Suit of the Week: Akris

118 Comments

1. Sometimes I think the stylists are just f***ing with us with the shoe choices.

   1. Absolutely.

   2. Moira Rose would have worn those in black. And the suit in black.

      1. Moira Rose is a fictional character, much as I love her, but I don’t think her choices would fly in a corporate environment. Maybe if you owned the corporation…

   3. Lol, I’d come to the comments just to comment on those shoes. ha!

   4. Hahahaha! Yep!

   5. came here to say just that

2. I’ve been wearing more and more ballet flats and slides because no one on zoom can see my feet. I find it’s a lot more painful than heels due to the lack of arch support. Thoughts? Am I just used to heels? Am I just buying the worst possible flats?

   1. Yep, I think you’ve identified the problem: zero support. My zoom shoes are Birks or slippers personally.

   2. Ballet flats are terrible for feet.

      1. +1 Can’t figure out how everyone can wear their beloved Rothy’s for the same reason. I also like my birks, or something with arch support and a small wedge heel. I think you really have to look at the comfort brands – Cole Haan (some styles), Ecco, etc.

         But I’m really happy with my Birkenstock mayaris and my Birkenstock clogs slippers for wfh.

   3. Back again to recommend the only “shoes” I’ve worn since March. Insanely comfortable. Supportive like a real shoe. https://www.sperry.com/en/shearling-cup-sole-slipper/35649W.html

   4. My most comfortable office shoes are 1-2″ block heels, then flats like ballet or smoking slipper styles, then higher or skinnier heels. What works best for you will depend on your natural arch shape!

      For WFH, I wear my “house Birks” as they are more supportive than padding around barefoot. We are a “no shoes” house so wearing anything else hadn’t even occurred to me!

   5. Are you WFH and standing all day, or wearing them during a walking commute? I need more arch support than most people, but I’m fine wearing mine for my mostly sedentary job on a daily basis. I can’t wear them for hours of standing or walking though. My WFH look is usually paired with either bare feet or socks.

   6. The concept of arch support is entertaining to me. Almost no shoes reach my arch, so there is no arch support. Exception: Abeo metatarsal

      1. This. Should my shoes reach my arch? The inner bottom part of the middle of my foot? The part that doesn’t make footprints because it doesn’t touch the ground? Why would that be comfortable?

         1. Just wait a few years…. you’ll find out…

      2. Get an orthotic. Life changing for me.

3. Unpopular opinion, but no one here should even consider a $3400 blazer unless they have maxed out their campaign contributions to Biden and donated all they can to charity. Really, I think almost nobody should ever have a blazer that expensive, but I’m trying to hedge it. Hate me all you want.

   1. I think it’s an obscene amount of money to spend on an article of clothing (and get a bit irked to see expensive suits like this frequently featured on a site wherein the readers tear people apart for being insufficiently woke); however, it’s not for me to tell people that other people have a better claim to their own money than they do.

      FWIW, Americans give almost a half-trillion to charity every year, and the Biden campaign will likely end up with a billion dollars. (Consultants and large media companies are like Scrooge McDuck diving into his pile of cash.)

      1. I’m in a purple state, so you’d think that all that $ would be going to perfect Biden commercials. And the ones I’ve seen are so sloppy in their editing that they almost support the sense that he’s a doddering old man. If you’ve got a bunch of choppy editing, what are you not seeing? It is borderline disturbing and I wish that they’d not air them or air something better. Things like this aren’t helping (no doubt someone was well compensated for their work; they should refund all of it).

      2. Sure, but the “you do you” philosophy is how we ended up in our current mess, especially with the pandemic. Some choices are objectively better than others. It’s patently absurd that there are people in the USA who own nesting yachts while families are scraping by on $11,000 a year in single-wide trailers.

         1. Agree, but I don’t care if you spend $3500 on a splurge outfit or a piece of art or a new patio or whatever.

   2. I like the color of the suit, but sure as h3ll can’t afford anything close to that. Costs more than twice my monthly mortgage and car payment combined.

   3. I hear you that this seems like a lot of money to spend on an item of clothing given the state of the world. But then where is the line? My $100 yoga leggings are frivolous too, and for many people, $100 for leggings is just as crazy as $3400 for a suit.

      1. I think even a quite poor person (by U.S. standards) can wrap their head around $100 leggings. $3390 just for a jacket is another ballgame.

         1. Actually, they can’t. They shop at Walmart, including for clothes (it is already the largest grocery chain in the US). They may know they exist, but have no idea why you would just part with $85 more than you need to spend on them. They know you’re not doing yoga in them (if you are that against is hugely wasteful spending when you can google your favorite poses). Eating chips on the couch does not require clothing spending.)

            Does anyone get out of their bubble? The world outside of the bubble is vast and IMO why Biden is likely to be as surprised as HRC in November. Biden may have come from Scranton, but the advisors and such are probably so far removed from that world that they can’t craft messages that are persuasive enough to matter.

            1. I meant that it’s still in the realm of understanding, not that poor people would agree with buying them. There’s a difference. It’s like how I can say “oh wow, that’s so expensive” when someone flies first class instead of coach with a $600 price difference, but it doesn’t rock me to my core, you know?

            2. I don’t disagree with you that there is a urban yoga-pants-and-Starbucks bubble, but the rural midwest and the rural south are their own bubbles too.

         2. Not the Anon at 3:11. While it’s easier for people to comprehend $100 leggings than a $3,400 blazer, I bet a lot more money (overall) is “wasted” on $100 leggings than on $3,400 blazers.

            LuLuLemon does about $4 billion in annual sales. Akris generated $40 million in sales – one-hundredth of what LuLuLemon generated. Even if we assume that an Akris blazer could be bought at 1/10th of the price, i.e. Akris represents $36 million in frivolous overspending, by any measure, LuLuLemon accounts for a lot more frivolous spending.

            1. This is an excellent point. Net dollars, a lot more is “wasted” on $100 leggings than whatever higher arbitrary threshold the OP wants to throw out there.

            2. I think if you are a female CEO or equity partner, you shop at Akris. And that is fine. It must be nice to buy clothes made by fabric not made by treated and cut/sewn by adults paid fair wages. It’s like buying a car that is not a 5YO Honda Civic or a fancy car or private school or vacations where you don’t stay on someone’s couch (or your couch). Not all of it is “needed” but it supports people who need jobs who may or may not get treated fairly for their time/skills/goods.

               Agree that the shopping of female CEOs for CEO-type clothes is small potatoes of necessity. Spending at fancy mall stores is much larger and much more common. IDK if Akris is even sold in my city. It is aspirational. You can find a knockoff if you want.

   4. I’m not buying a $3400 blazer or an $80,000 engagement ring (or anywhere close to that, even after hacking off a zero) but find commentary like this exhausting, particularly on a fashion blog (you know, that makes money by selling things to the readers). Where do you draw the line on what’s “acceptable” luxury and what is not? I’m sure there are things in your closet/home/budget that are luxuries compared to a large portion of the global population.

      1. Yeah I was the leggings poster above, but you said it better. Pretty much everything in my life would have seemed insanely luxurious to me when I was growing up — and would seem luxurious to many in this country, and certainly the wider world. Where do you draw the line, indeed?

         1. This makes me think of a conversation I had with someone in high school. It blew his mind that there are shirts that cost less than $40. It blew my mind that there were shirts that cost more than $40.

         2. Totally agree. I didn’t grow up poor but had/have a lot of family who were/are poor. My parents both grew up on food stamps, for example. We lived a much more luxurious life than my parents did growing up and were the rich people in the extended family (relatively speaking, although somewhat hilarious to me now in hindsight that I thought we were rich!). I moved in middle school to a much wealthier area and suddenly was one of the “poor” kids (again, relatively speaking, not in reality) and was honestly shocked by some of the things that people spent money on/could afford. Now literally anything in my life is an insane luxury by comparison to my childhood or even my wealthier adolescence. We bought a house last year and our down payment was more than double the value of the house I grew up in for example (and we only put 15% down) but are definitely among the most frugal/least wealthy in our current circle. Having been fortunate enough to experience significant upward mobility, I find views like the OP’s (almost) as exhausting as my friends who complain about how they have no money living their fancy lives I could not have even imagined as a child. But, as my mom always says, someone always has it worse and someone always has it better. It’s easy to point at what other people do and note that they’re selfish or corrupt or whatever because they have more but just remember that there’s always going to be someone who can say the same about you.

      2. My parents still think a $5 coffee is an unnecessary luxury. My grandmother would drop if she knew what I spend in a month on coffee.

         1. +1 I’m pretty sure my grandmother is rolling in her grave that I don’t put vegetable scraps in a ziplock bag in the freezer to save for stock. My coffee budget may be enough to kill her again.

         2. It is an unnecessary luxury.

            1. Ugh, many things in our daily lives are unnecessary luxuries. What is so wrong with indulging in occasional luxuries? Whatever device you are typing your responses on is also likely an unnecessary luxury, just as an example. Giving up $5 coffees isn’t going to save our vast social problems any more than they’re going to help a millennial buy a house

            2. Hope you don’t have an iPad, Anonymous at 4:48 pm! Unnecessary luxury.

   5. There is so much money in campaigns and lobbying, donations to Presidential campaigns by individuals don’t matter at all unless you are in the .0001% and give a substantial amount. I refuse to give one penny to this absolute farce of a presidential campaign.

      I thinks it’s great if people can afford this blazer, appreciate lovely things, and buy it and wear it. I wouldn’t buy it because expensive blazers aren’t my thing right now, but I don’t begrudge people that can. Do I have some expensive things? Sure, ones I carefully selected and paid with money I earned. I believe it’s a far better use of my money than contributing to all that money sloshing around in politics. I give to charity, I grew up poor, and so on. I want nicer “things” including food security and healthcare for everyone, not to take away from those that have more.

      1. “Buying a thing” feels so much less wasteful to me than attempting to influence the outcome of an election with my money, especially given my budget. It seems like a profound ethical failure of our entire political system that so much money is spent on campaigning in the first place.

         1. Oh yeah, I would 100% support getting the money out of politics, but this is the world we live in. I hope all rich liberal people in this country are maxing tf out on their donations to Biden because Trump is a unique danger to all of our prosperity.

   6. I don’t think you should get on your high horse about a suit. The expensive suits are made out of largely natural fibers, not polyester, and not made using Chinese factory labor. In addition, my more expensive pieces in large part last forever. I bought an expensive jacket NWT second hand after the dot com bust and I am still wearing it. I bought other pieces used second hand in the early 90s and still wear them. Pieces that no longer fit that are quality can be resold and don’t end up in a vast landfill.

4. This looks like a LeSuit combo from Burlington Coat Factory to me.

   I just want to say how very thankful I am to live in modern times. For many reasons, but most of the time, for pharmaceuticals. I can’t imagine trying to live without my antidepressant, and when I get debilitating cramps every month, the only thing that keeps me going is 8 Aleve per day. Having to do manual labor without either of those? So, so thankful. It’s strangely something I think about often.

   1. Me too. Like John Mulaney said, “Oh, God, the old times. No Zyrtec or nothin’.”

   2. I think about this all the time. I would be nearly blind and likely dead in any generation.

      1. Yes I’d be functionally blind but no matter because I died in childbirth 34 years ago…

   3. I’m probably not meant to be alive, considering my extreme health problems in childhood and how many maintenance meds I require to function now. It’s good that I’m childfree, because my genes are trash.

      1. Same man, same. Except my condition is both structural and internal so I get meds and surgeries. So fun!

   4. I’ve been thinking about this too while watching Call the Midwife. The show really clearly shows how socialized medicine in the UK completely, 100% changed things for so many women and their families. Today, we have better medications and technology, but in the 50s and 60s, it must have been nothing short of transformative to have access to “free” healthcare (paid for only through general taxes). I so wish we could have that in the U.S.

   5. I think about this a lot now that I have a baby. Baby bottles, formula, bottle brushes, my dishwasher, childhood vaccinations, a washing machine, baby bathing tubs… so much easier than what my grandmothers had to deal with.

      1. I have totally become a formula convert recently and am so, so glad that a safe, healthy alternative to breastfeeding exists today. So glad.

         1. Just want to lend some support from a fellow formula feeding mom. The worst part was the lack of support from other people. My little guy is now four and he’s about as smart and healthy as you can imagine. You’re a good mom.

            1. That’s so nice of you. You’re a great mom yourself!

      2. My great-grandmother gave birth to 6 pairs of twins, and 5 children survived past infancy (no more than 1 per pair of twins). Some died during or right after birth, but she also didn’t have enough milk and supplemented with goats milk. Modern medicine, formula, and contraception means she would have had a very different life.

      3. I think that our grandmothers started solids at . . . 5 minutes old? IDK a granny who doesn’t suggest putting rice in a bottle with Karo syrup the minute a baby fusses. I think they did a lot of things that worked for them back when there were fewer options (and lead-based paint and open-flame gas heaters).

      4. Omg, good point. My son’s fairly ‘mild’ food allergies (that he grew out of) likely would have killed him in the olden days. As the grandparents kept harping on about how ‘in their day’ nobody had allergies, we both reminded them that was because in the old days those kids died. For ‘unknown’ reasons. As so many kids used to. Selective rose colored glasses….

   6. I grew up with parents whose views on modern medicine for anything less than a broken bone or life-threatening illness were somewhere between “sinners deserve pain, offer it up to god” and “pharmaceuticals cause abortions and also make fish gay”.

      I discovered DayQuil in college. Did you know you can just swallow a bright orange pill and suddenly feel 50-90% less sick? And there are other pills that will break a fever or rapidly end a headache! Plus there are ones you can take that just get rid of the symptoms of minor allergies.

      I don’t even know how to explain how straight-up magical pharmaceuticals seem when you’re not used to them. I tried to tell some of my younger siblings about them and they thought I was making it up.

      1. Have you read Educated by Tara what’s-her-name? She has a similar experience with Tylenol.

         1. Tara Westover. That painkiller chapter was memorable! So were some of the graphic injury parts…

      2. Too funny, when I grew up our medicine cabinet was baby aspirin, some weird salve in a metal tin, and turpentine.

   7. Yep. I’d be dead without medications, and I’d be on a fast road to dead without some of the most specialized (and therefore extremely expensive) medications. I also like modernized healthcare because I’m typing this with a central line in my chest, from my bed at home rather than in a hospital.

      1. Thinking of you!

      2. Thank you! It is not covid. As confirmed by the three brain poke swabs in four days. I’m just normal chronic illness sick with an infection. Again.

   8. Hard agree. If I made it to adulthood (unlikely, I had a severe but treatable illness as a teenager) then I would have died in childbirth due to the long-term complications of said illness which again, required specialists for my labor/delivery. Even taking those things out of account, the underlying cause of my illness is STILL not well understood nor is there any treatment. So, I get to play whack a mole with various specialists as we can only treat the symptoms. SO fun, SO expensive, and SO not conducive to manual labor. Being a farm wife with 5 living kids (2 dead) as my grandmother was would literally have killed me.
      Also? My maternal grandmother died in her 50’s from a heart condition we can now ID and treat MUCH earlier/better. I still tear up when having to explain to my son why I didn’t have a grandma on that side like he does.

   9. I already commented upthread but one thing I wanted to add – I work in maternal health and it grates to hear people chide mothers for getting epidurals during childbirth or not being these 100% “nature mamas.” They either don’t care or don’t understand that while “women have been giving birth naturally for thousands of years,” maternal mortality was through the freaking roof and remains so to this day in areas where high-quality maternal health care is unavailable. I cannot deal with those people.

      1. OMG yes, I cannot stand the line about women giving birth for thousands of years. Yes, and childbirth used to kill a lot of women. FFS the Spartans considered dying in childbirth equivalent of a soldier dying on the battlefield. They literally viewed childbirth as equivalent to battle…

      2. Preach it sisters – and the other thing that drives me crazy is the notion that “if you’re stressed / scared during labor, it will slow down your labor.” Really? No one’s arguing that the vibe around a laboring woman shouldn’t be reasonably calm, but you know, women who go into premature labor are stressed and scared and it doesn’t slow down their labors, now does it? And while we’re here — spare me the notion that your body knows “how long to cook the baby” (so to speak). The curve of stillbirth rises dramatically after about 41.5 weeks and intervention or at least very frequent monitoring is needed to avoid a bad outcome. I put people who believe that notion in the same category as anti-maskers or anti-vaxxers.

   10. I think about the advent of antibiotics … and then I think about antibiotic resistance. But then I think about the work being done with bacteriophages and I feel better.
       I’d have been drowned for a witch not terribly long ago, too.

       1. If I hadn’t been drowned as a witch or just abused to death by my old timey husband for being opinionated, I would have died many times over from bladder infections that spread to my kidneys.

5. I was flabbergasted when I heard my coworker wears heels at home. I guess everyone has their own routine and ways of coping w all of this insanity but whoa!

   oh- another family of two kids still had their kids wear their school uniform during virtual school (wasn’t required) and stuck to the school schedule. Wish I had that much patience.

   1. Caveat that I dont have kids yet, but I think school uniforms during school hours are actually a great idea. It might help to separate “school/work time” from “home time”, which I think is something we’re all struggling with. I wore a school uniform for 13 years, and it was surprisingly comfortable and easy–no need to pick out your clothes every day.

      1. I agree. I would almost certainly not do that, but it definitely seems like one of those things I would think about and say “Yeah, I really should do that.”

      2. Loved having a school uniform as a kid and tbh frequently miss having one now.

   2. I know homeschool families who had their kids wear uniforms pre-covid. It makes getting dressed and buying/maintaining clothes simpler. Plus for some people, being fully dressed really impacts their productivity.

      1. I mean, I’m like that. If I’m still in my PJs at noon, which happens, I don’t feel like I’m “working” yet, even if I’m at my desk frantically answering emails and have been since 7am.

         It’s when I go get dressed, brush my teeth and hair, and even put on a little makeup that I feel like my work day has started.

   3. Our kid wears her uniform during virtual school. It really helps distinguish school days from weekends, since we are all at home All The Time now.

   4. We don’t have school uniforms, but I have my kids get up, shower, and have breakfast at the same time they would have before. I think it really helps them mentally get prepared for school. I also insist that they sit at their desks and not in bed.

6. Good discussion of depression this morning — one question since lots of people are saying their partner has or has had stages where they were depressed. Are you or they able to pinpoint what caused it? Are most people able to say x triggered months or years of depression for me? I’m curious as to what brought it on for my partner and there isn’t anything obvious. Part of me thinks it could just be the pandemic (though that’d point more to anxiety, no?).

   1. For me it was job loss and it went on I’d say for 2+ years. I was unemployed for 18 months of that time but it opened up all of these feelings of worthlessness etc. to be shown the door from a job I loved/lived for and with time (this phase is now 5+ years behind me) I realized it was because I placed ALL of my self worth on the important job etc. and was really naive about corporate America; it was my first real job so while I had heard all the stories about how corporate America doesn’t care and I intellectually got it, somewhere in my heart I believed my experience would differ and when it didn’t it crushed me for way too long a time period.

      But more generally, no I don’t think it’s NECESSARY that people always know why they are depressed or anxious.

   2. Brain chemistry.

      1. But is it a life event that triggers a change in brain chemistry or is it just something the body does and no one knows why — like a heart valve can start having problems and it’s very rarely caused by anything except maybe normal aging.

         1. The thing that you seem to be so curious about is situational depression and it is only one kind of depression.

            1. You sound a little defensive. It seems like most everyone posting about mental health want others to understand it better. I think OP is trying to understand, so there’s no reason to shoot her down.

         2. For me my body just did it

      2. Yup

      3. brain chemistry/hormones – mine kicked in in my mid-late teens and is still very cyclical with my cycles. Also genetics. Women in both sides of the family would ‘take to their beds’ or be ‘sad’ or ‘quiet’ or drastically more irritable at some points – the men generally self-medicated with alcohol. There was always depression, we just recognize it more and have better ways to treat it now.

         1. Bingo. I’m in the first generation of my family to really get psychiatric diagnoses. It’s abundantly clear that these issues existed on both sides for generations. I’ve been anxious for as long as I can remember, really, but got considerably worse in middle school. My wife’s depression started in high school and has continued cyclically since; sometimes with an obvious trigger but sometimes not.

   3. I think it’s not usually something obvious, but I know someone who only became depressed after taking molly at a concert. It was really weird, but it seemed to have a long-lasting, immediate impact on him, presumably by permanently altering serotonin levels in his brain or something. I think it “flipped a switch” on a genetic predisposition, although we will never know for sure.

   4. I’ve been on antidepressants twice in my life. The first time was my third year of law school, and I don’t really know why. Objectively everything was fine, but If I had to guess I think it was from all the uncertainty of finishing school. The second is right now, and I’m 100% sure it was directly caused by Covid and social isolation. I’m an extrovert that lives alone. Not seeing anyone in person for weeks on end is not normal, none of my normal coping mechanisms were available, and zoom was not a sufficient substitute for me. I’m doing better as a result of the meds, but I’ve honestly have never felt that alone and isolated before and hope to never again.

   5. I think it absolutely could be the pandemic. Or it just could have happened. Sometimes there isn’t an event. I was plumb miserable about a year ago even though my life appeared all but perfect. I’m doing much better now, pandemic and all, because I’ve been in therapy ever since. (I don’t have a formal diagnosis of depression, but I do have mild symptoms.)

      My dad, who has tended to depression his entire life, was particularly bad about 20 years ago when he had a shitty boss, a few years in a row of difficult students, and no other options. He seemed much better when he retired a few years ago, but it’s always there. I imagine it always will be unless he seeks help, which is unlikely.

   6. It can be brain chemistry or a situation, but it’s usually a combination of both. Or, people experience both at some point in their lives. Your brain chemistry may make you more prone to depression and a situation could push you there. I’ve had stages depression triggered primarily by my brain and others triggered primarily by life circumstances, but it seems silly to try to treat them as either/or. The pandemic could totally induce depression rather than anxiety. Social isolation, uncertainty, lack of stimulation, lack of ability to take part in activities that bring you joy and help you cope with stressors, feeling a lack of direction or meaning — all of those things would point to depression for me. If I was worried about my job or worried about a sick family member or high risk myself I might be more anxious.

   7. Heredity, brain chemistry + brain injury. I cannot survive off my meds. I will hurt myself or end my life. I have spent a TON of money on therapy and tried numerous medications. This is just how my body is

7. Here are some more potential talking points for you – at least thing I would like to ask a chef about. :)

   What is the season of food he looks forward to the most or finds most inspiring?

   Do they do a lot of foraging? if so, what are the most traditional (or innovative) ingredients foraged locally? Since you live locally, you might even want to forage yourself. Or know what great aunt Sally used to get free from the woods.

   Is the chef local as well? If not, are there any local tradtions that has been surprising or inspiring?

   Are there any local farms or shops they would recommend you support with your own shopping in current situation (only if you would, of course)?

   Be enthusiastic and specific in complimenting the food. And maybe you remember something very specific (a dish or a flavour combination) you’ve had at a previous visit that really stuck with you, and that you’ve kept as a great food memory.

8. I recently re-read some Kennedy biographies that I got in high school. Now that I am a parent, it leapt out at me how much of a helicopter parent Joseph Kennedy was (to the boys, at least). Like totally entertwined in their adult lives, pushing them along, etc., etc. I wonder how that family would have been with a basic accountant dad, instead of one with a lot of money and power and a chip on his shoulder and something to prove. [And poor Rosemary — had she been born into a normal family . . .] At any rate, it was bizarrely comforting to have this be a non-recent phenomenon and also not exclusively female.

   Also, FWIW, I am much younger than JFK Jr., but followed him for some reason (George magazine, maybe? Dating Daryl Hannah and his mom was mean to her?) but thought I should get into NYU Law at some point b/c I had done a lot better (but not at Brown or wherever he went, a State U that my parents could afford). And I didn’t get in — I was so incredibly naive! What happens for rich / connected people is not what happens for a Vanilla Jane from Anytown, USA.

   1. Yes, that’s true. But also, how much younger than JFK Jr are you? NYU law didn’t used to be a top school, for a long time it was a regional law school. I’m not sure when that changed and NYU raised in the rankings, but I’m pretty sure it was after JKF Jr attended. (I think it might’ve started in the late 90s and really happened in the early 2000s, but not sure).

      1. This – the NYU Law JFK Jr went to is not the NYU Law that you applied to. It used to be a MUCH less selective school.

         That said, Jared Kushner also got into NYU Law and that wasn’t that long ago, so the institution is still perfectly happy to make deals for the rich and connected (I speak as Jared’s classmate, and as someone who generally had a favorable NYU Law experience).

         1. +1 from a fellow NYU Law grad. I generally am pretty positive on the school but this stuff happens and it doesn’t sit well with me. Although, I’m not sure there are schools where this doesn’t happen. And at the end of the day, rich kids getting into schools that they didn’t earn is pretty low on my list of things to be outraged about. I’m sure the person whose “spot” Jared or JFK Jr. or [insert rich white dude here] took probably did just fine – if they were that close to getting into NYU, they surely had other good options.

      2. Too lazy to google, but probably it had gone from being a regional school to a national player by then (or was well on its way). I think that GW is sort of the equivalent in DC — my MIL went there as a commuter student (as did many of the older NYU grads I’ve met). Now it is a T25 law school (if not higher — stopped keeping track of all that). Other cities probably have similar things happen with their schools coming up in the world (IDK if any schools sink over time — maybe not as we didn’t used to be a country of 300M where people are expected to go to college now in most places).

   2. I think Joseph Kennedy was a terrible person but Rosemary’s fate was not because she was born into that family. The treatment of people with mental illness and disabilities during the 40’s and 50’s was horrifying. Lobotomies were never exactly common but the best estimates is that there were about 40,000 in the US alone. They were frequently used in some places to treat children with behavior problems and for people with a wide variety of (what were considered at the time) to be mental illnesses. And the shame and stigma of mental illness during that time makes modern society look positively utopian.

9. Yesterday’s thread about mixing white and yellow metals made me wonder where rose gold fits in. Is it as mixable as the other two? What color clothes does rose gold look good against?

   1. I love mixing metals but yellow gold and rose gold together look funny to me. I like rose gold with silver.

   2. I mix them all if I feel like it. I just like jewelry and like wearing what I like wearing.

10. I need to buy a new pair of casual white (or light colored) sneakers to wear on walks or around town. Preferably something vaguely cool looking (like Golden Goose but not at that price :))

    any leads?

    1. Onitsuka Tiger often has very nice white sneakers.

    2. My favorites are Converse shoreline slip on sneakers. I know not everyone finds them comfortable though!

    3. Soludos or Superga.

    4. Superga or Veja.

    5. I like Vans, Converse, or old-school Adidas.

    6. Ecco

11. Is anyone else able to look at their referral credits in Rothy’s right now? I’m not able to load it at all.

12. There’s a male acquaintance in my town who has been friendly in the past, inviting me to Yoga, Swimming etc. There are times I have felt that maybe he is looking for more than friendship but thought maybe I am reading too much into it. Last week however he sent me a text to invite me to the local swimming pool or to a walk, the weather was good. But he added something that left me infuriated, he mentioned wanting to “caress my hair”, I immediately blocked this individual. I am accustomed to people being intrigued by my hair, I am black and at the moment I have large braids I did on my own. I don’t really mind when people are curious about my hairstyles. But this individual’s level of familiarity left me feeling very uneasy and I also question whether it is some form of fetishization–the last time I accidentally ran into this man after getting off the train he kept on commenting on my skin tone. Going to the extent of wanting to touch my bare arms, I had to step away–I recently had a scare with COVID so I try to avoid direct contact people as much as possible. The fact I am looking bronzed etc after spending some time in the sun. Any one else experienced this?

    1. He sounds like a total creep and I’m glad you blocked him. Sorry he made you experience that.

    2. I’m so sorry that happened. Gross. What a jerk.

    3. Experienced men being creepy racists? Yeah I’m sure every black woman in the country has.

    4. Good for you, I love it when women don’t accept poor or weird behavior from men and immediately block. I can’t speak to the fetishization part personally but it makes me uncomfortable when men talk about my appearance totally out of place like his comment was. I’ve had strange men obsess about what my ethnicity is (I’m actually white but w a unique or weird look I guess).

       It doesn’t sound like you two have the type of relationship where it’s appropriate for him to be going on about your physical attributes like that. Too many women put up with it.

       His comment was super cringe even without the racial element, but the skin tone + hair comments makes it seem to me that he is fetishizing you as a black woman. I definitely think you did the right thing. He sounds dumb AF and it’s not your job to educate him.

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