I’m not sure what makes someone a good Substacker, or someone’s tastes Substack-worthy. It feels like a delusion of grandeur to imagine that I should be blogging and telling a public what stuff I’m enjoying, or what thoughts I’m having. But it also seems sort of fun? A few years ago Zoe, Meetka and I started blogging on blogspot and we just read each others’ little entries and that was pretty fun. So sort of like, why not…
I suppose the appeal for me is that, as an “artist,” generally I’m making things that are treated as raw material for a cultural sphere, so it feels nice, humanizing even, to write or speak as a consumer, a person (specifically a lady, a chica, a gal [jfc]), and only last-but-not-least, as an artist and writer. Which is to say, sometimes in my work life–and who knows where that begins and ends–I don’t allow myself to express the more “frivolous” pleasures I indulge in, or even just talk about the variety of things I am watching or reading, not all of which go with the currents of the trend cycles my industry abides by. The tyranny of the contemporary and all that. So I am going to try out writing some memos about stuff I like and don’t like–also because just writing about art and theory for magazines and catalogs can get zzzz. I like to buy things, I like to write things, I like to make things (if I’m being honest, more often I like to think about making things and be lazy until someone makes me make them), and more than anything I like to regale people with my speculative analysis about why things are bought, sold, made, hated, lost to time, etc.
Thus I begin with something boring and practical that I’ve been negotiating in my life: itchy, dry skin. Something has shifted and my skin has gone from somewhat sensitive to extremely sensitive and so a great deal of my winter clothes and general wardrobe now cause discomfort that I wouldn’t call extreme but enough to be distracting. I’ve been testing out everything I own, retiring the unbearable items (cashmere and angora are my nemeses), and trying to add more skin-friendly materials to my closet (Silk! Cotton! Merino wool sometimes!). This is all extremely embarrassing in a way, because there’s definitely a psychosomatic element to it, but the brain and body are One, and I can’t argue with the fact that now Uniqlo socks make my skin crawl.
So, the latest of my efforts: I bought some raw silk shirts from Ozma of California, because raw silk supposedly shouldn’t drive me nuts. I also am just always on the hunt for t-shirts I actually like. Maybe I also liked that the brand referenced California– where I am from and the vibe of which I often miss and increasingly consciously want to bring a little bit of to my life on the East Coast. See also: sporadic enthusiasm about building a plastered and terracotta tiled bookshelf for the living room that I can see fully in my head and periodically order sample tiles for before I remember I’m in a 4th floor Brooklyn walk up and that would look extremely r-word with my parquet floors.
Anyway, I love this shirt. The other one I bought was way too small. (I always get confused about sizing because I am tall and fairly proportionate, but my tits are on the smaller side really. So I go for a S and then usually it becomes clear that shirt sizes are more about your proportionately-broad shoulders than your small-to-average tits. So I’m a M more often than not). It was not cheap so I will be waiting to buy more. I wore it out for the first time with a heattech shirt underneath on a really fucking cold Sunday evening, + new Palace winter hat (via Grailed, another listing), Celine cords, and ROA shoes (similar), so I looked sort of like a middle school skater, but I was into it. My friends, the material does NOT itch. Also, great cut–It’s got a baggy fit but is not too long, which is always the problem for me with t-shirts, being a bit too narrow for shirts to rest nicely atop my hips. Neither is it too short, which is important to me because, as someone who came of age in the High Am-Appy Period A.D, I can’t take myself seriously in a crop-top.
A cropped tee is a semiotic sink-hole, giving off no vibe other than I Have No Vibe. In 2024, a crop-top redoubles and voids the ironic 80s silhouettes of the High Aughts. Bralette crops I can get behind conceptually, but I’m not often in what I’d deem a “bralette scenario” (On a boat? In a club?). I wish I were more regularly? Maybe? Though popular and definitely not vibeless, a bralette struggles to avoid the crop-top’s fate and more recently seems to be increasingly employed in the service of 80s pastiche (Looking at you, Gil Rodriguez). I’ve yet to wear a bralette like GR’s definitely cute long-sleeved one and not feel like a melty AI image of Sade.
80s nostalgia seems to be boomin’, albeit in this thoroughly reduced form. For example, GR also recently introduced this puffy-sleeved top that goes a step further than the brand’s other silhouettes (which are more like 80s via the Substance’s 80s-not-80s aerobic universe), almost intriguing me in its High Yuppie-ness. Ciao Lucia is riding this wave too, but with a bit more subtlety, aka minus the dramatic shoulders. Their recent offerings cut a similar profile to Attersee and other lady-brands’–not sure who comes first–button down lady top (ed: sorry these appear to invariably be billed as a “vest”, see below fig.1) that seems to be reproduced everywhere. The Ciao Lucia brand of Neo-yuppie, in its subtlety, is also at risk of being boring. The drama of The GR top seems to point to greater possibilities for womens’ fashion, which has suffered from a weird asceticism in the last few years, while at the same time doing something kind of weird with regard to its full-blown 80score silhouette.
Is this 80s-sim look arriving at our doorsteps via a renewed interest in shit like Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan (1990)–which became everyone’s favorite movie suddenly; no shade if you already liked it; you know the “everyone” I mean–as part of a wave of regeneration of interest in an unabashedly moneyed look/feel? This landscape has been thoroughly mapped: Quiet luxury circa 2022 blah blah blah. But I’m also thinking of the more aspirational version of this, like I’m thinking about velvet curtains now lining every new Millennial-Creative-Director-targeting space that serves a 25 dollar cocktail, like the Great Soho House-ification of the world. (Picture Penn Station with cheap brass light fixtures and deep teal curtains.) This development also is tangled up in post-Normcore fashion downtown circa the COVID party years–a sort of mash-up of the period-specific looks of every simpering villain character from neoliberal era (Yeah, roughly End of Bretton Woods through Great Recession) teen movies–that spread around town along with a penchant for reading and writing like Bret Easton Ellis. You know the MF-in’ vibes; you’ve got your pleated skirt bullies, y2k Abercrombie popped collar bro, your low-rise off duty cheerleader chica.
All of this reminds me of when American Apparel rebranded in 2010 after successfully iconicizing the indie sleaze electroclash look in the previous decade. In summer/fall 2010, the brand completely overhauled their look and company MO, and started pushing a preppy, also 80s-inspired but 80s Reaganite angle. There’s not a lot of visual documentation of this shift online. Possible that now the two AmAppys just blend together to the eye. Possible that they intentionally wiped most of the ads from the internet? But I remember it was a full-on and abrupt rebrand; I worked at American Apparel at the time, and they came in and gave everyone a free Preppy outfit and went through the store showing us what was no longer okay to wear on the floor and what to push customers toward (pleated skirts and pants, rounded collar button ups, baggy chiffons, slouchy knits). In a short news story from 2010, Dov Charney is quoted as saying “hipster is over [ . . .] Kids are moving away from piercings," Charney says. "We want to grow old with our customer. We want to be a traditional American clothier."1
As we all know, that’s not how AmAppy’s story ends. The brand now serves as nostalgic base material for Fashion-Enjoyers–conscious or not–of all ages, and peddles reissues of its old offerings under a new name. It is not our Ralph Lauren, as Charney seemed to hope it would become. But AmAppy’s position and how it transformed over time is far more interesting; it makes you wonder why slutty when, why preppy when, why slutty preppy-when. I think one would be remiss to not acknowledge the political and economic context of the brand’s rise during the Bush era, and its rebrand during Obama’s first term, and relative disappearance from view during Trump 1.0 and its ironic revival in the same period.
The AmAppy nostalgia-prep rebrand happened just before Occupy Wall Street, a moment when youth culture and left politics actually coincided One Final Time. There is no causal relationship here, but mapping the texture of when and how fashion does an irony-spiral is interesting. In essence these are just the operations of kitsch–like I don’t find it that interesting when fashion seeks out “otherness,” or “the street” as its inspiration, which is uncomplicatedly kitsch–but when the kitsch-object is the ‘good taste’ of an earlier period (puffy sleeves?), and when culture seeks to ironize luxury itself (quiet luxury?)–I dunno, that seems sort of funny.
Anyway, the main point is not that American Apparel already offered us an ironic conservative way to dress, but that the ironic-neo-con, post-ironic-neo-con, not-ironic-neo-con fashion thing happened again like clockwork in the 2020s. We could say that AmAppy’s recycling, reducing, schematizing was prep-as–kitsch–an “aesthetic of the second degree,”2 to follow Barthes. If AmAppy treated preppiness as kitsch-material, and lately it’s being delivered to us again, pushed through the meat grinder once more, what comes out the other side? What is the aesthetic of the third degree?
Another way of thinking about the “third degree” might be the “-core” suffix-phenomena. Today, people dress “-core,” rarely “-esque,” or “-ly.” Think about those Ssense ads with the starter packs (Fig. 6). There is a whole lot to parse re: commodity fetishism in that campaign; how we are prompted to and seem to accept the premise that we are dressing like we’re going to do or be xyz rather than wearing clothes that support an existing image of the self. For instance, ballet-core: Dress as a ballerina rather than like a ballerina. Or, like, women essentially wearing a Carolyn Bessete Kennedy costume rather than developing a sense of style inspired by Caroline Bessette Kennedy.
The -core model or discourse of dress is more like cosplay than anything else. Even if the self has long been expressed through commodities, there was once something more stable on offer, in an market ecosystem where ads hailed the consumer as an existing type or individual with desires rather than treating the consumer like a Barbie or a Lego. Balletcore, Gorpcore, cottagecore, and the mother of cores, normcore (about which ink should no longer be spilled, at least for a while, after last year’s Millennial scramble to claim and reinvigorate the concept), all of which distill and accelerate the silhouettes and traditional materials of a given formation and exhaust it.
Now, returning to the Gil Rodriguez top, the Ciao Lucia, the Attersee, etc. On one hand, the elements of the 80s that are popping up in womenswear are some of the more conservative elements, a posh 80s profile made kitsch (who can help it, it is tacky and ridiculous even if it was posh). On the other, they also arrive as a thoroughly reduced version of themselves. We’re offered a deflated 80s with little of the drama attached, the whole world is like a coat with the shoulder pads ripped out, a tent without a frame. An image? Essentially, I’m just saying that puffy-sleeved shirt is 80s-core in a weird way, an aesthetic of the third degree. Once, Twice, Three times a lady.
This aesthetic of the third degree is the inkling that I’m waxing poetic about. And it’s twofold: 1) I am becoming obsessed with increasingly strange dispositions toward historical forms (See: below comments about the new, also see next memo about Dean Kissick’s Harpers’ piece, but more about Dean’s conversation with Helen Molesworth on the Zwirner Podcast, which was actually so much better than the essay w/ compelling tidbits on both sides.) And 2) Just how much fashion in the last fifteen years or so has relied on ironizing various forms of conservatism–which obviously goes well with the political affects du jour. Everything from Vampire Weekend and AmAppy prep, to Real Tree camo, to the brief but totalizing trad-cath schoolgirl looks of the COVID shadow period. Perhaps it's nothing new; when you think about it, most post-war supposedly “radical” and especially “leftist” aesthetics are heavily reliant on ironizing and “detourning” symbols of the right and the state. And insofar as most contemporary capitalist culture gets its rocks off by posturing as “radical,” it makes sense that this would continue, even if the whole operation is evacuated of politics.
Totally down for fashion to not have politics–at best, as BF Laszlo said when I asked him about this, “all fashion is reactionary.” Just as one does not need to design a reading diet that only supports their political views, I am also absolutely fine with exploring the possibilities of dressing like a neo-con, and I often do. Marx was a Balzac fangirl, so I don’t see the harm in any of this. What keeps me up at night is how utterly boring all of this is, aesthetically-speaking. Though I do like that GR top. None of these developments are anyone’s fault, but they are super weird, and I think quite interesting to think through. I’m sure people who are very on Tik Tok have more to say about this, but I really don’t want to be on Tik Tok for precisely this reason. This might make me sound like the Jeff Koons of womens’ day-to-day fashion, pushing obsessively toward the new, but here I find myself.
Koons has fallen out of fashion in part because “the new” he “fetishized”–”ironized”?–was associated with capital, speculative finance, big business. But now, it seems capital is way more interested in the old and finding a way to recycle it. “The New” goes largely unspoken about, replaced with “innovation,” which unlike the new still obsesses over the past in its own ways. Innovation requires a detailed analysis of what came before; it’s very, very historical, though usually not intelligently so. Where “renovations,” might keep a house’s original frame, “innovation,” trashes it and builds a new and flimsy exterior around decaying insides. “Newness” doesn’t look so bad to me these days. What “new” is remains a mystery.
So, anyway, I guess the 80s are coming back–or I just want the 80s to come back? If the 80s are back, then the 40s are too (“80s does 40s!”). And if the 90s are back, then so are the 50s (“90s does 50s!”)– and the 2000s and the 2010s, and, and, and, and therefore everything that came before because, as we know, history already ended in 1991 when the Wall fell and western civilization super-died when the internet was invented. “2020s do eternity.”
If the 80s are going to be back, these are things that I like:
Natasha Simchowitz and I recently discussed our fondness for the New Romantics side of the 80s. Therein lay the lost dramatics of 80s period pastiche, crystallized. I’m down for an 80s-esque turn that draws on the decadent and weird scrambled-up classicism of London youth. Like, I bought some spats to wear w/ oxfords and loafers. I want poet-pirate shirts, not worn on their own, but vest (more vest) and all. A while back I bought and quickly sold a ‘89 polka dotted Comme mens vest (fig. 8). Huge mistake; would have worn the hell out of it now. I kept trying to wear it without anything underneath…dumb.
Menswear as womenswear is a big ol’ duh at this point, but seems like most are sticking to oversized coats, blazers and trousers and wearing oxfords, and again these lady-fied vest top things are circulating, but I’m feeling ready for more exaggerated silhouettes, more layering (also good for skin), more drama, more what if I tucked my pants into some slim boots? Would that be crazy? More this 80s Alaia tuxedo skirt suit that I bought 3 years ago and have never worn (similar, also this, and this). More this Dries jacket that I think could count if styled right.
Anyway, unrelatedly, I baked a pie last week. My friend Oliver asked me for the “date cake recipe” which is just the date cake recipe from the Gjelina cookbook, and which is very good, a favorite among friends. I had to pull the book out to send him a photo and just preceding the date cake there is a “Blackberry, Huckleberry, and Ginger Pie” recipe. I’d had some mulled wine at Partner Laszlo’s family’s holiday party the previous night, and looking at this Gjelina pie recipe reminded me of this somehow, and I wondered if anyone ever does a sort of mulled wine pie type of thing. And then I thought about blackberries and how much I like them, and how I don’t know where to find Huckleberries, and thought “Well I’ll just make this pie but put all the spices that I associate with mulled wine in it, and the ginger, like Gjelina.” This also all happened because I got some clotted cream at a cheese shop and wanted something to use it on. I have never made a pie before, so I struggled with the crust, but very much enjoyed making a cross-hatched lid or whatever you’d call it (ed: lattice pastry). I think I need a deeper pie dish–and needed more blackberries, and maybe should have mushed them up after macerating because they retained their shape in a sort of unpleasant way (like, what’s the point of this “pie?” I am just eating blackberries. BF Laszlo said it was fine, but this was how I felt).
Historically, I have not enjoyed baking. I always told myself the precision and patience needed was not for me. But lately I’ve found those very characteristics enjoyable. I am pretty bad at “hobbies.” What can one do that isn’t work? And how do you keep yourself from making things you like into work? For instance, I bought a guitar during COVID to revive my teenage hobby of writing bedroom pop songs and never showing them to anyone, and soon decided that my deskilled songwriting needed to be heard by the world and insisted on writing the music for a video work of mine–shouts out to Evan Zierk for actually scoring the film (pw: sweetnewstyle) and being kind enough to honor my request of incorporating my melody into it. The only thing that I enjoy that I am not big-headed enough to think I should explore in the public view is cooking–this is not a cooking or food Substack so this doesn’t count. I think it’s a fashion substack? But not the kind where I mostly tell you what to buy, because we probably follow the same instagram vintage shops, fashion Substacks, and get the same ads on social media.
So. . . get it, the pie and the Substack…they’re the same thing.
Next up, Memo #2 about Dean’s Harpers piece and its aftershocks :)
https://www.chron.com/business/article/Can-preppy-look-save-American-Apparel-empire-3179052.php
Roland Barthes, Roland Barthes, p. 66, https://monoskop.org/images/b/b3/Roland_Barthes_by_Roland_Barthes.pdf
Aside from Metropolitan resonating with me as a teenager I too was an upper west sider forced to walk home from parties across the park– we must also remember the blonde was the great memoirist of Oberlin College, author of “It Happens Every Day!!”
Second comment now that I’m done reading:
What a gorgeous pie!!!