A few weeks ago, a good friend threw herself a middle school dance-themed 30th birthday. There were bottles of ! perfume, mixtapes featuring Julianna Hatfield and the My So-Called Life theme, babydoll dresses, and possibly best of all, stacks of early 90s fashion mags from the collection of a person with a more severe magazine-hoarding problem than mine. There is a lesson to be learned here, and that is this: there was a time – that’d be 1992 – when Liv Tyler was on the cover of Seventeen (age 15!) and Angelina Jolie was hawking prom dresses (and looking just as EFFING AMAZING as she does now). Also, never throw away magazines.

Are you ready for this?:

I love the ninetieeees (oh yes…there WILL be more).

I found this amazing antique bag at a Goodwill a few years ago and I always get compliments when I wear it out. Not exactly Goodwill pricing, but here is an identical-looking one on eBay.

My vacation in Austin included dancing with gentlemanly strangers with boot-scootin’ skills at The Broken Spoke, a silver-lame-masked bartender at The White Horse in East Austin, coveting objects new and vintage, for men and women, at Stag and Uncommon Objects along South Congress, and more meat than a person should consume in a day, let alone one midday meal at The Saltlick on the way out to the Hill Country, where I stayed at a friend’s family ranch called Broken Foot. It got its name more than 20 years ago, when the owner was clearing trees alone on the property and fell some thirty feet, shattering his foot. He crawled to the (stick-shift!) truck and drove himself to the hospital 30 minutes away. There was wide-open space, laidback but luxurious hospitality, gun-shooting with same expert-shot owner, impromptu dance parties til 4 am, firepits, and the offer to return – and put the “work” back in work, something I feel missing in my daily life – for July peach season. I’ve still got dust on my boots and Austin in my heart.

I fly out for Austin, TX Thursday morning, where I’ll divide the time between the city and a house in the Hill Country. I’ve been doing a little internet research, including listening to “The Road Goes on Forever” by Robert Earl Keen (who sort of reminds me of “I’m Good Now” by Bob Schneider) and tunes by tortured troubadour Townes Van Zandt, who, as it turns out, I’d already been listening to without realizing (Steve Earl, Willie Nelson, the Cowboy Junkies – To Live’s To Fly! – Bob Dylan and oh, like everyone else has covered him).

All the more fitting that I return to check out ‘Ann’ at the Kennedy Center! In terms of what to pack, I’m not sure yet. Except for my Tony Lama boots, which are all oiled up and ready to go. I feel like I somehow need to pay homage to the “Keep Austin Weird” motto and pack something bizarre…

Any Austin must-do/see/eat/buy recommendations? Sounds like South Congress is the way to go for vintage and shopping generally (though this Roadhouse Rags sounds like an experience). Lustre Pearl looks like a good time. We might try out The Salt Lick on the way out of town. Let me know your favorite spots!

I’ll be back tomorrow eve (while I pack!) to announce the winner of the ‘Ann’ tickets. Thanks for all the email comments – it’s so fun to hear from you all, and there have been some awesome, and lengthy, inspirations.

For now, I leave you with Townes, Ke$ha style:

Something super sad just happened, and it’s called I Just Found My Dream Sofa on Craigslist and Someone Else Got to it First. Insult to injury: all three pieces were for $100.

If any of you lovelies come across something ohh, just like this, please email me and I will forever be indebted.

Can’t believe this is not mine. SHIT.

Just went out and bought cookie dough,
Rachel

There’s a newish GUESS store on F Street near Metro Center, which somehow didn’t blip on my radar til I walked past the other day. Whenever I come across the brand, I always think back to the time when, as a fashion-starved teenager growing up in Southwest Virginia, I was shopping at Sam’s Club with my parents, and showed my mom a t-shirt I wanted – black, with the brand-name “GUESS” embroidered across the chest (I know, I know). “Guess?” she said, “As in, ‘guess what’s under here?’” That was the end of that conversation.

VINTAGE “Tiki Temptress” via Etsy.

MODERN “Fetching Fresco” via Modcloth.

Today I am overly excited to have discovered that I have a pair of shoes in common with Jane from Sea of Shoes. I scored these flawless Biba platforms on eBay. Worn with pointelle ankle socks from American Apparel. I’m wearing these socks today, not with the Bibas but with my new platforms from Gap.

Grace Coddington’s 70th birthday party, via Vogue.com:

“……The most extraordinary moment was Karen Elson, after recalling how Coddington took her into her office as a seventeen-year-old scraggly redhead, sang an incredibly moving version of “Amazing Grace” a cappella, bringing some to tears. After a huge birthday souvenir book of career highlights and a Lartigue photograph from Vogue were presented to Grace, a giant cake by David Chang was brought out as Elson and Hamish Bowles sang “Happy Birthday.” Then it was time to hit the dance floor. Ben, the spinmaster from David Sims’s studio, started with “Le Freak” by Chic, and within seconds, there were conga lines of models like Liya Kebede, wearing fall 2011 Balenciaga; Shalom Harlow, doing marvelous spins and dips to Diana Ross and Grace Jones. Coddington herself danced with Julien d’Ys and Stephane Marais in the center of a circle that included Pat McGrath. Last seen escorting Coddington to the dance floor was de la Renta, one of the best dancers in the universe. And the crew that launched Coddington into the adoring public eye, The September Issue’s R.J. Cutler and team, were filming it all.”

No big deal.

Sounds like a September Issue pt II (or perhaps one focused on the fashion-world-cult-figure-turned-breakout-star-to-the-rest-of-the-world Grace Coddington…?) is in the works…

Alsoon Vogue.com and in the Rihanna-covered issue, a Tax Day reminder from local writer/social/restauranteur Carol Joynt to be financially smart.

Bad boys always and forever look like some iteration of Johnnny Depp in Cry Baby (Netflix-queue that baby up and thank me later). Can we talk about these amazing giraffe-and-other-zoo-wildlife necklaces?

Yeah, uh huh. Yawn.