Welcome to 2024, you beautiful fashion freaks!!!!
As you’re reading this I am most likely 36,000 feet above the continental United States making my way slowly but surely to Portland, Oregon — a city and state I have not been in since I graduated college 14 years ago — to pay a visit to my extremely pregnant best friend and one-time roommate at said institution of higher learning. In addition to celebrating her impending motherhood, while I’m there we also have plans to wander around Reed College campus, sip a coffee or two at the Paradox, and eat a “Thanksgiving leftovers” sandwich I’ve thought about regularly since the last time I had it. Since I no longer have any idea what’s hip in Portlandia as the last time I lived there that show was still on the air, if you happen to be a resident of the Pacific Northwest and have any recommendations for things I must do/see/eat/purchase while in town, please shout them out posthaste.
This week, I also had a close encounter with jury duty. Yes, after 13 years of city life, they finally got me. And while you all know it is my greatest passion and calling in life to evaluate people and circumstances and pass my judgement upon them, given my flight out of town I was unfortunately unable to commit the next few weeks of my life to litigation. Better luck next time, coppers! And by next time, I mean October when they told me I will once again be summoned.
Before we get into the heart of today’s newsletter, I must confess that I am obsessed with knowing other people’s New Year’s resolutions and how they are planning to improve themselves in hopes of learning how I, too, can improve myself. So I am begging all of you to please respond to this email and tell me what exactly you’re getting up to. Personally, I will be continuing on my impossible uphill battle to properly hydrate every day, I am trying to ween myself off my full-blown TikTok addiction, and I’m going to try and get back on my Morning Pages bullshit even though I can never tell if it’s actually helping anything or not. And, in general, this year I’d also just like to invest more time into my creative writing and the professional endeavors that give me the greatest satisfaction, such as this one. And I don’t want to put the cart before the horse here, but this week I did teach myself how to edit a photograph into a video clip and so I’m thinking Mess might be long overdue for a YouTube component? Considering that would necessitate me having to put on a real outfit instead of just the sweatsuit I wear to walk Fran every day, it seems like a big ask, but we shall see!
Last week, free subscribers missed out on an exclusive edition of Mess filled with a whole barrage of my insightful, yet useless, end of year observations. If you don’t want to miss out on even more of my musings, make sure to sign up for a paid subscription today and then catch up on everything behind the paywall. Or, if you’re looking for some more free Mess material, join the Discord where your fellow readers are sharing their brilliant, academic analyses of pop culture on the regular.
Given that celebs are still on vacation and gearing up for another year jam-packed with useless content and even uglier outfits than ever before, this week’s newsletter is a little light on Mess, but nonetheless I’ve cobbled together a handful of things I think you’re going to “enjoy.” Consider this a toe dip into the ocean of disastrous dressing that awaits us in 2024.
Let’s get down to business!
First of all, if it wasn’t already abundantly clear from the fact that I’ve essentially stolen Fashion Police’s whole shtick, I am OBSESSED with Joan Rivers. Longtime paid subscribers will recall that there is a particular photo of her from the 2002 Grammys that I desperately want to be my business card. So, of course, when I saw that her apartment was taken off the market this week I had to take a peek inside as I’d only ever seen it in her perfect documentary, A Piece of Work. While the whole thing is impeccable 80s Versailles-core, my absolute favorite detail has got to be the contrast between the mirrored ceiling panels and the elaborate drapery surrounding this marble tub. I am green with envy over these curtains. In fact, my only life goal has now become to one day be wealthy enough to own such a bathing scenario. If you’re not tub curtain rich, are you really even rich at all?
What a coincidence! I’ve also been worried that I’m getting TOO famous!!!!! This headline from the NYT’s interview with Travis’s managers is very funny to me because it seems they have completely misunderstand what the issue is here. The problem is not being too famous. I really don’t think Travis is even in the echelon of fame where he needs to be concerned with something like that. That seems like a Beatles or a Michael Jackson or a Taylor Swift problem to solve, not a Travis Kelce. Travis’s problem is extreme overexposure and the fact that he seemingly has never met a brand deal he didn’t like. And, it just so happens, that the announcement of all of those brand deals are now coinciding with his relationship with one of the most famous women on planet earth. This really feels like something his management team should’ve thought of before right now. Because, again, a little late for Travis to suddenly prioritize his authenticity when he’s already plugging every product known to man from Lean Cuisines to Just For Men. As long as he can print his face on it, my man is promoting it. Also, I keep seeing all these headlines taken from that same interview about how he wants to be the next The Rock and pivot to acting and, I’m sorry, but literally the last thing the world needs right now is another Rock. First of all, we already have a John Cena. And besides, one professional athlete turned thespian with weird presidential ambitions and insane contract stipulations about never losing a fight on screen is QUITE enough, if you ask me.
Faithful Messketeers know I’ve had an ironclad moratorium on Kanye for a couple years now and I am absolutely loathe to include this image, especially as whatever he’s got going on with his new living doll makes me incredibly uneasy. However, this ensemble is pure Mess bait and I just have to bring it up to say that I have never seen more compelling evidence that this man is a dedicated I <3 Mess reader, or at least someone on his team is. I mean, the pile of furs on the floor and binding the breasts? The proclamation that 2024 is a no pants year? The micro thong in lieu of said pants??? An undergarment that is made by his ex-wife’s shapewear brand, of course, because all this is really about is using his current wife as a prop to make Kim mad, generate attention from media outlets that have otherwise stopped speaking about him entirely, and promote his new album that will probably never actually come out. And yes, I know that saying Kanye is a reader sounds like an enormous stretch, especially as I don’t believe that man actually reads, but weirdly enough this wouldn’t be the first casual encounter he and I have had on the interweb. When I was at Vanity Fair he screenshot my article about Jennifer Aniston telling people not to vote for him in order to alert her to the fact that “Friends wasn’t funny either.” And back when I worked at Page Six, I wrote a silly little story about how he wore the same pair of Braindead sweatpants for a week straight and the next day he posted what seemed to me to be a very pointed mirror selfie to his Instagram Stories in which he was once again wearing them, writing over the image “same pants.” So Kanye, if you’ve somehow once again become ensnared in my digital fashion web and find yourself reading this right now: Fuck off, nazi scum.
On a much, much lighter note, Paris Hilton must be stopped. It is time to outlaw her from the kitchen and relegate her back to a life of leisure where she belongs because what has befallen this lasagna is a Hague-worthy crime. And before you chastise me for coming too hard at this fledgling chef, I need you to know that this is not Paris’s first time making this meal. This is what she refers to as her SIGNATURE. DISH. The crunch when she cut into this thing was truly ungodly. Where is Gordon Ramsay when you need him. I am not sliving!!!!
Something else that I am not sliving for is the Peltz-Beckhams who have once again found a way to make what should be very normal content into something weirdly sexual for no reason. In this case, Christmas family dinner, which apparently necessitated Brooklyn playing bongos on Nicola’s behind while wearing naughty and nice Santa Claus hats. They really have a gift for making the public the unwilling trois in their ménage. You might recall some of their previous award-winning social media cringe, like when Brooklyn inserted his hand into Nicola’s butt crack on vacation and then forced a third party to take photographic evidence of said act, or when they congratulated Brooklyn’s father David Beckham on the release of his Netflix documentary by posting a carousel of photos of themselves playing grab ass in the hotel room. At least these two’s impotent attempts to drum up tabloid interest through ass-centric PDA remains the one great constant in this life.
Speaking of constants, much like the Kardashians’ annual bikini in a snowstorm photoshoot, this too has become a yearly Lisa Rinna PR-grab classic. In fact, Lisa has been posing completely in the buff like this since at least 2017, although I feel like every year the emojis get just a little bit smaller and the blur tool a little less present. But I have to admit, the sparkler GIFs as pasties is an inspired touch and I would love for someone who is not Katy Perry to figure out a way to replicate this Fourth of July effect IRL on the red carpet.
I don’t consider this ensemble to be traditional Mess fodder, but this image prompted someone out there to call Jada Pinkett-Smith Fat Joe on Ozempic and I truly can’t stop thinking about it. Although, personally, I think this has more of a Mr. Worldwide vibe to it. Anyway, this Instagram post is actually supposed to be about Jada’s entanglement with a pair of denim leg warmers, a trend that all Messketeers know she is a full two years too late to, both on the ankle wrap and joutfit front. May this image also serve as a painful reminder of Riccardo Tisci’s very Gretchen Wieners-esque insistence on trying to make deer print happen.
As I wrote above on Substack dot com, I thought perhaps we’d luck out and the coquette trend would somehow accidentally get left behind in yesteryear, but alas, we are not quite done with the infantilized hyper-feminine just yet! It’s not even that I’m opposed to pink and bows and lace and other such girlie pop things, it’s more that this particular aesthetic always feels to me like it thinks it’s doing something really subversive when it’s actually just doing something really reductive. Anyway, Julia’s look did get me thinking that a fun twist on last year’s underwear look could be a move towards petticoats and more historical underpinnings à la Iris Law’s collection of Little House on the Prairie bloomers. Also, do you think Gen Z has figured out yet that putting a bow on it is just their generation’s “put a bird on it”?
Something else I was hoping we’d leave behind is what has apparently become our annual tradition of being absolutely flabbergasted over Juergen Teller’s “Best Performances” covers for W magazine. I know I’ve lamented our utter lack of cultural short-term memory before, but the cyclicity of the discourse is speeding up to a truly braindead pace. And worst of all, it’s BORING. We already did this, remember? Celebs holding parking spots? George Clooney with the trikes??? I know you all saw last year’s covers. I know you all have Google and know how to familiarize yourself with this very famous photographer’s body of work. I’m not even trying to make the case that this is some of the best examples of what Juergen does, but repeatedly getting this outraged over it year after year feels not only like a self-report of bad taste, but a failure to understand a very basic media lesson. I’m sure that W got an unbelievable traffic spike after last year’s covers went viral, not to mention infinite free publicity for that issue. Like, do you not think that doing the exact same thing all over again is very intentional??? The virality is baked in. All your shit-talking of these covers is exactly the point. It’s like hate watching every episode of The Kardashians in an attempt to get the show cancelled. We will never be free.
Also, I would just like to propose that perhaps the real problem here is not Juergen, but rather the actors themselves. Remember the shoot he did with Alexander Skarsgård Donald Ducking it? FUN. Juergen is a silly little guy!!! His photos have a sense of humor and I think you can often really tell the subjects he works with that get it and those that don’t. That said, at the same time, he did backlight Da'Vine Joy Randolph on her own magazine cover and I find that to be pretty unforgivable, so who knows.
Now this, on the other hand, I am looking forward to seeing much, much more of in the year to come. I have such a soft spot for absurdly furry footwear, likely dating back to the very Céline mink pumps mentioned above. The campaign for which showed the shoe dangling precariously over a pool, an image which is forever burned in my brain and was brilliantly shot by one — wouldn’t you know it — Mr. Teller. Aside from my enjoyment of a Cousin Itt clog, I also wanted to bring up these shoes because oomfie Chloe Kennedy sparked an interesting conversation over on Twitter about celeb nudie fashion and how it’s really just another tool the rich and famous use to differentiate themselves from the masses because it’s something only people of their stature could get away with wearing in public, not to mention something only they could feel safe in thanks to their societal stature and literal fleet of bodyguards. And I think something about that also applies here in the absurdity of an eye-wateringly expensive shoe that is really built to never touch the ground. Of course, we’ve seen infinite versions of this in the past from those Célines mentioned above, to the Marni clogs, the Brother Veilles and The Attico’s feather explosions, to name just a few. But I think this year we might see that extended to even greater, more preposterous lengths. Think trains of Mongolian fur trailing two feet behind a celeb everywhere they stroll.
In other PETA-related news, amidst the sea of jumbo fur coats we’ve seen out in Aspen this winter, I’m loving these more ~authentically~ Western ensembles. As much as I believe Julia ruined joots forevermore, Rihanna is wearing them well. And as a staunch millennial, I think there will always be something deeply appealing to me about a sweatshirt layered beneath an oversized blazer. But for as good as Rih looks, Kevin Costner is giving her a serious run for her spurs in this very Westworld The Man in Black ensemble. This should come as no surprise given the fun hat high horse I’ve been on for years now, but I think there’s something about a cowboy hat that is very cool! Although, it also seems like an accessory that would immediately lose all of its cool the second it crosses into LA city limits.
Elsewhere in trend land, this photo of Addison Rae just called me old. Because while I was hoping that we’d finally moved on from our aughts revival, her NYE outfit proves that Indie Sleaze is still very much alive and well. As I’ve referenced in the past,
pointed out that we are entering a period of “true aughts” fashion where that decade is no longer just the jumping off point for today’s trends, but rather the looks of that era are being faithfully recreated piece for piece. Like this photo would’ve taken OG Tumblr by storm. Also, I just noticed it appears that she’s taking it on an actual digital camera, something I’ve noticed a lot of Gen Z doing on TikTok lately which is it’s own fascinating luddite resurgence. Because obviously if we’re bringing back any technology from that era it should be HitClips and HitClips only. Regardless, just one tiny word of warning from a Y2K elder before we move on: Despite what the Addisons and Cory Kennedys of this world might have you believe, tights under jorts is not the right look for the vast majority of us. Proceed with caution lest you wind up 500 Days of Summer-ing yourself.Cardi rang in the New Year with two outfits that I felt aptly summarized the gist of fashion in 2023. She had the skintight sheer leggings with the exposed thong underneath, easily celebs’ favorite look of the year. But I like the added touch of being able to see the gold Versace medusa detail on the underwear through the pant. Cardi also brought back the belt-fit in a major way, doing a Louis Vuitton homage in this Sergio Castaño Peña dress with trompe l’oeil waist cinchers going all the way up. And I truly have the mind of a madman because as soon as I saw this dress I was like, oh my god! It’s the return of the hair claw neckline I love so much! A neckline I haven’t seen since Ashley Graham at the Time 100 gala. So I looked up Peña’s Instagram only to discover that he was also the designer of that dress. I have a sickness. Why is this exclusively the type of information my brain stores away. Who is this useful for. Not me, surely.
And I failed to bring this up in our pre-NYE newsletter because I felt it too boring of a detail to note, but then I received a third example of bright red tights trending courtesy of Bella Thorne to close out the year and thought perhaps it’s worth mentioning after all that along with the Indie Sleaze moment raging on we’re also getting the return of the opaque colored tights of that era. I previously pointed out the sudden barrage of all-white stockings we were seeing this winter and
recently shouted out a vibrant blue pair so, at this point, it seems only a matter of time until a certain man named Dov Charney weasels his way back into our lives and wallets. (Also, I can’t believe that googling him after writing that is how I found out that he’s currently working for Yeezy and was behind that White Lives Matter shirt! Losers of a feather really do stick together!!!)To round out today’s edition, yes, sure, I know that this safety vest and helmet weren’t actually, technically a part of Rita Ora’s insane NYE concert rehearsal ensemble which included this neon yellow, fur-trimmed, chainlink-print jacket that says “FROM ANOTHER PLACE” across the back, but it really should’ve been. As I said when that country singer Priscilla Block first came to my attention at the CMAs last year for posing with a traffic cone on the red carpet, there is something I find very compelling about the genre of hi-vis safety apparel. Plus, it’s a workwear category that still feels like it has yet to be mined to the max by high-end brands. Now if we can just figure out a way to make it a little sluttier……
Ok, well, much like Mariah, I’m kicking off 2024 by showing you all my bad side (In her case, left. In my case, this entire email.) and crossing my fingers that you’ll love me all the more for it.
Here’s hoping that your year is starting off with the gentle and tender yearning of John Mayer locked in a cat cafe.
Time for me to go make love to the camera. Later, dolls!
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Ciao!
Mariah in the tub 😭😭😭
I cannot see furry slides and not think of eeeeelariaaa Baldwin! She’s also clomping around in fur feet!