if Steve Jobs was making self tanners.
Haley: Exactly. Okay. Let’s go back and explain what happened and why we are relaying it now instead of, you know, just writing the intended story.
Harling: Okay, so, we decamped to my apartment to try out four different varieties of next-gen tanners, which we applied to different body parts in order to witness their separate effects.
Haley: There was a cream, there was a clear (!) liquid, there was an oil (!), there was a pad (!)
Harling: We’d both forgotten how arduous it was to apply self-tanner in the first place.
Haley: Yes. Well, perhaps we made it harder by putting four different products on four different body parts (but how else could we test them all in a single day???), but not that much harder. And actually, we didn’t hate the process, right? Or at least, we were kind of intrigued by how smoothly some of them went on. But then we were trapped in your apartment in our underwear and we weren’t allowed to put clothes on yet or sweat and it was very hot and I felt like I was melting.
Harling: And smelly. Melting and smelly. And sticky. Just bad adjectives.
Haley: Yes. And then I went to therapy!!! In the middle of it! Lol.
Harling: Which was truly brave
Haley: So stupid. When I was there I crossed my legs out of nervousness and I swear that partially messed up my tan…
Harling: I think it’s worth noting that you were reticent to reveal to him that you had just applied self-tanner.
Haley: I couldn’t tell my first male therapist that I had applied self-tanner mere moments before our consultation! Wasn’t ready to bear his judgement.
Harling: Too much too soon.
Haley: Agreed. So anyway, I returned, then we ordered dinner. The smell was getting stronger.
Harling: And the whole time we were waiting to actually start looking tan. The sun was setting. We needed to take our “after” pics! But no dice. Even though one of the products said it took 2-3 hours to develop, and it had been what? 3.5 at that point?
Haley: Yes, and nothing.
Harling: I was also desperate to shower.
Haley: Oh! And then there was the tone mixup!
Harling: Oh a crucial plot twist, yes.
Haley: We were taking notes in a Google Doc about the properties of each of the products so we could properly review them. Both of us were squinting at the bottles and typing away. And then I got to the bottom where it said: medium/dark. And you got to the bottom where it said: light/medium.
Harling: And we had no idea who had used which one where.
Haley: Yes, that was user error. Anyway, so then somehow it became 9 p.m. and I had to go home. We agreed we’d take the after photos tomorrow and both shower that night since one of the products told us to—but sans soap. Which is a cursed shower.
Harling: Let the record show that I asked Austin to smell the self-tanner smell on my elbow before I showered and he said, “I can’t smell anything.”
Haley: I also sniffed your knee and liked it. Left knee more than right knee.
Harling: I think I was getting tripped up by my upper lip, which smelled like a sour penny.
Haley: Lol. There were def some bad smells. But aside from the smells the general feeling of self-tanner after you’ve applied it is bad. You feel like you can’t just live your life. So I was excited to shower and go to bed. The next day we came to work and looked…
Bad.
Streaky.
Dirty?
Harling: Like we’d just come back from a rodeo.
Haley: Crystal was like, “You’re looking so tan, Haley!” all nicely and I was like, “this is a self-tanning disaster,” and she started laughing and was like “okay, yeah, you look absurd.” Which gives me cause to never trust her again.
Harling: That’s the thing with self-tanners that gives me so much anxiety. You might look tan at first glance, but anyone who cares to give you more than a cursory look can easily detect evidence of the fraud that is occurring.
Haley: Absolutely. I mean, in my prime self-tanning years I tried VERY hard for that not to be the case. But it was so much work and it probably didn’t pay off. Even in the best case scenario, where a fake tan looks even, it WILL get splotchy as it fades and washes off. So there is truly no escaping it.
Harling: I think applying and maintaining self-tanner is hard even for people who are really good at makeup and are super meticulous about their appearance, which is not something I would say about either of us…. hence the even greater struggle.
Haley: Right. And doing this experiment made me realize I’d really lost the taste for the kind of beauty that requires hard work. I used to use self-tanner fairly often, and used to spend a lot of time on my physical appearance in general. There was a time when I think it really did bring me a kind of joy! And as the years passed and all my regimens slowly dropped off, there were even moments when I felt a little nostalgic for that former self, for how much fun I had trying to feel pretty (even if it had consequences I wasn’t seeing). I thought maybe this experiment would enliven that energy, but it kind of just made me feel old. But in a good way, like I’d outgrown self-tanner.
Harling: Yeah, I also had the revelation that the mediocre effect that self-tanner elicits is not worth the labor it requires by my current standards of lazy self-care. I don’t think I’ve outgrown all beauty rituals that involve time/some work (for example, my curly hair wash and go routine is very time-consuming and annoying but I love the results), but I’ve definitely gotten better at recognizing what brings me joy when it comes to beauty versus what feels like a chore, or a vestige of a former self.
Haley: I feel like a broken record for saying so at this point, but it’s really true that growing up is about sloughing off the parts of you (SO TO SPEAK) that no longer feel right, and it’s the most satisfying exercise, and no one can rush it. I did not expect self-tanner to serve as an impetus for another version of this lesson.
Harling: And I think growing up is also about understanding that you can (and def will) change your mind about things. Maybe we will both be self-tanner obsessives five years from now! I doubt it but who knows!!!
Haley: Good & valid point, my liege. Okay, back to our streaky day in the office. We were concerned about our story. Because at this point we were still planning to review the products! We even went to your house and took after pics!
Harling: We still wanted to review the products, but we encountered a brand new problem in our already mountainous litany: We had complete opposite experiences in terms of which ones we liked best.
Haley: Yes, my legs were streaky, but your ARMS were streaky.
Harling: And we used the same products on each.
Haley: Which meant that we didn’t even have a single nice thing to say about any of the products. And since we had no interest in putting up a story where we just shit-talked a bunch of tanning products, we were at a bit of a standstill. And meanwhile we both were dying to exfoliate, because even though we DID look tan, and the streakiness wasn’t that obvious, it just didn’t feel right. Also you had a natural tan under the fake one, which I found hilarious.
Harling: So upsetting to paint over that with fraud juice.
Haley: We decided not to do anything for a day. And the next day. And by day 3 (!) I was like, “Wait, Harling, I kind of like my tan?”
Harling: And I was admiring it right when you admitted that. It looked so nice peeking out of your white button-down.
Haley: After allllllll my overtures about being too mature for a fake tan!!!! Even Avi copped to liking it, which I took as meaningful because he never understands my obsession with being tan (he’s Indian), and thinks I should just love myself.
Harling: The nerve.
Haley: Hahaha. So anyway, I believe my change of heart was a result of a lot of it coming off in the shower.
Harling: The rodeo residue, yes. That helped mine, too. I used intense scrubbing gloves to help smooth things out, so I no longer had an obvious demarcation on my neck where I clearly forgot to swipe the product. Very embarrassing. I think I would have liked my day 3 tan as well if I wasn’t comparing it to the actual natural tan I had earlier in the week.
Haley: I scrubbed vigorously, too! So it started looking more natural. And then I kept forgetting I’d used fake tanner and seeing myself for a second in the mirror and thinking, “Wow, I’m looking so tan! All that tennis!” And then I would remember I was a fraud. But the point remains: I don’t think it was worth the effort.
Harling: Do you think liking self-tanner/being comfortable wearing it/not feeling self-conscious a.k.a. fraudulent is an age thing or a personality thing or both? In other words, is the tendency to overthink the enemy of a relaxed self-tanner experience?
Haley: It’s funny you mention that, because one of my most visceral self-tanner memories isn’t even my own: It was this suuuuper old shitty video of Cat Marnell applying self-tanner in a messy apartment. Did you ever see this?? [Ed note: I can’t find it otherwise I would link!]
Harling: Yes!!!
Haley: Omg. Remember how she was so haphazard?! Cat is the quintessential self-tanner addict. And I’m positive she still uses it. Not even because I actually am but because I don’t want to imagine she’s not.
Harling: She’s also not the type of person who would care one iota about a streak or two.
Haley: Yes. Her whole thing was not giving a shit! She was like, “Stop worrying about it. Seriously. Just swipe it on! I do it twice in a row!”
Harling: Lol. When you think about it, getting anxious about self-tanner results is an even more absurd equivalent of getting anxious about a haircut. Neither are permanent! But ESPECIALLY the tanner. It’s so inconsequential.
Haley: But this isn’t really making me change my mind about self-tanner! Is it for you?
Harling: Nah. I’m just being a devil’s advocate. A tanvocate.
Haley: You would. Maybe the upshot is self-tanner is not inherently good or bad, and if it it’s worth the effort for you, GO FORTH and own the streaks! And if it’s not, revel in the simplicity of wearing your natural skin tone. This isn’t unlike my revelation with quitting makeup, because outgrowing self-tanner has made me more accepting of my paleness.
Harling: And it is for SURE a healthier alternative to baking in the sun, if a tan is what you’re after.
Haley: That is a good point we should have brought up earlier! But I’m still secretly into an organic I’ve-been-outside-because-it’s-nice tan. Not the frying-by-a-pool kind, just the I’ve-gotten-into-gardening kind. Paired with some menocore. (Maybe I haven’t accepted my paleness?)
Harling: Me too. I love looking healthy/glowing in the summertime. To achieve this in a safe way, I’ll occasionally allow myself 20 minutes of unobstructed vitamin D time before putting on sunscreen.
Haley: So hedonistic of you.
Harling: I’m not a doctor, though! Consult ur derms, people! I’ve just found this to be a way of getting a teeny bit of sun without getting burnt. Personally.
Haley: Yes, and I support you. So anyway, in case it wasn’t clear, we decided to kill the self-tanner review story and run this instead.
Harling: Indeed! And we would loooooOoooVE to hear your thoughts (and by your I mean the royal you, i.e. anyone who is reading this) on self-tanner, Cat Marnell’s devil-may-care application style, and/or getting into gardening.
The post Haley and Harling Discuss Their Failed Self-Tanning Experiment appeared first on Man Repeller.
July 22, 2019
Tapping, Not Scrolling: Your Monday Instagram News Digest
Happy Monday my sweet sun-soaked petunias! I hope your July weekend was filled with a variety of fresh fruit and unconventional ways to stay cool (like Harling’s hack of putting pajamas in the freezer before bed). Alternatively, I hope you put your feet in some grass.
As for me, I went to the beach, burned (badly), and disconnected for the first time all summer. Of course, as Man Repeller’s social media manager for whom Instagram is a morning alarm and a bedtime routine, my definition of disconnecting may be different than yours. Because I still found time for a poolside Instagram dive, it just wasn’t, well, work-focused. And, wow, so fruitful. Here are a few things that elicited thoughtful taps instead of idle scrolls in my algorithm:
1. Welcome to Slime Town
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A post shared by aleia (@aleia) on Jul 21, 2019 at 9:09am PDT
Tapping through friend and contributor Ansley Morgan’s Instagram stories, I stopped dead on this tableau of snails on a date, which prompted me into a scroll-hole of @aleia, account of the artist and photog Aleia Murawski, who creates tiny worlds occupied by snails, like this honeymoon suite with waffle beds, a naughty night in the making, and this, which I couldn’t add to my saved folder fast enough.
2. Avant-Garde Bridal: The Best Thing Since Sliced (Grain-Free) Bread
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@cfda @voguemagazine Fashion Fund DAY 1 #DanielleFrankel
A post shared by Danielle Frankel (@daniellefrankelstudio) on Jul 17, 2019 at 9:36am PDT
From Eva Chen’s recent IG stories as acting judge of the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, I stopped on an image of Danielle Frankel Studio’s avant-garde wedding designs which led me here and here (!!!) and here. Cool bridal is it. If I ever do get married, or if I get around to the blowout 35th birthday party I have planned in my head, I will be wearing that white lace pantsuit. Mark my words.
3. Drool on My Screen Protector: A Memoir
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A post shared by rachel (@rachelaliceroddy) on Jul 20, 2019 at 3:37am PDT
I routinely look at Rachel Alice Roddy’s Instagram. She uses some of the most sumptuous language to talk about food, but especially rich, authentic Italian dishes (she is a food columnist for The Guardian living in Roma, after all). This weekend she dropped her recipe for fresh capers, which led me to her recipe for red pepper, potato and tomato soup. Hot take, summer soup is where it’s at.
I’ll also be thinking about this run-on sentence: “While frying for @guardianfeast I fried for us too, polpettine di sarde, sardine balls, which for some reason makes me giggle, 700 g fresh sardine boned and mashed (sardines are plentiful here but could be replaced by any oily fish) great handful of dry breadcrumbs, salted ricotta (just a bit, as much for the salt as the cheese) pine nuts, uvetta di passa nera (currants) rolled into balls Fried in olive oil and eaten while hot hot hot gawd damn.”
4. All Aboard the Hanx Train
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Tom Hanks stars as Mister Rogers in the upcoming film alongside Matthew Rhys, Susan Kelechi Watson, and Tammy Blanchard. Click the link in our bio to watch the trailer now. 
The Best Denim Shorts, Starting at $20
And yet! They are elusive. When it comes to finding the right pair for yourself, there are so many ways they can go wrong: too-slim leg openings can choke the thighs; the wrong fit can ride up in the worst places; pockets that are too wide or too narrow may do the opposite of justice to your butt. (Justice: We demand it!) The jorts shopping has gotten so bad at times that I even eliminated them from my own wardrobe, until I finally found this pair of vintage ones from Etsy which changed my approach—and also birthed this story. After doing a bunch of denim shorts research for myself and others, I’m ready to share my findings with the world.
Here are a few critical things I look for:
-A tiny flare in the leg opening
-A higher waist, but not too tight, to keep them from riding up
-A tiny bit of stretch or really soft, well-worn denim
-A cut that is a bit higher in the back, so they don’t gap
Please find the spoils of my research below. I’ve called out the sizing options really clearly to make shopping easier for you—both in straight-sized brands (some of which also have great options in their extended sizing) and in plus-sized brands that have incredible options too. And because I am so dedicated to the shorts-searching cause, please feel free to comment below if any questions about sizing or fit remain!
Classic Cut-off
“The greatest classic cut-off of all time” is what most people request. I’ve found that the below shorts universally look really good (and I’ve called in nearly every one of these pairs for Man Repeller shoots over the last few years).
size 23-32
size 23-32
size 24-30
size 23-31
size 22-32
See All 5
size 00-24
size 00-24
size 00-28
size 20-28
size 16-30
See All 5
Denim Trouser Short
I looooove a trouser short in any material, and I almost feel like I’m cheating with these denim trouser shorts. I mainly love them because they’re the easiest to dress up. (Wear them with a cami and kitten heel mules and you’re set for a summer din!)
size 0-8
size 0-14
size 0-12
size XXS-M
size 36-42
See All 5
size 00-28
size XS-XL
size 4-18
See All 3
Long Denim Shorts
Board shorts are one of my raisons d’etre in the summer, and these capture that chill, beachy vibe, but with denim. Another bonus: You’re showing less skin, which means you’ve got less square footage to shave, if you’re into that!
size 23-31
size 23-32
size 23-30
size 24-32
size 24-32
See All 5
size S-XL (men's)
size 00-24
size 10-22
size 24-28
size 24-34
See All 5
Vintage Denim Shorts
This category may be my favorite of all, because their already-storied life on earth has caused the denim to become naturally worn and soft. Hot tip: When shopping on Etsy, you can send sellers your actual measurements so they can make sure they fit exactly how you want them to fit. These picks are actually a gold mine, so be careful, breathe deep, and jump on these before the next Thomas the Tank Engine fanatic does.
size 00-20
size 0-4X
size M
size 0-4X
size 24-32
size XS-L
size 8-26
size 23-3XSee All 8
I said it earlier and I’ll say it again: Got questions? Meet me in the comments!
Feature photos via Reformation.
The post The Best Denim Shorts, Starting at $20 appeared first on Man Repeller.
My Little Trick for Reading More Books
Last spring, I began a search for a system to kick my lackluster reading habits into high gear.
On a sleepy walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, my friend Haley and I were discussing our mutual longing for better reading hygiene. I could only name a few books I had read the year before (Arbitrary Stupid Goal and Mumbai New York Scranton by Tamara Shopsin were two, and frankly would be worth reading instead of a year’s worth of humdrum books), but there were hundreds I wanted to crack open, and I would never touch most of them at the rate I was going.
Haley and I volleyed various tactics for cultivating a habitual reading practice back and forth. Inevitably, the dreaded book club suggestion came up. There is a time and place for a book club, but it’s not in the delicate revving-up stage of resetting reading routines. Racking my mind, I recalled a method I’d seen Julie Kosin of Harper’s Bazaar employ, the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge. Haley and I mulled it over—maybe it could work. But we deemed a book per week unrealistic in the face of our schedules, and settled on 26 books over the course of a year instead (one book/every two weeks was a better options for the measured and moderate among us, we figured). We then sent the following formatted Google Sheet to a dozen close friends, inviting them to participate and track with us:
It’s not a Google doc that will make your skin better, though I also can’t guarantee that it won’t.As a courtesy to people joining in, I crowdsourced 75 book recommendations and left them in a lone tab for anyone who might find themselves left in an uninspired literary lurch. On the evening of May 15, 2018, six of us started tracking. And a year later, on the evening of May 15, 2019—one hour before midnight—I finished my 26th book (The Women by Hilton Als). Twenty-six books might be small potatoes to some (imagine a reading strategy broken down by an employee of Simon & Schuster), but it was a hell of an improvement over the four books I’d meandered through the previous year.
The remedial book club approach worked like a charm: It held me accountable in some sort of public sphere, while also giving me a lens into various friends’ content mixes. Commenting within Google Sheets gave us the ability to ask each other questions about certain titles and compare notes—especially helpful as the sheet’s inhabitants spanned from New York to Washington D.C. to San Francisco. Motivated by the promise of an enticing queue, I use the “want to read” button on Apple Books’ app (automatically installed on the iPhone) to bookmark titles that float by my radar for future reference.
I read before bed, on the subway, in waiting areas, and on long lines—anywhere that may tempt me to mindlessly prune my phone for material. I sat in the wrong office for a TSA precheck appointment for 45 minutes last January because I was so rapt with my book, Taking Risks: A Jewish Youth in the Soviet Partisans and His Unlikely Life in California. I stayed up way too late on a work night swallowing Nadja Spiegelman’s I’m Supposed To Protect You From All This whole, and I identified my most dire flaws in Dreyer’s English on the top deck of the East River Ferry. I made the mistake of bringing Ottessa Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation along as a poolside read: I wish I could master the art of designating certain books for vacations, based foremost on setting or tone, like a literary sommelier.
Reading across a matrix of genres and subjects sustained my interest, too: I jumped around from Shoe Dog, the memoir by Nike founder Phil Knight and new favorite novels like Early Work by Andrew Martin and the haunting Loner by Teddy Wayne, to Tina Brown’s Vanity Fair Diaries and essays on craft in Draft No. 4 by John McPhee.
I had a watershed moment of sorts while devouring Final Cut by Steven Bach, swept up in the non-fiction drama behind the production of the 1980 film Heaven’s Gate, made well before I was born. While many vocal readers are touching on the newest releases in the hype cycle, I found reading a story about an event that occurred completely independent of my existence as liberating as it was effective in sloughing a layer of solipsism off of my reading goggles. (From a contrarian point of view, this particular summer presents a convincing counterpoint, as my dance card fills up with a smattering of much-anticipated new titles like Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror, Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s Fleishman Is In Trouble, and Emily Nussbaum’s I Like To Watch.)
See All 14
I found that the practice of steady reading is a salve for our 21st century woes: It functions as the antidote to blue light, which finds me everywhere I turn aside from the spine of a bound book, and reading before bed is like drinking sleep serum, causing me to sleep noticeably better than the nights I stare into the pixels on my screen.
I don’t mean to insinuate that in order to read with any regularity, you should take a Zuckerbergian or Dorseyian approach and treat it as a productivity hack. The intended outcome of reading for pleasure is in many ways the opposite of self-optimization: getting engrossed in a novel is a small rebellion against the digital pace outside its pages. The shared spreadsheet we landed on is like a better, lower-tech Facebook, a connective tissue for friends on both coasts that keeps the momentum of our common resolution going.
Update: Want to get in on a 26 in 52 Google Sheet? We’ve created one for Team MR and…for YOU. It’s right here, ready for you to join — just create your own tab and copy over the template. See you in there!
Feature photo by Edith Young.
The post My Little Trick for Reading More Books appeared first on Man Repeller.
I Taste-Tested 6 Oat Milks and There Was a Clear Winner
1. Minor Figures Oat Milk
First of all, I have to give this brand points for the extremely endearing packaging, which features a woman dressed as a bird drinking a cappuccino (+2). Apparently her name is Penelope (+1). I wish it was a teeny bit sweeter and a teeny bit thicker because I like my oat milks to taste like milkshakes (-2), but the overall flavor was pleasantly reminiscent of the bottom of a cereal bowl (+1). I would imagine it tastes even better heated up in a latte or cappuccino, seeing as it was formulated by baristas for this exact purpose, but I had to stick to the straight formula for the purposes of this experiment.
Final score: 3
2. Oatly! Oat Milk
Pleasantly thick (+1). SUPER creamy (+3). Just the right amount of sweet (+1). I would compare the consistency of Oatly less to the bottom of a cereal bowl and more to a scoop of vanilla ice cream that has melted, which is why it works so well in caffeinated drinks. It’s like a non-dairy version of half and half. Kudos to Oatly for having some of the weirdest, most entertaining packaging in the game (+1). I particularly enjoy the fact that pretty much all of their product copy involves a run-on sentence.
Final score: 6
3. Pacific Oat Milk
Hmm. I did not like this one. I wanted to like it, just like I wanted to like beets when I recently tried them for the umpteenth time in my adult life, but alas, in both cases, I would simply prefer to be consuming something else. Pacific oat milk is extremely liquid-y, which makes me think it would detract from a caffeinated drink instead of enhance it (-1). It’s also very sweet. Too sweet (-2). I was pretty surprised when I checked the list of ingredients and found them to be pretty much identical to that of the other oat milks I had sampled. There was no added sugar. Not even honey! A true mystery, especially because the nutritional information indicates that a cup of Pacific oat milk has more than twice the amount of sugar (19 grams) than most of the other oat milks. I’ll throw it a point for being the only organic option, though (+1).
Final score: -2
4. Happy Planet Oat Milk
This one was just the right amount of sweet (+1). Like a work friend who will pick kale out of your teeth with her own fingernail but will mock you for your admittedly questionable taste in music. It did, however have a slightly musky aftertaste, which is common to a lot of non-dairy milks, which isn’t the end of the world, but not my fave if I’m being picky (-1). Overall the taste and lighter consistency actually reminded me of macadamia milk, which I tried once when my neighborhood café was out of oat milk, but slightly creamier (+1) and more refreshing (+1).
Final score: 2
5. Silk “Oat Yeah” Oat Milk
Not super sweet, but also not completely devoid of that tell-tale oat-y taste. It has a nice, balanced flavor profile (+1), and is pretty creamy (+1). The taste was similar to that of Silk’s soy milk, and had the kind of consistency I actually enjoyed drinking straight from a glass. Bonus point for a funny name (+1), but I’m inclined to deduct one given that its ingredient list included the most additives of any I tried (-1).
Total score: 2
6. Califia Farms Oat Milk
Quite creamy this one is, my lieges (+2). Don’t ask me why I decided to write this sentence like I’m Yoda or why I’m now referring to you as a feudal superior, because the boring answer is simply that it just felt right. Am I high on too much oat milk? I wouldn’t put it past me. I would, however, endorse the subtle sweetness of Califia’s oat milk before a jury of my peers (+1), which is especially notable since it has the least sugar of any that I tried (+2). I do wish it was a little thicker, but only for the purposes of my ideal hot latte (-1).
Total score: 4
I was very willing to cede my oat milk loyalties to another brand besides Oatly as a result of this experiment but, I cannot lie. It’s still my favorite. That being said, if you prefer a slightly less milkshake-y vibe in your morning coffee, I would heartily recommend Califia. If you like macadamia milk, I think you’d really like Happy Planet’s oat milk. Ditto for Silk’s “Oat Yeah” if you’re a soy lover. Opt for Minor Figures if you’ve always wanted to befriend a woman named Penelope dressed as a bird. Slurp up some Pacific if you have a sweet tooth that won’t quit. There’s truly an oat milk for everyone, and that concludes my sermon for today.
Photos by .
The post I Taste-Tested 6 Oat Milks and There Was a Clear Winner appeared first on Man Repeller.
July 19, 2019
Could This Be the Secret to Shia LaBeouf’s Appeal?
This isn’t just another article about Shia Laboeuf’s outfits. I mean, they are good, and they have been good for quite a while—a nuanced coalescence of scum-bro, anarchist, and art boi. He always looks like he may have just left one or more of the below:
His bed
The gym
An Into The Wild-esque nomadic journey
The skate park
A REALLY abstract art gallery opening
A mommy-and-me class
Forever 21
His college dorm, late for the 8 a.m. class
Dinner with your parents
Painting houses
For all these ensembles and more, Shia’s been lauded as the “king of fashion”, a style icon in Uggs, a normcore fashion god, and I agree. (If it is not now abundantly clear, I am a devotee and deep-sea diver of the Instagram account @shiasoutfits.) I love the way he surprises and delights within the parameters of looking like an extremely regular dude. But like I said, this isn’t just about the outfits. Because his style may serve as the perfect corner piece, but it is not the whole puzzle—and it is the whole puzzle that has inspired me to plaster photos of him with little decoupage hearts all over my Man Repeller locker. (Not actually, but the art project cometh.)
View this post on Instagram
Mother’s Day #shialabeouf #shiasoutfits
A post shared by Shia’s Outfits (@shiasoutfits) on May 13, 2018 at 11:45am PDT
You’ve probably heard at least some of his backstory: Shia entered the Hollywood scene at age 10 and his foray into show business served as a retreat from a hostile family environment. Understanding that in the context of his breakout role, Louis in Disney’s Even Stevens, whom I loved deeply, makes sense. Cue humor—the balm for trauma and pain.
When he almost-but-not-quite rose to Blockbuster B-list elitedom, I felt delighted that schmaltzy Louis Stevens could make it big. And when he suffered a child-star fall from grace culminating in an arrest for public drunkenness and court-ordered rehab (and then spent good time atoning for it), I felt a maternal sympathy. And when he threw himself into performance art pieces like the viral #JustDoIt video, or #TouchMySoul, where he invited people to phone in to an open call line with heart-wrenching stories whilst live-streaming and live-transcribing every moment, I thought, What’s this really all about Shia? before realizing that his urgent and sometimes conflicting searches for meaning and comfort and art (and, of course, a paycheck) within the cookie-cutter Hollywood system directly connects to the way he approaches his style, too. And then I imagined our theoretical wedding wearing matching pantsuits and inviting only the people we met during a 24-hour period bar-hopping in Oklahoma City.
I think often (a lot, I mean) about one particular petal pink women’s fleece sweatshirt, $29.99 from H&M, with the words “Maybe Baby” emblazoned across it that he’s been spotted wearing around not only to pick up his mom from the airport but to movie premieres. He pairs it with all the trappings of normcore dude style—dirty golden geese, stretch jeans, mismatched socks, a dad hat, and wired earbuds (because AirPods? Not for Shia.) A move that crystallizes why Shia is so consistently compelling to me, stylistically and otherwise: No matter how normie he goes, an urgent sense of chaos persists.
And I think… I am also… like that?
View this post on Instagram
Mom knows best and is a true style icon #shialabeouf #shiasoutfits #mom
A post shared by Shia’s Outfits (@shiasoutfits) on Mar 13, 2019 at 7:59am PDT
Shia isn’t always the most sympathetic figure, but I find his attempts to do better and be better and self-actualize (even to sometimes middling results) to be endearing and relatable. His style just happens to be a byproduct of his extremely unique existence. For all things combined, I think he deserves the strange little corner he’s carved out in pop culture.
So, do I love when he pulls his sweatpants three inches above his belly button and tosses on an old pair of Uggs, leaving large swathes of ankle exposed? Yes. Do I exult in a hot pink tights worn with an army backpack and Kinks tee? Yes. Is this outfit something I believe to be revolutionarily good and replicable? Yes, yes, yes. To me, Shia is even more than his top-tier anarchist-scum-bro-art-boi style. He’s a just a guy who’s trying to do the right thing in both style and life, but is sometimes fantastically bungling it or being just plain weird about it 75% of the time. But he’s always, ALWAYS willing to try again.
For that, Je t’aime, Shia.
Feature photo by BG017/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images.
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