Seeing Brown, KK as MM, And A Restaurant Radar Round-Up
Also, a fabulous book with a fantastical premise— all below.
1.
B.D. McClay’s essay on Kim Kardashian’s Met Gala “moment” donning Marilyn Monroe’s iconic “Happy Birthday Mr. President” gown was one of the smartest commentaries I’ve read on the on the current state of celebrity, red-carpet dressing, and its purpose for the public gaze. “In another time, the looks on these lavish evenings would have been constructed primarily for the other people in the room, but now they are photographed, livestreamed, instantly converted into jokes and memes…their audience has swelled to include the sweatpants-clad zoomer drinking boxed wine in a small apartment,” McClay writes. So what’s the messaging when a celebrity chooses to wear a dress that’s famous not because of its visual appeal, but because of the woman who originally wore it? My hunch is that in 50 or 60 years, we’ll still regard that dress as the one Marilyn Monroe wore, while Kim Kardashian’s moment will have long faded from our collective memories.
2.
My latest Restaurant Radar Round-Up: Veronika, which re-opens next month in the stunning Fotografiska building (many of you will recognize it from Netflix’s Inventing Anna series). I got a sneak peak during a recent Fotografiska-hosted event, and can assuredly say the interiors and decor are equally stunning. Also: Thai Diner, which Jodie and I tried to dine at this week, but it came down to a battle of will versus waitlist, and well…hence why it’s still on my lineup; Cadence (vegan soul!); the Chelsea Hotel’s legendary, newly re-opened El Quijote, and Cafe Spaghetti (the name says it all, no?), which I’m hitting up tonight.
3.
Soapbox moment: I’ve been trying not to let myself get absorbed into the celebrity courtroom circus of the Johnny Depp vs. Amber Heard trial—so much so that I’ve been pretty aloof to most of of the testimonies. What’s been harder to avoid is the public mockery and dissection of every little detail, specifically Heard’s appearance and courtroom demeanor. Rory Satran reported on this for WSJ, while the NY Times’ Jessica Bennett delivered a harsher assessment of the situation: “Michele Dauber, a law professor at Stanford University who studies gender violence, said she has been ‘unnerved’ by the display of schadenfreude over Ms. Heard’s debasement in this public forum. ‘There is a glee, a kind of delight, that is being taken in watching her be humiliated,’ she told me.” Honestly, no one in this trial is perfect. But who the hell on earth is??? Yet here we are, gleefully pillorying someone who may very well have been the victim of domestic abuse (who cares about her damn braids or if she’s a nice person!). Have we already forgotten about Anita Hill, or Monica Lewinsky, or the number of female founders and CEOs we cruelly and unfairly ousted and publicly shamed just two years ago? YES.
4.
It seems like an unlikely color to trend, but perhaps it’s a muted retro-feeling rebuttal of sorts to all the colorful splashes of the rainbow’s brighter hues we’ve been seeing everywhere these past few years: BROWN. It takes a major role in the design and decor of Paris’ new Hôtel Orphée; there were several brown-leaning ensembles in Gucci’s recent Resort ‘23 show, and according to Domino Mag, you may want to consider cabinetry painted in shades of umber, espresso or deep terra cotta.
5.
I just finished our latest book club read, Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s charming, fantastical story of a tiny Tokyo coffeeshop where time-travel is possible. I loved following all the various characters’ histories, and was so pleased to know that there’s two more novels to fly through before the series wraps up. Up next from my own personal pile: Dana Brown’s Dilettante, and These Precious Days by Ann Patchett.