Retail Therapy 024: Cool Kids & Tiny Beanies
Newsletters, Julia Fox, and Drinking Cortados
Listen to today’s Retail Therapy on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube (see above), and anywhere else podcasts are found.
How To Find Out What The ‘Cool Kids’ Are Into
What defines a Cool Kid™? Are the things I consider Cool™ not niche enough? Can you even be cool if you don’t put out a weekly newsletter?
In what turned into a slight existential online crisis for me, Barrett and I dove into a conversation that began with a newsletter: Perfectly Imperfect, to be exact.
If you’re not familiar already, Perfectly Imperfect was featured by The New York Times last week and it was definitely worth the read for unintentional humor reasons.
Started during the loneliest days of the pandemic, the newsletter offers highly curated recommendations from on-the-cusp tastemakers and aspiring aesthetes including the synth-pop singer Jake Lazovick, the Canadian painter Chloe Wise, the model Meetka Otto and the “Euphoria” actress Chloe Cherry.
When the newsletter itself had a party, The Times was there to make sure they got interviews with people who I assume were under the influence based on their answers to what’s Cool™ these days.
Some examples? *extreme SNL Stefon voice* Weather reports, the indie-sleaze revival, unsweetened iced tea from McDonald’s, riding Citi Bikes, wet cupping $1 slices of pizza, and (of course) Third Eye Blind.
Yeah, I don’t know either.
Let’s All Dress Like Nordic Fisherman
Tiny Beanies have been polarizing for as long as they’ve been around. Me? I’m fine with them and would even entertain wearing one — as long as the weather is below 40 degrees outside. Barrett? Well, he seemed a bit more conflicted. But who can argue with Christian Bale’s tiny beanie from GQ last month?
If you’re not privy to the trend itself, here’s a meme that can help explain it all:
The conversation surrounding beanies snowballed once we began referencing a column written in The New Yorker — I’m A Tiny Beanie And This Is My Modern Life — that had a few sentences that could be considered biting to Retail Therapy listeners.
Sometimes, after a particularly long day, I confide in my colleagues in the drawer back home, Double Knee Pants and Chore Jacket. Do they struggle with imposter syndrome, too? My human has a computer job in a fancy office, so why does he insist on dressing like a rugged tradesman?
Double Knee’s father was an actual carpenter’s pant, constantly dragged and scuffed around until patchwork was needed. His brothers—one worn by a plumber, the other by a roofer—point out his lack of wear and tear and call him “fancy pants” when he visits home. Double Knee knows that he was lucky to avoid such a rugged life, but he sometimes wishes he had a hard-earned rip or two.
I mean, shit. But honestly, that didn’t hurt as much as the final paragraph:
Do I regret finding my place in this world atop a cortado-drinking dude who hangs skateboard decks on his walls as art? Not at all. He and I are simply doing our best, even if our fathers and forefathers might not understand this modern life style.
Yep, we’re in the thick of the zeitgeist here.
Harry Styles, Gucci, Julia Fox, and Emily Ratajkowski’s Podcast
Harry Styles’s new Gucci collection just dropped, but that wasn’t really our topic of interest as we peeled back the layers further and further. What transpired was a larger discussion about celebrity, the use of celebrity to sell products, the rise of celebrity podcasts, why Julia Fox is famous, and (most importantly) why Julia Fox has become the celebrity I can’t look away from.
And yes, we even recorded this episode before this photo dropped:
God save The Queens.
As always, we closed things out with our wishlists and imminent cops.
Apologies for any broken links below — a lot of these products are now from older seasons or have since sold out, so our link situation will remain in flux.
Will’s Wishlist
Vintage Side Tables
Adidas x FA Experiment 1 Shoes — Purchased this week (on sale!)
Barrett’s Wishlist
To listen to this week’s episode of Retail Therapy in its entirety, look no further than Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Feedback? Compliments? Comments? Concerns? We’d love to hear your thoughts on this week’s episode.