Taste of The Week 11/12/23
A good digital archive, Chinese grandma marry Jane, boring building index etc.
Since the lunch of this Substack, I started every newsletter talking about the violence and genocide happening to innocent people in Gaza. I’m sorry but not sorry. Personal is political, and therefore I have no reason to not use my platform talking about the politics that occupy my mind. I posted an essay How to Write in a War last week in regard of the responsibility the collective has on experiencing grief on others’ pain, yet, there’s still so much left untouched. This week I’m feeling a rebellious urge on disrupting the peaceful ordinary daily life. The majority of people, me included, still go to their 9 to 5, go to school, hang out with friends, cook dinner, laugh and dance, and go to bed, as if humanities are not drying. The normality that we are experiencing and the abnormality experienced by people in Gaza makes me want to scream from the top of my lungs.
if you are reading this newsletter, please at least crave out a few minutes in your daily life to think about them.
READ
Please read At the Threshold of Humanity by Karim Kattan.
“The world itself echoed in this voice on the phone telling me: there is a solution, if only you weren’t so stubborn, there is a solution, which is to vanish within the contradictions wrought upon you; if only you could disinvite yourself from the world, if only you did not complicate the world with your existence, if only I did not have to talk to you, if only I did not have to listen to you, if only.”
It is so powerful. I don’t want to add my interpretation as space and stage should be left for this article. So please go read it if you have a minute.
READ
I came across the almost completed digital archive of Whole Earth publication. We love a good digital archive. (And I hope eventually Pack The Bag will be a part of my personal digital archive). It is for the collectors, it is for the nerds, it is for the people who will willingly spend afternoons and afternoons digging into the outdated but always relevant content. I have nostalgia constantly and wish I could trace back the content that shaped my teen identity. Unfortunately, there’s not much digital archive about early 2000s Chinese culture out there. We missed out on real good stuff.
I talked about the Fendi 1999 show in the last issue of the Taste of The Week, and boy do I have an obsession with everything vintage (especially materials that are well-documented and well-archived, the same reason that I loooove a good museum). I firmly believe that everyone’s tastes have a place. If contemporary content upsets you, try to find inspiration and beauty in the archives.
If you have a digital archive that you enjoy, please share it with me.
FASHION
Talking about vintage. Saw a fashion blogger (sorry i don’t remember the name) post about these old 80s style Chinese grandma marry jean and was talking about how comfortable they are. These are what we are talking about when we say incorporate your culture in your style. It is too cold for the winter but i will for sure try it out next summer (and for $12? Come on) i can totally see myself wearing oversized denim with these flora marry jean. A bit of inspiration for you.
WATCH
You should learn about The Boring Building Index by Humanise.
OG followers would know that I started my social media on sharing photographs of Soviet Union architectures. I’m always fascinated by how the construction of space shapes human feelings and interactions. Humans have delved into these topics for a long time; we call it fengshui sometimes, or energy vibration, but I truly believe it’s all about what it allows us to see and how it enables us to move around.
When I lived in London, my favorite building was the Barbican Estate. It was a few blocks away from where I lived, and I visited there often. It was once called the ugliest building in London but I was fascinated by the combination of nature and brutalist artificial structure. It is oddly romantic. “In me, the tiger sniffs the rose” is the vibe.
Nothing defines the modern boredom better than taller-is-better commercial skyscrapers. The growing obsession with standardization and productivity, emerging with capitalism, is killing creativity. We have more phallic-looking skyscrapers, less romance and less storytelling.
I would love to pick up where I started and talk more about architectures in my future essays, but please, please, please, starting from now, pay attention to the buildings around you.
(Screenshot from Humanise website)
BEAUTIFUL STUFF
This 3D printed liquid ring from MarcelaLopeArt is so lively.
Marla Aaron’s TikTok. I love how creativity comes from the way jewelry can be worn instead of just the jewelry itself.
Vintage balance ceiling lamp in Chrome. I love everything chrome when it comes to home goods and interior design.
I wore this outfit twice this week and I’m proud of it. Wearing bright color makes a winter day (yes it is winter when it is dark at 5PM) a bit more bearable. Forgive the dog hair on my jacket. They have became part of my identity (girl that has dog hairs on every single piece of clothing).
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