Leandra Medine's Blog, page 96

What If Your Commuter Bag Was Also Just a Great Bag?

Other than my underwear, there are few things that I’m sure to have on my body every day. I rotate my shoes most of the time. My sunglasses switch around. My jewelry likes to take breaks, too. But my bag? I lug the exact same one around every single day. It’s pretty simple: When you find something utilitarian that pleases your eye and does what you need it to do, there’s no need to change it.

I’d go so far as to say the following: The same bag every day is cool! As long as you like it! I’m a true commuter who uses every damn form of transportation (subway, bus, uber, my own two feet, etc.) and I think of my commuter bag as a tool to get me to and from work with as much ease as possible. However! I’m not willing to compromise the overall look. Call me vain, but that’s how I am. (And vanity is last month‘s theme anyway). Luckily, there are plenty of bags that can do both—and I’ve compiled them below. In neat little categories, since organization is part of the deal here.

Shoulder & Tote Bags

A shoulder bag is the most frequently used style of commuter bag here at Man Repeller. They’re maneuverable on crowded subway cars and it’s easy to grab things out of them. I’ve personally used this MZ Wallace bag for both commuting and photo-shoot schlepping and I love it because 1.) It doesn’t slip off the shoulder and 2.) The bag itself is super light, so it doesn’t add any additional weight. I recently (by recently, I mean just this morning) saw this Clare V carryall at an appointment. It felt very sturdy and looks so cool. For practical, durable bags, I love this one from Madewell, this one from Everlane or this one from Cuyana (the latter of which has a zipper on the top for extra security). And look at this W Concept gold mine! How sweet and summery is this one from Inne Studios or this awesome accordion from Joseph & Stacey? I’d even use this one as a purse, tbh.

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Backpacks

I personally haven’t used a backpack since elementary school, but I’m reconsidering it because sometimes my back hurts so much I start to feel the pain in my feet. (Is that normal?) I really love this one‘s creamy vanilla bean color and would 100% wear it every day. This one is perfect if you’re a laptop-lugger (and comes in a really cool mod print). This is probably the most professional minimal backpack and word on the street is that it’s really sturdy and has tons of room. If you still want to make a statement and have some fun with your backpack, might I suggest this Yves Klein Blue quilted one? It’s a version of the shoulder bag I swear by.

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Crossbody & Messenger Bags

The crossbody and the messenger make the biggest statement of all the commuter bags. So, naturally, as soon as I start searching, the mind reels. I love, love, love this nylon Prada messenger from The RealReal. But this convertible one may be the most awesome—it can be a messenger bag or a backpack. When I found this one, I immediately thought of an architect toting around their blueprints. (Maybe it’s just the model’s glasses, but it happens to be the perfect size for a small portfolio.) I think this one is ideal if you want to look studious but not tenured. And who else wants this two-tone style just because it’ll look great with that Canadian Tuxedo ensemble you sometimes sport?

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Packable Bags

There are some days when I don’t leave the house with much but am suspicious that my circumstances will change by the day’s end. Things come up! You grocery shop on your way home. You buy a change of pants because the ones you wore to work got too tight midday. You decide to get a pedicure after work and need a place to tuck the boots you’d been wearing. Rather than grabbing a plastic bag from the bodega, stock one of these packable bags in your purse. I always have one from the brand Baggu with me. This way, I’m never unprepared when there’s something new for me to schlep—might that be bananas, oat milk, or the small set of speakers a coworker no longer wants

All the Street Style You Could Want Courtesy of MR X Klarna’s Summer Soirée

In partnership with Klarna. 

Even though I am a noted summer hater, even I can’t resist the chic allure of a rooftop party. So when Man Repeller had the opportunity to throw an ab fab summer soirée with Klarna on the SHOWFIELDS rooftop, I got preternaturally excited. We sent out the call to the most fun, most stylish, most party-hardest community members (aka all of u) and boy oh boy did the guests show out.

But the Klarna rooftop party wasn’t your average rooftop party — it was a gathering of “summer style personas.” We asked everyone to come in their outfit that most personified who they were trying to be this summer. For instance, Matt Little’s summer persona is “overly tan cocktail enthusiast sitting at the community pool,” so Crystal built a foam pool on a luscious astroturf lawn that was perfect for selfies. My persona is middle-aged black valley/precocious Instagram toddler, so there was a pink fur-covered table designed specifically for rosé pong. The Bumbys were on hand to “give a fair and honest appraisal” of everyone’s persona, and they were as gentle as they were accurate.

While roaming the party like an old-school society gossip columnist, I cornered a few folks to ask about their personas. They ranged from the reinterpreted icons (like 2000s era rap-superstars and ’90s era dreamgirls updated for today), to living mood boards (think “elevated peasant”), to the purely functional (aka looking good in the heat). It was a true feast for the eyes, with some of the best street style (roof style?) fashion I’ve seen in some time.

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One floor below the most happening fake pool in town, the MR X Klarna shop was ready and open for business. Crystal, Eliz and Harling created their own individual capsule collections of their summer personas from Klarna’s collection of merchants (all of whom will let you buy now, pay later). Along with the shoppable collections (more on that SOON), a carnival claw full of Repeller and SHOWFIELDS goodies was propped up in the corner ready to fill folks’ lives with carnival-style fun. The best part of all? It was actually designed to let people win. How novel!

It was a full-on summer dream come true. Everyone was a little sticky, a little sultry and a whole lot of fun. But listen, you’re not here for me, you’re here for the outfits! Take a look and then drop your summer style persona in the comments.

Be sure to stop by the Man Repeller x Klarna pop-up at SHOWFIELDS on 11 Bond Street. It’ll be shoppable all summer!

Photos by Ken Castaneda. 

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Proof the Fleabag Jumpsuit Deserves Its Own Award (and 8 More Instagram Happenings of Note)

If you include Friday, according to Screen Time, I spent over five hours on Instagram this weekend. Considering the weather (mid-80s, sunny), my schedule (free as a bird), and my location (New York City), this figure is jarring. But—to employ one of the internet’s only remaining defenses—I did learn some stuff. And now, in lieu of spending, say, five hours in Central Park, I present you with the below: 10 things that made the scrolling worth it.

1. This photo of Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Jonathan Van Ness

Have you heard of the Television Critics Association Awards? I had not but I’m a new/ardent fan for three reasons: 1. They presented Phoebe Waller-Bridge with an award for Individual Achievement in Comedy last night, 2. the two journalists who introduced her were wearing The Jumpsuit (which, btw, is $45), and 3. this photo of a beautiful budding friendship (JVN also won for Queer Eye):

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We won a gorgeous TCA last night @queereye & Omfg I love @bbcfleabag

Unconventional Life Hack: Stop Cancelling Plans

Welcome to Unconventional Life Hacks, a regular feature wherein we propose one surprising, unlikely, or absurd idea that just might radically change your approach to life. (Or at least make you *consider* doing so.)

I love making plans. It’s passively productive, like writing a to-do list. I love executing them, too. The moment I see a familiar face or hug someone hello or find myself three hours into a dinner that was supposed to be a drink, I feel reborn—as if social connection has lulled me out of the cozy coffin of my mind to remind me that life can be kind of nice. And the feeling I get once it’s all over, free once again to revel in my earned solitude, might be the best part of all.

But this isn’t a soliloquy on my passion for socializing. In fact, my deeper, more urgent truth is that the whole thing mostly makes me feel dread. Dread despite reason; dread despite evidence! The dread of anticipation. The horrible, cavernous window between planning and execution during which I know the socializing is coming and simply wish it were not. It is this precise angst that urges me to cancel (although I rarely do), or pray for a blame-free cancellation (what’s better?), almost every time. This dread threatens my social life like a psychopathic little troll.

“What is that?” I recently asked a friend over dinner.

“It’s called social anxiety,” he said.

“Oh. Right.”

Maybe I don’t dread every plan—Saturday plans, for instance, are typically safe, as are barbecues and birthdays, as a rule—but most solicit a little something. And almost none of them ultimately deserve it. This inherent contradiction came into starker relief recently, when my boyfriend moved in with me and became an objective witness to My Process, which entails me whining about plans non-stop and then returning home after having them and admitting, tail between my legs, that I’m so glad I went. It’s impossible to ignore this kind of emotional whiplash. It’s very toddler-esque.

But it’s also made me realize I’m not as introverted as The Memes would have me believe. Clearly socializing can give me energy—most of the time, I dread it for a different reason. An anxiety reason. It’s easy to misdiagnose though, because something curious has happened in the cultural consciousness over the past five years: We’ve synonymized the need to recharge with low-grade social anxiety. In the eyes of the anti-social internet, to dread a social plan is to be introverted, and therefore to cancel it is to accept yourself. Ipso facto, bailing is a form of self-care. And cancelled plans are the most potent wellness supplement on the market.

Introversion and social anxiety are very different beasts, though, aren’t they? They mean different things, and require different outcomes. Which is to say, no one answer will be right for everyone. But for me, the most effective path to social fulfillment is simple: Stop cancelling plans. It pains me to say it, because there is almost nothing I love more. (As I type this, I have dinner plans in an hour that I’m almost positive are not going to happen, and I’m not even mad about it.) We’re in the golden age of bailing—of asking everyone in our social lives, including ourselves, to forgive flakiness full-stop.

But I’m beginning to doubt the usefulness of indulging these kinds of whim—the moments of laziness, the whiffs of anxiety, the ease of Netflix—for the sake of avoiding the emotional and practical overhead of pursuing human connection. I know cancelling is nirvana, but too much of it is isolation. When I refuse to cancel plans, my friendships are stronger for it, I always get something out of it (which is more than nothing), and I’m never not reminded why I made them in the first place. We’ve done a lot of legwork to normalize bailing, but maybe we just need to be more judicious with when and how often we make plans, and then actually, for the love of our toothless anxieties, actually fucking keep them.

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Harling’s Guide to Buying Vintage Furniture

When I first started thinking about furnishing my new apartment, I felt like a snail navigating a foam pit–overwhelmed, out of my depth, and well aware that my particular set of skills was not conducive to the mission. Give me a naked body and I will give you a litany of ideas for how and where to clothe it. Give me a naked apartment and I will give you a nervous grin.

But after coexisting with roommates and deteriorating IKEA furniture for four years, I was ready for the challenge of approaching home decor in a more thoughtful way when I signed my own lease in May. Thoughtful, to me, meant mostly vintage items and investing slightly more with the intention of holding onto things for years to come. I’ve spent the past three months elbows-deep in this pursuit, and I’ve learned a lot along the way. Below are my most important takeaways from the experience.

1. Bookmark inspiration

Because I’d never thoughtfully decorated an apartment before, I didn’t have a clue what my interiors style even was. I decided to try piecing that puzzle together by diligently following home inspiration, design, and vintage resale accounts on Instagram and bookmarking stuff that appealed to me, an exercise that proved to be very helpful. Some of my favorite follows include: @porterjamesny, @kathryn_bentley_, @homeunion, @pearly_interiors, @collectoshop, @mdfg.nyc, @matildagoad, @rebeccathandi, @ah_berlin, @ponceberga, @lonnymag, @studioives, @claudehome, and @johnslivingroom.

2, Develop a running list of keywords

The more inspiration you gather, and the clearer your preferences become, the more data you’ll have about what specific time periods, silhouettes, materials, and designers fit into the makeup of your home aesthetic. These will eventually serve as the keywords you use to search for pieces on resale websites like Chairish, Etsy, eBay, and Craigslist, and even for conducting hashtag searches on Instagram. I’ve had great luck searching “mid century modern,” “burl wood,”  “Vladimir Kagan,” “Eames,” and “Bitossi” (vintage stuff from the latter three designers usually retails at a steep price, but searches will often turn up less expensive items that sellers tag accordingly because of their similar style or origin).

3. Ask for close-up photos and confirm everything works

Oftentimes the condition listed for vintage items will be somewhat vague (what does “good” really mean!?). So before buying previously used items, make sure to ask for closeup photos of any flaws, scratches, or blemishes, and double check that all the important stuff is in working order. This is especially important when ordering a piece with drawers, as these don’t always open and close fluidly on older furniture. In addition to confirming that they do, you can (and should!) ask if the drawers are dovetailed (if they are, it means the piece is especially well-made). Inquiring about possible flaws is not only helpful for evaluating the item in question, but it’s also great leverage for potential negotiations, which brings me to my next point…

4. Always negotiate

Some websites, like Chairish and eBay, have built-in technology to facilitate price negotiation for vintage pieces (you can “make an offer” that is lower than the listed price). On sites like Etsy that deal in a lot of used pieces, you can message sellers privately and ask if the price is negotiable, which it almost always is. Sellers will also often accept even steeper discounts if you offer to pay in cash upon delivery.

5. Compare with modern replicas

Though I’ve made a big effort to buy mostly vintage for my apartment, I still think it’s worth comparing the prices of popular vintage pieces to those of modern replicas so you can weigh the pros and cons of investing in one over the other. The vintage versions often cost more but are of a higher quality, so you get what you pay for. Sometimes, however, the price differential is so significant that buying the modern replica with the understanding that it might not hold up as long is unequivocally the logical path forward. For example: I spent weeks researching vintage Eames fiberglass shell chairs to fulfill the fantasy of pairing them with my kitchen table, but ultimately the only ones that even came close to being within my budget were irreparably scratched and damaged. I ended up buying replicas from Wayfair for a fraction of the cost. They’re not well-made, but they achieve a similar visual effect that satisfies enough for now.

6. Budget time for shipping

Fashion commerce spoils us when it comes to shipping cost and duration. Unfortunately (albeit understandably, given the contents), shipping furniture can cost an arm and a leg and take weeks, sometimes even months. This revelation was perhaps the biggest pain point of my naïveté. I should have started ordering stuff WAY sooner! Because I didn’t, I’ve been lounging on temporary bean bags instead of a sofa or armchair. Said bean bags cost me a total of $40 for two of them, and they defy every scrap of my lingering 90s-era bean bag nostalgia by somehow being incredible uncomfortable, and not at all conducive to molding. Lesson learned. I’m so excited for the distant future in which I have a couch.

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What tips do you have from your own adventures in home furnishing? I’m eager to add to mine.

 

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Help, I’m Addicted to the Unfollower App

A couple of months ago, I decided to download the unfollower app and subsequently ruin my own life.

It all started with an unsuspecting conversation with a coworker, who was complaining about an old friend who had stopped following her out of the blue. A self-professed Instagram savant, I was confused by her insider info: How did she possess this knowledge? That’s when she unleashed upon me the secret of the Unfollower app: An app that tracks who doesn’t follow you back, who you choose not to follow back, and, perhaps most scandalously, who chooses to unfollow you. Overcome by curiosity and thrilled by the prospect of identifying all my nemeses, I quickly downloaded the app.

For the first week or so, it seemed like a welcome blessing. I’d refresh my profile every so often, just to track any unexpected changes. I could monitor the disloyal and reward the faithful—Gretchen from that Canadian camp in summer ‘05 decided to jump ship? Good riddance! I’d hit her with an immediate unfollow. Cousin Tara’s new boyfriend followed me back, despite only meeting me once over drunk kebabs? I’d be sure to throw his latest post a “like.” I found the app to be amusing, another frivolous way of passing time, if not a meaningless exertion of energy, no different from many other social media platforms.

Still, engaging with the unfollower app requires something that feels distinctly un-chill. Which is why I was surprised to learn my friend Ariel, whose laissez faire attitude to Instagram I’ve always admired, was an active user. “I use the unfollower app as a way of filtering the people I follow, ideally those I don’t care to be following in the first place but still feel like I can’t unfollow,” Ariel explained to me.“If I find out someone [like that] unfollowed me, I immediately unfollow too. It’s a way of editing down the unwanted content I consume. Obviously, it goes both ways, and I get offended for a second when I find out someone unfollowed me first. But ultimately, I just like to know.”

Her explanation made perfect sense, but my experience with the app soon transformed into something much more. Like a toxic relationship, I began closely monitoring my follower count, obsessively refreshing the app every time I watched the number take a dip. I’d anxiously pour over the profile of whoever unfollowed me, scrutinizing their content, resenting them for opting out of my own. What had I done to deserve this treatment? I’d wonder, rolling my eyes at my new sworn enemy’s fifth picture of her dog. Why does this stranger hate me?

“The unfollower app is disorienting because you aren’t given a reason why they unfollowed you,” Bea, 18, told me over Instagram DM. “The feeling it gives you is similar to when someone you know ignores you when you smile at them in passing.”

After a few weeks with the app, I realized my curiosity hadn’t just devolved into paranoia, it had become a kind of narcissism. I was assuming everyone who chose to unfollow me held a ruthless vendetta. And by dragging my followers into this egocentric point of view, I had inadvertently revealed my vainest tendency: assuming that everyone who affects me is acting with intention—as if I am the protagonist in everyone else’s life. But I can’t unpack this kind of egotism without talking about insecurity, for the two are innately linked, like symbiotic organisms using each other as a life force. When someone I admire follows me, for instance, it boosts my ego for the same reason an unfollow bruises it: Some part of me believes I’m only as valid as the attention I get.

What I find especially unsettling, about all of this, is how I still haven’t deleted the app, despite knowing how much it eats away at my self-esteem. Refreshing my unfollower count is like bad reality TV—it isn’t logical, but I can’t look away either. Which is why I want to ask: Have you ever used the unfollower app? Do you care if people unfollow you, or think twice before hitting the unfollow button yourself? Do you believe egotism and insecurity through the lens of social media are thick as thieves or two separate self-cons?

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Do Trends Matter Anymore? Leandra and Harling Discuss

How important are trends in 2019? Does the internet’s ability to take trends from micro to ubiquitous make them more powerful or less? Are we on the verge of entering a post-trend society, or is asking that a trend in and of itself? These are questions I’ve been mulling in general for a long time, but they began echoing even more loudly when I read an online article in which someone disparaged trends for their tendency to quash personal style. I parsed through the complexity of this topic in a recent Slack conversation with Leandra, which is recorded below. Meet us in the comment section for further unpacking. -Harling

Harling: Hi! I’ve recently been digesting a few weighty fashion questions and I’m curious to hear your thoughts.

Leandra: Hi! Tell me.

Harling: I just wrote a story about an aesthetic movement that is gaining ubiquity in fashion wherein everyone seems to have mutually agreed to dress like they just got back from a garden party in Ibiza by way of a music festival in Sedona, and the more I thought about it the more convinced I became that it is evidence we’re entering a true, post-trend era. Because it’s not a trend so much as it is an apotheosis of summer fashion, ripe for interpretation according to one’s personal style.

Simultaneous with writing this, I read a piece in which someone was quoted talking about how trends are the death of fashion, and that when something is trendy she is less inclined to desire to wear it. I respect this perspective! And I’ve certainly felt that way at times, especially at the very end of a trend’s cycle. But despite that, and despite feeling energized by the prospect of operating in a post-trend world, I’m also compelled to defend trends. Because even though they might now carry the same weight as they did in a pre-Instagram age, they still maintain the capacity to delight, and they still seem important in the grand scheme of how fashion operates. What do you think?

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My kind of outfit recipe: ketchup, mustard, and a human hot dog.

A post shared by Harling Ross (@harlingross) on Feb 26, 2019 at 7:06am PST

Leandra: I think that a) I had to google apotheosis because it’s one of those words I don’t actually understand, that b) garden party in Ibiza mixed with Sedona music festival is one of the strongest characterizations you’ve ever invented, that c) we’ve been conjecturing about a post-trend world since personal style became the most pervasive trend of the moment but that d) personal style is still very much a trend in its own right, so it is impossible to imagine a world where fashion exists without the concept of trends.

It’s like if there was no food in the food world. That’s actually a terrible comparison, I regret saying it !but! I agree with your impulse to defend trends–I’d defend them too. And we spoke about this briefly in our shopping email exchange but someone who says trends are the death of fashion is coming at them from the perspective of either setting or very early adopting said trends. They’re not the death of fashion at all–they’re actually kind of the life of it. I can elaborate further, but does this make sense to you? If it is true that fashion says “me too,” that is literally the definition of a trend that takes off, no?

Harling: It does make sense! I think that the definition of “trend” has been flattened to mean “EVERYONE is wearing this,” and in a way that’s true now, but it’s a recent development and it confuses the fact that, in the past, a trend cycle had so much more nuance. I was reading about Laver’s Law recently, which is the timeline that fashion historian James Laver invented in the 30s stipulating that before a trend is in fashion it’s “edgy,” once it is in fashion it’s “smart,” and TWENTY years later it becomes “ridiculous,” but now the ridiculousness arrives much sooner. And I think that’s what leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth, and gives trends a negative connotation even though they’re still performing the same function they were before, when it comes to informing how we think about fashion, which is why they’re definitely not obsolete.

Leandra: So, before a trend is in fashion it’s edgy because it’s only being exercised by conceivably “edgy” people, right? Once it’s actually in fashion, and worn en masse, it’s smart because we tell ourselves stories in order to live, but I would disagree that it’s ridiculous 20 years later–it’s more like nostalgic 20 years later; it’s ridiculous like five years later. When the proximity is still close enough that you are comfortable judging yourself for having participated. That said! I agree–it does arrive much sooner. The cycle is more like five months now, right? And there’s a direct correlation between how much sooner we experience peanut butter syndrome (too much too fast) and how much more we are exposed to visually through social media. If I spend enough time scrolling through the discover page on IG, trends that I genuinely love, that I believe to be mainstays of my personal style start to make me feel like a parody of myself.

Harling: Totally. That’s the thing about PB syndrome–it makes you forget how you originally saw the trend you genuinely love (or used to love), free from the noise of how other people see it. That process actually reminds me of what the internet has done to certain words or phrases: gaslighting, “mood,” content, toxic, etc. Their meaning carries less weight now, or rather, their meaning is attached to too many different things, you know?

Leandra: No I don’t, can you explain? Sounds interesting!

Harling: I think what i’m trying to say is the the internet has the power to dilute things, be they fashion trends or zeitgeist-y words. Once they are applied to too many different contexts, their original spark is dulled.

Leandra: They become misnomers. So that presents a good question–how are you defining trends, like what do you think that writer meant when she said “trends are the death of fashion”?

Harling: I see what she was saying in that trends feel more like gimmicks now–cheap thrills that boom and bust at a rapidly increasing pace and therefore don’t seem to carry as much importance (and can actually be damaging in the sense that they encourage ubiquity and quash individuality, to an extent). I guess my thesis (which I’m still processing) is that broader aesthetic movements, like menocore, or the aforementioned Ibiza/Sedona extravaganza, are the successor to trends in terms of what is actually shaping fashion in a broader, long-term sense, and those are slightly different from trends, though trends do play a role in them

Leandra: They’re more like sub-trends, right? Or they’ve been repackaged as like, “storytelling opportunities.”

Harling: Yes–that’s a good point. A big reason why trends live and die so quickly is because they become headlines, which robs them of the opportunity to be “discovered” by, let’s say, admiring someone’s outfit on the street.

Leandra: See, there’s a lucrative thesis. Trends as headlines. But still, I think that trends as headlines is a trend in and of itself! And that perhaps even the retreat to absolute minimalism, which is being heralded by houses like Khaite and Toteme and The Row and so forth, are a reactionary headline. I’m thinking, though–Abie’s grandma still asks me, every time a fashion week season rolls around, “What are trends on the runway?” And I always laugh because, “it’s not like that!” but really, it used to be: There were short skirts one season, long ones the next, there were dresses or big shouldered tops, and there are still these banner trends that pour out of seasons. But the outlets through which this information is disseminated are so much more vast. It used to be that you read Women’s Wear Daily to know what was happening on the runways in Paris, and that was bible and those were the trends and Doneger Group would roll those into a report et voila: a season is born.

Now, the playing field is so different, there is no end-all-be-all platform that commands The Rules. There are platforms with more credibility, right? The New York Times, Business of Fashion, etc. etc., but for the most part, we accrue all of this information–“fashion news”–through portals like Instagram and Twitter. And on those portals you get equanimity, right? A personal style blogger calling cow prints the trend of the season right next to Vogue saying the same about tiger print. And you believe who you trust more, and there is no regulation around the decision-making process of an individual on their trust allocation practices. So you end up with this weird jumble of information and misinformation and then someone says trends are the death of fashion, a think piece is born. You know?

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Here’s the TOTAL LOOK as they say in the pet food business

A post shared by Leandra (Medine) Cohen (@leandramcohen) on May 26, 2019 at 8:03pm PDT

Harling: I do know! And when you add to that morass the fact that brands pay people to promote their products on Instagram, or gift things in large volumes, or design pieces specifically so they will blow up on social media, it becomes even more confusing. At the end of the day, though, I don’t think of trends as “good” or “bad.” They’re just information!

Leandra: I like that framing, and think I agree. Although, I do think they’re good. They create a meritocracy that facilitates the growth and nurturing of genuine icons of fashion. Be they designers or personalities.

Harling: They also give fashion structure. Without them, it would just be applesauce. I’m trying to think about the right way to parse through the relationship between trends and sustainability though, which is a key factor in any discussion related to trends in 2019

because another reason trends get a bad rap is because they encourage consumption (i.e. you need to buy the new/popular thing to get the THRILL).

Leandra: Well, sustainability in and of itself is kind of a trend. It is, no doubt, also a path forward, but we have not collectively hit a stride yet by any means. Sustainable shopping is somewhat of an oxymoron because the truly sustainable option is not consuming at all, but austerity doesn’t work within the framework of this industry, and I don’t believe that we should try to make it work. There’s a comfortable spot between excess and abstinence, but the public opinion (or is it the vocal minority?) make getting there kind of tough. There are ramifications tethered to a refusal to consume, point blank. Just as there are any other sustainable effort (rental businesses, for example, are basically dry cleaning services also, and there are tons of implications around that water excretion). I may have taken us a little far off topic.

Harling: Yes, I’ve been thinking about what “sustainable shopping” and participating in trends means to me within the confines of acknowledging that the fashion industry is innately tied to consumption. For me it means only buying things (which can include trendy things) that are well-made, ideally with cotton or silk or wool or some other nice fabric that feels nice on my skin and stands the test of time, things that are made to last. Sometimes that means spending a little more, but generally it also means making fewer purchases overall. It’s also worth noting that trend participation can be as simple as reinterpreting things I already own.

So I don’t shun trends, but I do think about how I (literally) want to buy into them–if at all. And I appreciate them not just in terms of getting dressed but also in terms of thinking about what is currently making fashion tick. Also, for what it’s worth, I also really admire people who can take a trend and make it look totally unique on the basis of how they’ve chosen to style it (which is ultimately probably more challenging than styling something no one else has).

Leandra: Yeah, I define sustainable shopping as buying something you will genuinely be tempted to keep forever. It’s not necessarily anti-trend, though often it manifests that way–Hermes, Brunello Cucinelli, etc. Chanel is the rare trend generator that also creates the illusion of genuine investment shopping…do you think The Row will ever fall into this category? Celine and Bottega, those are trend brands to me. New Celine definitely but old Céline too. I wonder if I feel that way because of the quality of person who gravitates towards those brands! Especially relative to one who prefers, like, Loro Piana.

Harling: For sure, I think that speaks to what you were saying earlier about how trends nurture genuine icons of fashion. Because ultimately I’m far more interested in WHO is wearing the thing (and how they’re wearing it) than the thing itself. As for The Row’s capacity to generate trends, the Thilde pants are sparkling evidence.

Leandra: See, I actually think that one belongs to old Céline, because of the front zippers on leggings they made a season earlier than Thilde’s debut. TOOSHAY?

Harling: Tooshay. The power of trends strikes again.

Feature photo by Matthew Sperzel/Getty Images

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Microblading Is Worth It (and Other Times My Mother Was Correct)

I am, for the record, obsessed with my mother. But it wasn’t until recently that I actually started taking her advice. For years she extolled the virtues of eating healthy, but I decided to relish the freedom of my twenties by eating takeout. She always told me to stop seeing men who didn’t treat me well, but she was still my first phone call when I didn’t listen and my heart got broken anyway. She tried to teach me to knit, to play piano, to cook delicious and elaborate meals—all skills I now, of course, wish I possessed, especially as I sit down to eat another another sad plate of bland chicken and broccoli.

I realize now it takes a particularly prescient child to heed the advice of their mother, and, especially in my teens, prescient I was not. Which is why my life is now riddled with examples of when I should have listened to her. Below, five things she was right about.

The Jumpsuit I Never Should Have Bought

I realize that women of my size—all six feet of me—must have existed years ago. And yet, when I go vintage shopping, it seems next to impossible to find clothing that will stretch to fit my frame. Vintage mom jeans? Forget about it, unless I intend on chafing. Vintage high-waist midi skirts? Sure, if by “midi” you mean a skirt that falls mid-thigh. Needless to say, when I do in fact find a vintage diamond in the rough, I cling to it for dear life.

This was the case last summer, when I found and bought what I believed to be the perfect jade polyester jumpsuit, and brought it to my cousin’s wedding. As I gave it a twirl in the hotel where we were staying, I could tell by the way my mother was eyeing me that she didn’t quite think it fit. “Would you want to wear something more…comfortable?” she asked me. As tends to happen, her innocuous comment threw me into a rage. It’s possible, in fact, that I accused her of “body shaming.” Indignant, I stalked my way to the car, fully prepared to wear my jumpsuit to the wedding. As soon as I climbed into the passenger seat, my beloved jumpsuit ripped up the ass. It was only then that I conceded: Perhaps she was right.

Microblading, Generally

My mother has always been on the cutting edge of new beauty, at least by the standards of Boise, Idaho, where I grew up. But her sojourns into the land of experimental beauty haven’t been without their pitfalls; there was the time, for example, that she got eyeliner tattooed on her eyelids. So I was understandably hesitant when she explained to me that she was going to also get her eyebrows tattooed. “It’s called mircoblading,” she told me, and I scoffed the scoff of an ignorant girl. I came home soon after my mother’s two sessions and was taken aback by her glorious eyebrows. “They look so real!” I mused, calculating how I, too, could one day afford to look like Cara Delevingne eyes-up. Two years later, I have my mother to thank for the gloriously fake eyebrows that sit on my face. I love them so much that I wasn’t even self-conscious when an ex boyfriend referred to me as “Groucho Marx” for the rest of our failing relationship.

Going to the Podiatrist

Growing up, corns were a constant worry for my mother. I remember Dr. Scholl’s Corn Pads wrappers in the trash and padded shoe inserts in every pair of heels and sneakers. I also thought they were disgusting. I was rude about my mother’s corns, squeamish around her bare feet, and so it can only be karma that I now am also the possessor of a corn—one that refuses to go away on my left pinky toe. Marathons, I have learned, do not help this. I tried to Google what corns are, but all I can gather is that they are something like a callus, only more painful.

When I called to yell at my mother about the corn I genetically inherited from her, she told me a quick trip to the podiatrist would fix everything, which I proceeded to put off for weeks. But eventually, begrudgingly, I made the appointment. Within five minutes the podiatrist lopped off my corn and sent me on my merry way, but not before asking for my money and reminding me that corns grow back, and that I’d need to come back every six months. I was aghast. On my way home, I came up with a brilliant plan: I’d simply order my own scalpel and take matters into my own hands, no co-pay required. When I proudly told my mother about this, she begged me not to do it. I ignored this advice. Instead, I practiced being my own surgeon on my bedroom floor when my scalpel arrived the next day. There was blood. There was pain. There was the realization, once again, that I should have listened to my mother.

Not Getting Bangs

This piece of advice is a classic that my mother and I like to revisit on a yearly basis. Something will happen that will convince me I need bangs (rejection from a boy, a binge session featuring Natasha Lyonne in Russian Doll), and I’ll start talking about it getting them again, despite hating them last time.

My mom, always wanting what is best for me, reminds me of my previous bang endeavors. Like the time I had my coworker Lauren cut my bangs for me in the middle of the office because the urge was just that strong. (Also, remember “baby bangs?” Unfortunately, so do I.) I always try to convince my mother that, this time, things will be different. “Bangs are back!” I’ll cry to her, knowing she’ll never listen. So I’ll get bangs, then I’ll call her crying, and she’ll still console me without uttering that dreaded phrase, “I told you so.”

It’ll Never Be This Bad Again

When something goes wrong, which happens frequently, my mother is always my first call. I give her all the credit in the world for resisting what I can only assume is a strong urge to screen my calls. She picks up almost every time, even if she knows I’m on my way back from the hair salon (again). And every time I call her crying, or angry, or disappointed, she’ll remind me that it will never be quite this bad again. And that as bad as I feel in this moment, I’ll feel better about it tomorrow, or after a nap, or after a meal. And though I seem to forget this essential advice on a daily basis, I’m starting to learn it is always, always true. And, of course, that my mother is always, always right.

The post Microblading Is Worth It (and Other Times My Mother Was Correct) appeared first on Man Repeller.

Lil Nas X Just Leveled Up Hip-Hop’s Rich Western History

The Yeehaw Agenda has reached its zenith. On July 29, Lil Nas X, the young, openly gay rapper who further encouraged the world to giddy up, beat out Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men for the longest running No. 1 song in Billboard history. His journey down the “Old Town Road” was initially filled with racism and rejection, but after a Tik Tok takeover, a phrase to encapsulate his style, and several high-profile remixes, he rose to the top of the music industry in custom KRONE outfits.

It’s been amazing to witness, and has all but forced the culture to finally recognize that not only is the classic cowboy is a bonafide style icon, but a number of those cowboys were Black people and People of Color. This occasion has given me an excuse to indulge in the joy of enumerating on the cowboy bread crumbs R&B and Hip-Hop artists have dropped over the past few decades.

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one more one more

A post shared by Lil Nas X (@lilnasx) on Jun 3, 2019 at 5:12am PDT

It’s a history that is often not recognized: On July 16, Vogue came under fire for claiming Madonna was the “first to subvert country music style.” The fashion outlet credited her with the true rise of The Yeehaw Agenda—even though it’s a movement focused on highlighting the intersection of Black pop culture and cowboy clothing. The mere implication of Madonna (who has been accused of stylistic cultural appropriation and racism a number of times) being behind a celebration of Blackness was too much to process. Black women let that be known, before Vogue’s tweet was deleted. Many felt that it white washed the history of popular artists being inspired by Westerns, and overlooked artists like Diana Ross and Busta Rhymes.

So who else should we be talking about? One of the first examples that comes to mind is Missy Elliott’s Hype Williams-directed video for “She’s A Bitch.” When Elliott raps “yippie yi yo, yippie yi yi yay,” she and a team of spray-painted dancers twirl imaginary lassos, while wearing black, straw cowboy hats. I personally appreciated the rhinestone eyebrows (courtesy of makeup artist Billy B.) and the all-black everything approach to the primary scenes. The artist literally made Missy a rhinestone cowgirl.

In a behind-the-scenes clip, the video’s costume designer, June Ambrose, said that the video had a dark feel when she read the treatment, but she wanted the costuming to also be sexy and new. Missy’s protege, Nicole Wray, was also decked out in western gear for the cover of her platinum-selling 1998 debut album, Make It Hot.

Yeehaw Agenda archivist Bri Malandro let me know that Destiny’s Child stepped out in cowboy hats more than once—Beyoncé wore a burgundy pair for the in 1999 video for “Bug-A-Boo” and the whole gang joined in on the fun for the remix. Bey’s golden outfit from the “Bug-A-Boo” remix video, which was equal parts cowgirl- and majorette-inspired, is actually on display at the Hard Rock Cafe in San Francisco, California. The group also wore cowboy hats for a performance at the Soul Train Lady of Soul Awards that same year, and for their Annie Oakley-inspired TRL appearance the day their Survivor album was released.

This was during the era when Mrs. Tina was heavily involved in their video, stage, and press costumes, and she would often put the group in matching outfits. Beyoncé, and her sister Solange, have continued to rock cowboy apparel over the years, with Beyonce hitting the stage in shimmering Mugler chaps, and the visuals for Solange’s When I Get Home album being a full on ode to Black cowboys and country living. I appreciate the continuity and their dedication to representing the dirty south.

Then there’s the October 1999 issue of Interview Magazine,  when David LaChapelle shot soul singer and songwriter Mary J. Blige against a fuschia brick wall, while she donned a magenta cowboy hat with electric blue trimming. It’s one of my favorite Mary shoots of all time. The colors complement each other well, veteran makeup artist Nzingha handled her face, and the shots look peaceful yet fierce. Blige is one of the biggest presences in The Yeehaw Agenda timeline, as she has repped the style continuously over the past twenty years. W Magazine pointed out her late 90s blue ensemble for her Party In the Park European concert, and who can forget her bubblegum pink, leather two piece, topped off with a white, feathery cowboy hat?

Get somebody that loves you like Mary J Blige loves cowboy hats pic.twitter.com/1pyFue7EvX

— TrillTimeThePodcast (@KayeTrill) January 14, 2019

Style- and beauty-wise, SWV is probably best known for the extra-long, natural nails lead singer Coko had. But they were also forward thinking fashionistas—they wore animal-printed hats, leather pants, and boots on the cover of their 1997 album, Release Some Tension. Their video for “Someone,” featuring Diddy, pre-name change, looks like it was shot at an apocalyptic night club where grinding while wearing cowboy hats and lingerie was the norm. A few years later, another R&B group, Honeyz, flexed on stage in western looks and one of their biggest hits, “End Of the Line”, has a distinctly country feel to it.

Though he’s continuing a legacy, Lil Nas X’s fashion choices differ from his predecessors. Westernwear is his brand completely, and I look forward to seeing how he’ll push the style forward for performances and magazine covers. At this point, it’s almost as if fringe, custom Off-White boots, and cowboy hats are his baseline uniform, and his stylist works with designers to keep coming up with ways to reinvent it.

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A post shared by Lil Nas X (@lilnasx) on Jul 31, 2019 at 8:40pm PDT

The Yeehaw Agenda isn’t just about cute clothes though, it’s about the erasure of Black people from this history of farming and cowboy life. It is a reclamation, and a reminder that the history of fashion will always be intertwined with Black history. Lil Nas X is the latest Black star to show off his southern influences, with his seemingly inescapable fringed vests, cow-print garments, and bandanas. But if history repeats itself, as it tends to (going-out tops, anyone?), he certainly won’t be the last.

Feature photo by Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images.

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What the Wrong Relationship Can Sometimes Get Right

The most interesting mistakes are the ones with twist endings. Which is why the below three stories caught my attention while I was reading through July’s Writers Club submissions. The prompt had asked: What’s the worst mistake you’re glad you made? Below, Molly, Catherine, and Cameron share stories about missteps in love and fractured romances that, in the end, aren’t really about those things at all.

A Difficult Habit to Break

By Molly McLaughlin

The worst mistake I ever made was a boy. More accurately, it was believing everything that boy told me was true. I was 17 when I started believing him and 21 when I finally stopped. I believed he was smarter than me, more important than me, and that it was therefore my responsibility to make the relationship work. I also believed him when he told me that the Arctic Monkeys were the height of musical brilliance and Lolita was a completely unproblematic work of genius.

Before this particular boy proved me wrong, I regularly believed men in general. In my head, their opinions were always true and unbiased, because they spoke them with such authority and, well, society said so. Whether it was my dad, my teachers, or random men catcalling me on the street, I rarely considered that my experience could be valid in the face of a competing male narrative.

That all came crashing down with the evidence that the boy I had loved for years was actually kind of a dick. When he broke up with me in his dingy college dorm room (for no reason he was able to accurately communicate), my best friend told me she had known all along.

One time, she reminded me, he criticized me for loading up the camping gear incorrectly after we had spent the weekend at a music festival. I had almost forgotten that moment. To me it was insignificant, despite the fact that I regularly camped with my family and he had been camping approximately zero times before. I do remember that he broke a tent pole doing it his way while I sat in the car, glowing with rage-tinged vindication.

After a lifetime of not believing in myself, it was a difficult habit to break. It was winter in a new city and I felt alone every day, like I was constantly fighting my way home through a heavy fog. I listened to The Goldfinch audiobook, all 32 hours and 24 minutes of it. I didn’t really enjoy it; I was just waiting for the fog to lift. Eventually it did. All I know is that everything reminded me of my mistakes until one day I woke up and realized I hadn’t been wrong, at least not in the way I thought.

Sometimes I feel stupid for believing him at all. But maybe if that boy hadn’t broken my heart so completely, I would have kept on ignoring my desires, discounting my expertise and silencing my own stories. Making that mistake in my early twenties made me the bossy, honest, vulnerable woman I am today. It’s still scares me to say what I think and ask for what I want, but it gets easier all the time. It feels like the truth.

Growing Pains

By Catherine Devine

I was surprised at how much I could cry for such a dehydrated person. I had just begun to process my first-ever fight with a boy, and my reaction was shock, shame, and, “Shit, Catherine, why’d you do that?”

In a moment of emotionally charged frustration, I flipped out on the guy I was dating because I thought he wasn’t spending enough time with me. I blew up his phone (while he was at an important family dinner nonetheless) with calls, text messages, the whole shebang. I had become a meme. The trope of the needy partner personified.

I never thought of myself as capable of this kind of behavior. I believed I was competent, strong, independent, someone who didn’t need validation from men, but I had proved myself wrong in a single evening. What else about my identity have I fantasized? I wondered.

The aftermath wasn’t good. In an effort to pick up the pieces, I stupidly told him that I loved him. He was mad, and I was tragically embarrassed and spiraling.

So there I was, one day later, sitting in my pajamas on the sidewalk outside my dormitory, on the phone with my incredibly patient mom, who can always tell when I’m sad based on her call log: the more calls the sadder I am. That day was the most I had ever called.

On the phone, I begged her to tell me that it would all go back to normal. “He’ll come back right?” I repeated into the receiver, as though her confirmation could make it true. My mom has always been my protector, my emotional rock, someone who made me food and read me bedtime stories. I wanted her to soothe me, to stitch my heart back together and tell me that I did no wrong. But that’s not reality—nor was it true. And there comes a time when a mother’s kiss cannot make it better.

She took a deep breath into the phone. “You know Catherine, this is just growing pains,” she said.

And I couldn’t think of a better way to frame my young adult angst. Growing pains: a natural byproduct of the maturation process. An acknowledgment of the banality of my situation that didn’t rob it of its significance.

I’m embarrassed about how long it took me to truly appreciate my mom’s wisdom. Psychological heuristics tell us that it is only natural to oversimplify people—it promotes brain efficiency—but how wrong I’d been to forget that my mom is many things, and has so much more to offer (to me and the world) than just comfort.

It was a bittersweet wake-up call, but I am grateful for it.

Anyway: Dating Him Was a Big Mistake

By Cameron Gunn

My sophomore year of high school was spent trying desperately to be a girl I was not—a girl I despised, actually—in order to please my totally popular, totally egotistical boyfriend. I can say this now because I graduated in June, and I know for a fact that [insert his name here] is not cultured enough to read Man Repeller

This boy is now a subject of my empathy. I’ve come to see his worldview—in which he is the star and the rest of the human population is either audience or ensemble—as sad, not to mention bound to result in an early existential crisis. This self-centered outlook isn’t entirely uncommon, although most of us grow out of it around age five. Anyway: Dating him was a big mistake.

I had recently quit dance, my lifelong passion, which left me with an insatiable void that I attempted to fill with his approval and attention. I developed new insecurities about every aspect of myself—my body, my intellect, my sexuality—because he constantly put me down, elevating himself in turn. I neglected my long-time friends, rejecting invitations and failing to be there for them, in order to put all my time and energy into him. I also became the most unhinged version of myself: I was completely irrational and overthought everything that concerned him. If he was at a friend’s house and the friend had an older sister, my stomach hurt with jealousy.

But despite the terribleness that was our one-sided, soul-crushing relationship, I don’t regret dating him. Because he inadvertently and ironically led me to find my truest love. He had signed up for theater as a resume builder. It was not enough to be the athletic and intelligent golden boy, he must also be artistic. And since he took theater, I took theater. It was a way, I thought, to gain one more hour with him, but what I actually gained was a very necessary outlet and a life path.

My newfound passion for theater provided me all of the love and affirmation I’d been searching so hopelessly for within another human. It was there that I learned that, for me, the key to self-acceptance is finding something to put my energy into that makes me feel good and whole and proud.

I’ll be studying theater in college this coming fall—and I have to thank my 15-year-old self for making the mistake of basing all of her decisions around a boy. Because I have no idea where I’d be without theater, and therefore I have no idea where I’d be without her.

Photo by Sherman Oaks Antique Mall via Getty Images.

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