end of summer = end of the world
you can see it all laid out
Halloween is supposed to be the time of year that the veil between dimensions is thinnest, but I disagree. It’s the end of Summer. It’s the end of the world. The golden hour stretches on and on and you can feel all of time oozing together as you watch the sun set slowly like the chain of your ancestors all did back and back to the beginning. Tomatoes and corn burst red and yellow and everything passes too quickly. Soon the air will smell like smoke, and wool will scratch your skin. Everything puts itself back together again neatly. I’m not tan enough.
I’ve always liked oldies in the Summer. I don’t want to be here or now. I like 70’s Elvis more than 50’s Elvis. You can hear the darkness creeping in. Like maybe he knows he’s about to die. I love this song by The Flamingos. It sounds like it’s being sung by real true ghosts, or broadcast from another dimension. I’ve been listening to lots of French bullshit. Whatever this is. On repeat. She’s from somewhere.
I was talking to my friend Kendall the other day about polka dots. She mentioned wanting a pair of Charlie Beads bloomers in the print, which made me smile. I find that the grand majority of people are dot-haters— they read too antiquated, or worse, have twee connotations due to their Deschanel-ian ‘10s revival.
And yet I can’t stop thinking about them.
If you’ve been around me for five minutes or less in the past month, I’ve likely muttered on about how I’m re-reading The Secret History. The book that has, years after its original publishing singlehandedly spawned the grating yet weirdly comforting subculture that is “dark academia”. The Spotify playlists for it are really quite funny, the in-house classical one is alright, but the fan-made ones are awful- Henry Winter was not listening to Hozier. It’s particularly funny considering one of the characters is often described as blaring John Philip Sousa marches at all hours of the night, really great detail especially picturing this on a fantastically preppy New England college campus in the 1980s.
Anyway, to bring this back to the topic at hand, dots. My dream collab at the moment is dark academia x dots, shot through with a layer of spooky macabre. Is “drab whimsy” too much of an oxymoron? This grounds them, and prevents them from looking costume-y or cheap. There aren’t teals, or reds, or anything that could be described as rockabilly. Instead, polka dots elevate typically stuffy Oxfordian fabrics and colors. It’s fun without being too fun. Dotty without being, well, dotty. Even typical 60’s mod silhouettes work here, pair them with messy hair and a pair of white socks and loafers. This Miu Miu skirt has me putting a vintage dotted pleated skirt on my fall wishlist.
Lookbook below:
The Pacific Northwest. Northern California. Never really been. Lived in a town called Government Camp in Oregon for two weeks once though. There was nothing to do really but get huckleberry milkshakes and watch Stand By Me (not only an Oregon movie, but a top End of Summer movie). The light there was golden, the nature was staggering. The magic there wasn’t my own.
I found it again recently in an incredibly small-batch knitwear line by Madeleine Murr called Bloke Knitwear. I saw a video of hers on Tiktok (see here) featuring girls with long natural hair soaked in sun-drenched happiness, more Joni Mitchell than Lana del Rey (but still a little Lana..). They surf and hitchhike on craggy shores and treelined roads wearing boldly striped knits. The line has sweaters and shorts that are inspired by salmon and rainbow trout skins— they’re distinctly nautical in a way that is both crunchy and ethereal.
Sweaters and shorts are available on Bloke’s IG every few months. Join me in eagerly awaiting the next drop, pretending that my office’s high-rise is a chic lakehouse inhabited with my gorgeous friends.
Like if you live for woo woo