Trip Down Memory Lane
Clothing as joke, as camouflage, as poem, as blog post...
Hello! I moved into my new place in Portland, Oregon this past week and I’ve been feeling nostalgic, so here are three unlocked bonus posts from the past two years that I feel deserve a second look and a wider audience (definitely not reposting because I’m overwhelmed and need an extra day or two to muster up a fresh post [don’t worry, it’s coming ASAP after I finish my 156th rewatch of the genderbent Gethsemane from Jesus Christ Superstar that has had me absolutely spellbound for the past seven days]). They’re all three a little weird and feel very emblematic of the Esque ethos (though they were written before the Big Rebrand, so you’ll notice I still signed off each as Human Repeller). Below, you’ll find a TON of fashion designed to either be hidden or be found, fashion that plays with what an outfit can BE (joke? secret? armor?), and one of my beloved rounds of Wearable Poetry (including a poem by yours truly that IMO is some of my best work and nobody wants to publish, though I actually got a few poems accepted into random little [thus cool] lit mags in the past two weeks after a years long dry spell!!!). Now that I’ve duly abused parentheses for a protracted paragraph, let’s get into it all!
Don’t forget that most of the links below are likely dead at this point! If you find something you LOVE, there should be enough info to seek it out, but if anything gets confusing just respond to this email or send me a note and I’ll help you out. Also, please excuse any formatting snafus or outdated references!
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Thank you SO MUCH for your support, whatever you are able and willing to do to help is extremely valuable to me and I’m honored to be a small part of your life on the web.
Bonus: Hide and Seek
Fashion to obfuscate or ostentate (or both).
Originally posted March 22, 2023
Yo! Today’s bonus post is another exploration of a false but fecund dichotomy (my kryptonite in these posts): Hide vs Seek. In past posts about “utility” in fashion, I noted some hiding and some seeking functions that clothes may perform in addition to simply covering the requisite orifices.
To me, hiding and seeking via clothing intertwines in layers of complexity: hiding your body’s shapes via huge frills might actually draw more attention to your person, seeking attention with a fascinating accessory might muddy the waters of your look as gestalt, the fact that uniforms, a sartorial expression of rigidity and restraint are often employed as fetish wear, the trap of being so searchingly vulnerable that you inadvertently repel people…
Below are mood boards, key words, and shoppable clothing recs based off the dualities of “Hide” and “Seek” as realized in fashion. I hope you enjoy this admittedly more-abstract-than-usual endeavor!
Hide
Obfuscation
Distraction
Billowy/lumpiness
Coyness
Restraint
Spikiness
Camouflage
Containment
Subtlety
Seek
Knighthood
Odyssey/Expedition
Attention-grabbing
Exposure
Punk
Openness
Bravery/Vulnerability
Pageantry
Whether your M.O. today is to hide, to seek, or to endeavor towards both at once, I hope you have a good one, and I’ll be back soon with more miscellaneous musings.
<3 HR
Bonus: Outfit as Joke, Secret, Wish, Armor, Question...
Disclaimer: some ontological liberties taken.
Originally posted June 15, 2023
Real bonus post hours! As you may or may not know, I went to school for sculpture (lol, BIG mistake), and as such, I often tend to view objects in terms of their functions as metonyms or physical manifestations of phenomena or abstractions: object as response, as apology, as weapon, as dream, as quotation, as mystery, as pet, as home, as hymn, as offering, as refusal…
This activation, almost enchantment, of objects was actually, for me, the result of a pipeline sourced in my love of fashion. Clothes are the most-alive objects in that they are designed to contain, constrain, expand, and outline the activities of living beings—their inherent proximity, both in distance and form, to the human body fundamentally associates these clothes, and the outfits they comprise, with humanity itself. Thus, outfits, too, can be construed as response, as apology, as weapon, as dream, as quotation, as mystery, as pet, as home, as hymn, as offering, as refusal…And on and on. Here are five ways of being that might apply to an outfit (as joke, secret, wish, armor, and question), and of course, five corresponding and shoppable outfits. Let me know your favorite!
Outfit as Joke
One thing I feel is missing from most of the fashion content I come across (outside of HR) is a sense of humble levity, of wry acknowledgement of the inherent frivolity and awkwardness in fitting something as awkward as a human body into glorified genital decorations. I played that up in this fit, which contains items I think a sentient piñata shaped like a jester would wear.
IDs:
Upolu Hat - €360
Ruched Camisole - $209 (Sale)
Moscha Trousers - $408 (Sale)
Moon Bag - $245 (Sale)
Trickster Friend Bracelet - $225
Fey Sandal - $125 (Sale)
Outfit as Secret
The decisions in getting dressed largely revolve around choices of what, and how, to reveal and conceal. This outfit deals with, and complicates, both the what (with shorts that are basically underwear paired with a modest [but slightly sheer (but censored with a black scarfy thing)] cardigan) and the how (with a hat that can zip into or out of its brim, an origami-d tote bag, and similarly fold-riddled flats).
IDs:
Zip Cap - €552 (Sale)
Vintage Tie Cardigan - $343.92
Black Tote - $306 (Sale)
Squared Toe Flats - $428
Outfit as Wish
This outfit is about desire, both in a naïve, childlike way, with rhinestoned sneakers and flowing hair bows, and in an embodied, sexual way, with a sheer, cut-out top and a very ‘aughties, pearlescent purse.
IDs:
Recital Bows - $98
Mesh T-Shirt - $108 (Sale)
Eclipse Bag - $980
2000s Skirt - $72.42 (Sale)
Fusion Sneakers - $327 (Sale)
Outfit as Armor
An outfit that plays with the idea of a “uniform”—bomber jacket, aviator-style cap and glasses, creepers (as in 2010 high schooler’s “uniform”)—as a protective, grounding, securing ritual of dress, with more literal “armor” details in the rounded shape of the shirt’s sleeves, the stitched “plating” at the knees of the pants, and an airbag-of-a…bag.
IDs:
Vintage Aviator Cap - $12.50
90s Sunglasses - €299
Vintage Bomber Jacket - $200
Leno Stripe Shirt - $485
Giran Trousers - $334 (Sale)
Padded 3-Layer Bag - $92 (Sale)
Viva Creepers - $69.98 (Sale)
Outfit as Question
The ultimate questioner is the oracle, who simply asks “??????” and lets the gods fill in the blank of both the content of the questioned question and its ultimate answer. As such, a scrying ball-of-a-purse seemed appropriate, as did a collection of beads which, when scattered, probably spell out the words the wearer might not know are in their heart. The dress is a question in and of itself, its bizarre, artificial silhouette like a mysterious punctuation mark from another dimension, and the shades of gray and cream are there for added ambiguity.
IDs:
Compost Necklace - $740 and Belt - $1,050
Vintage Linen Dress - $448.59
Sleeves - $131 (Sale)
Egg Bag - $698 (Sale)
Belmont Boots - $260 (Sale)
Hope you had a good time scrolling and clicking, you fiends! Thank you for being here, and see you again sooner than soon!
<3 HR
Wearable Poetry Vol. Two
Outfits based on poems by Linda Gregg, Frank O'Hara, Danez Smith, Ilya Kaminsky, and Me!
Originally posted April 21, 2024
Hi! How’re you doing? Chag almost-Pesach Sameach. It feels unbelievable that the first Wearable Poetry post I shared came out over a year ago—I have to say, this bluesletter is the first thing (besides, nominally, college) I’ve committed to for lone enough (four years) that recurring themes actually have poignance and temporal heft. It makes me proud, and happy you’ve stuck around for more outfits based on poems by Linda Gregg, Frank O'Hara, Danez Smith, Ilya Kaminsky, and Me. The photoshop jobs are still as hackneyed, and I still don’t have any good explanations for each outfit’s relation to the poem of its genesis—feel free to read into every choice I made, and assume anything brilliant was intentional and anything boring has a meaning so deep none of us could possibly begin to excavate it. Just kidding, but send me your favorite poem in a response to this email, please!
By Linda Gregg:
New York Address
The sun had just gone out
and I was walking three miles to get home.
I wanted to die.
I couldn't think of words and I had no future
and I was coming down hard on everything.
My walk was terrible.
I didn't seem to have a heart at all
and my whole past seemed filled up.
So I started answering all the questions regardless of consequence:
Yes I hate dark. No I love light. Yes I won't speak.
No I will write. Yes I will breed. No I won't love.
Yes I will bless. No I won't close. Yes I won't give.
Love is on the other side of the lake.
It is painful because the dark makes you hear
the water more. I accept all that.
And that we are not allowed romance but only its distance.
Having finished with it all, now I am not listening.
I wait for the silence to resume.
IDs:
Headphones - $149
Armour Vest - $280
Vintage Handbag - $47
V-Soul Silver Toe Shoes - $100
From Meditations in an Emergency by Frank O’Hara:
Mayakovsky
1
My heart’s aflutter!
I am standing in the bath tub
crying. Mother, mother
who am I? If he
will just come back once
and kiss me on the face
his coarse hair brush
my temple, it’s throbbing!
then I can put on my clothes
I guess, and walk the streets.
2
I love you. I love you,
but I’m turning to my verses
and my heart is closing
like a fist.
Words! be
sick as I am sick, swoon,
roll back your eyes, a pool,
and I’ll stare down
at my wounded beauty
which at best is only a talent
for poetry.
Cannot please, cannot charm or win
what a poet!
and the clear water is thick
with bloody blows on its head.
I embrace a cloud,
but when I soared
it rained.
3
That’s funny! there’s blood on my chest
oh yes, I’ve been carrying bricks
what a funny place to rupture!
and now it is raining on the ailanthus
as I step out onto the window ledge
the tracks below me are smoky and
glistening with a passion for running
I leap into the leaves, green like the sea
4
Now I am quietly waiting for
the catastrophe of my personality
to seem beautiful again,
and interesting, and modern.
The country is grey and
brown and white in trees,
snows and skies of laughter
always diminishing, less funny
not just darker, not just grey.
It may be the coldest day of
the year, what does he think of
that? I mean, what do I? And if I do,
perhaps I am myself again.
IDs:
By Danez Smith:
I’M GOING BACK TO MINNESOTA WHERE SADNESS MAKES SENSE
O California, don’t you know the sun is only a god
if you learn to starve for him? I’m bored with the ocean
I stood at the lip of it, dressed in down, praying for snow
I know, I’m strange, too much light makes me nervous
at least in this land where the trees always bear green.
I know something that doesn’t die can’t be beautiful.
Have you ever stood on a frozen lake, California?
The sun above you, the snow & stalled sea—a field of mirror
all demanding to be the sun too, everything around you
is light & it’s gorgeous & if you stay too long it will kill you
& it’s so sad, you know? You’re the only warm thing for miles
& the only thing that can’t shine.
IDs:
Brimmed Scarf - $128
Split Sleeve Johnny Collar Sweater - $445.50 (Sale)
Lace Ring Bell Skirt - £525
Mini Bucket Bag - $370
Slim Square Flip Flop - $34
From Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky:
Still Newlyweds
You step out of the shower and the entire nation calms—
a drop of lemon-egg shampoo,
you smell like bees,
a brief kiss,
I don’t know anything about you—except the spray of freckles on your shoulders!
which makes me feel so thrillingly
alone.
I stand on earth in my pajamas,
penis sticking out—
for years
in your direction.
IDs:
Desnuda North Earring - $375
Bonino Set - $442
Vintage Italian Straw Handbag - $62.25
Bocado Shoe - $198
By me:
Benediction
I bless your hair, in its spongy phase,
The way you said “solace,” a jar you wanted to keep
Though stained with red sauce,
The simple fact that you wore plaid,
The duty with which you put on your pants,
The berries on your mom’s pancakes you hid in a napkin
So I didn’t have to eat them, the way you knew I didn’t love you
But lived with me as if I did.
I sanctify the embarrassment you felt for me
When I pretended to: I’d been confused for my life
But you remember the tricks I’m too old to know now,
Everything that’s worthy in me lives in that vacancy,
And if you needed to, I’d let you love it.
IDs:
Twin Pearl Stud - $134
Multicolor Puzzle T-Shirt - $1,300
Joan Ring - $195
Braided Seams Pull-on Loafer - €450
All my best and worst tied up in a pretty package for you—
<3 HR
You are literally a genius and this is the coolest fashion newsletter everrrr like I know so little about fashion and wear the same things all the time but I LOVE and am so endlessly fascinated by Esque!!!
Your poem is lovely, Esque! What a bevvy of amazing pieces...I'm overwhelmed in a good way! I love how you've explored so many of the roles that clothing can fulfil.