FRIDAY FOURTEEN ISSUE 120

April 22, 2022
This week: How Coachella stopped being about music and became a content festival, Lena Dunham on friendship ten years after Girls, ten ways we can guard against our feelings of fear and dread when it comes to the climate emergency, there’s a new aesthetic in town and the kids are calling it 1980s Cocaine Decor, and more

Coachella isn’t about music, it’s a content festival (and the parallels between social media and festival fashion throughout the years is WILD)

Here’s everything you need to know about Revolve Fest, the “VIP” festival that ran over the same weekend as Coachella and was so chaotic that it quickly garnered the nickname “Fyre Fest 2.0”

In trending plant news, the New York Times is reporting that the beloved Fiddle Leaf Fig is now dead (RIP), and thank goodness because who can honestly keep these alive anyway?

Over on Twitter this week: A journalist takes us through the rationale of a retraction (this is fascinating), advice for men who want to help with the mental load, advice for anyone who manages people, a long list of rom coms where the two people don’t end up together, people share the best band or singer they’ve seen live, and great news: Levi’s has “perfected the jort”

Lena Dunham on friendship ten years after Girls

Okay, good, so we’re all in agreement that Bridgerton has lost its horny roots?

In the Guardian, Rebecca Solnit shares ten ways we can guard against our feelings of fear and dread when it comes to the climate emergency (“The future is not yet written. We are writing it now.”)

17 raw and real photos of Ukraine from a video journalist who’s been visiting villages that were occupied by Russian soldiers, and what life looks like for young Ukrainian refugees

In tech news: Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers in the first part of the year and is now planning to launch cheaper ad-supported plans, the first photos of Google’s Pixel Watch have been leaked, WhatsApp is launching more structured group chats with admin controls called “Communities”, Instagram is rolling out more social shopping tools, and Tumblr had to create a how-to-use site for all the TikTok users who don’t know how reblogging works and (fittingly or no?) it’s called Hellsite High

brb bookmarking this list of the best airbnbs in Italy

If you're part of a blended family, this fascinating piece in the Atlantic about the controversial ‘nacho’ method of step-parenting is a must-read

Start bookmarking interior inspo of black lacquer furniture, brass built-in cabinets and all-marble bathrooms: there’s a new aesthetic in town and the kids are calling it 1980s Cocaine Decor (“Cocaine Decor is the kind of uncorked, smoking sex appeal we’ve been craving during the pandemic, when the asceticism of lockdown left us wanting more, not less.”)

…and at the other end of the spectrum, we can’t get enough of this maximalist 1970s condo (complete with disco balls and a whole lotta pink)

The new anti-Instagram social media app BeReal has hit over 5m downloads worldwide and this piece on what users are liking and disliking about the app so far is pretty interesting. We put our money on this being another fad but we’re willing to be proved wrong. Is anyone using it yet?

Vanessa -->

Listening: The latest episode of Reply All, which is about Justin Beiber, rainbow bears, hacking and NTFs. The wildest podcast ride I’ve had in a while. Trust me on this one.

Watching: I binged the deliciously trashy Anatomy of a Scandal in one sitting and yes, I did cringe at this excruciating scene

Reading: I have a date on Monday with my picnic rug and the new Anne Tyler


Lizzie -->

On repeat: Any video of Harry Styles at Coachella I can get my hands on

Watching: People's Republic Of Mallacoota on ABC iview, a series that follows the community rebuilding of Mallacoota, which was ravaged by the December 2019 bushfires

Cooking: Keen to give these charred shallot pancakes a try