Retail Therapy 035: Belt Bags & Derby Boys
A Kentucky Derby announcement, brotox, Coachella, and more.
Listen to today’s Retail Therapy on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube (see above), and anywhere else podcasts are found.
Yep — Retail Therapy is headed to The Kentucky Derby this year to get some loafers-on-the-ground coverage of all the fits, cocktails, and horses (I guess). I haven’t been The Kentucky Derby since my early 20s, so it will be a nice reprise at a time in my life when I don’t have the confidence of a college kid when it comes to drinking those dangerous juleps.
Overall, though, I think the style of Derby is really one of the largest draws for me. It’s celebratory, it’s unique, it’s loud. Which is probably why we spent a majority of this week’s segment overthinking our fits for the year. Spoiler: I currently only know which suit I’m wearing and literally nothing else.
But every year I’ve gone, I always go back and read Hunter S. Thompson’s The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved to get excited. And a little scared. Here’s a brief excerpt, but I highly recommend reading the entire essay yourself if you’ve got an open Sunday afternoon on the couch.
The rest of that day blurs into madness. The rest of that night too. And all the next day and night. Such horrible things occurred that I can’t bring myself even to think about them now, much less put them down in print. Steadman was lucky to get out of Louisville without serious injuries, and I was lucky to get out at all.
Can’t wait.
How are dudes supposed to carry stuff en masse?
Since about 2019, I’ve been a complete and utter “tote bag guy.” My go-to is a dark green tote with six interior pockets, no zipper, and few coffee stains on the bottom. So while it does make sense for work, I still always end up resorting to a backpack when I’m actually traveling.
And yes, sometimes I do feel like a little kid with my backpack. And my suspicions only became confirmed after seeing this from Blackbird Spyplane’s newsletter:
The Grown-A**-Man Market is full of nice, adult-coded offerings that can look great in the abstract and which supposedly address and remedy the “Little Timmy” problem. I’m thinking about your small-batch artisan type waxed-canvas knapsacks, “elevated” takes on rolltop daypacks / bike-messenger joints, etc.
But the fundamental issue remains that if you are making your daily rounds in a backpack, there’s dangerously high potential for giving off “middle-school snotnose” and / or “junior-management go-getter picking up his convention lanyard” energy.
Did we agree with the anti-backpack agenda? Well, not exactly.
LL Beams
We’ve been loving some collaboration talk lately, and it seemed only natural this week to discuss a brand that’s had two collabs of note lately: Beams. Their recent work with LL Bean and Arc’teryx only seemed natural to critique, but I think I can speak for everyone when I say that both of these were 🤌.
Here’s an album of the LL Bean line:
And from the Arc’teryx:
Whole Squad Reducing Their Forehead Lines
Toward the end of this week’s episode, we dove into botox. More specifically, dudes getting botox. With neither of us having much personal experience in the area, we did what everyone’s been doing lately to learn themselves something: we took to TikToks from this PR Week article:
Botox, which celebrated its 20th anniversary of Food and Drug Administration approval last year, is becoming increasingly popular among young men – a trend dubbed as “brotox.”
The trend is perhaps unsurprising given Gen Z and millennials’ tendencies to focus on self-care, “glow-ups” and self-improvement.
The “brotox boom” is making waves among both young and old men – and TikTok is home to various iterations of it.
If our skin looks great at The Kentucky Derby, please do not ask any questions.
Of course, we closed things out with our wishlists and imminent cops.
For 2023, we’ve hit the reset button on our wishlists and made them a bit more digestible for the year ahead. To access the complete version of our 2022 wishlists, look no further than our final Listener Digest of 2022. New items in bold.
Will’s Wishlist (2023)
YSL Patent Tortoise Le Loafers ($895) — Link
AYR Sweatpants ($145) — Link
Pebble Strike Match Holder by Houseplant ($125) — Link
NikeCraft General Purpose Shoe —Link(Bought and re-sold)Sangre de Fruta Garden of Earthly Delights Body Wash ($48) — Link
New Balance 574 Legacy (MKT) — Link
Bode Kids Lace Shirt ($198) — Link
Barrett’s Wishlist (2023)
Loewe Puzzle Cardholder ($335) — Link
Bottega Veneta Credit Card Case ($420) — Link
R13 Beige Kurt Sneakers ($470) — Link
Le Labo Fragrances ($220) — The Matcha 26 | Another 13
Homme Plisse Issey Miyake “Color Pleats” ($325) — Link
Polo Country Ball Cap ($55) — Link
Moscot Yontif Sunglasses in Blonde ($340) — Link
Listen to today’s Retail Therapy on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube (see above), and anywhere else podcasts are found.
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I'm pro bookbag and I think aersf.com is making some great minimalist backpacks and day packs.