Everyone remembers their first time. They compare it to feeling a kid on Christmas morning, recall their phones exploding with more notifications than humanly possible to respond to. Some need to take a step back in order to fully understand the significance of the moment—when Meghan Markle gave their fashion brand her personal stamp of approval.
Influencer marketing may be powerful, but as these brands can attest: not much compares to when the Duchess of Sussex is photographed wearing one of your pieces, triggering the so-called Meghan Markle Effect. It can shift conversations entirely for those already established brands and can throw a little-known, at-home operation onto a globe stage in an instant.
“In terms of growing our business exponentially, Meghan has enabled us to do this in a very tangible, immediate way,” says James Bartle, founder and CEO of Outland Denim. The Australian brand is on a mission to create responsibly-made denim while supporting ethical work conditions, namely in its facility in Cambodia. Markle wore the label repeatedly during her royal tour of Australia in 2018, and its sales skyrocketed, allowing the under-the-radar business to grow. “You cannot put a price on the brand recognition nor the credibility that the Duchess is able to bestow on a small, socially oriented enterprise such as ours.”
Outland’s success story isn’t unique: Many other designers that the Duchess of Sussex has touched since her public persona shifted from actress to royalty, British Vogue guest editor, curator of her own fashion collection, and pal to Beyoncé can attest to her impact. In their own words, the designers ahead explain exactly what happened when Markle wore their creations.
After five seasons of climbing their way up the ladder at Empirical, the women of Younger are finally getting their due. Liza (Sutton Foster) is no longer balancing coffee runs for Diana (Miriam Shor) with editing books on the side. Instead, she’s a full-on editor and co-leader of the Millennial imprint. And Kelsey (Hilary Duff) isn’t just a star publisher on the rise: She’s the head of Empirical, and the new Charles (Peter Hermann). Over the past five seasons, we’ve watched Liza and Kelsey fight for respect in the company, push to have more women’s-focused literature published, and for their imprint to be given higher status. And now they have it. All of it. They’re calling the shots and running the C-suite. “It felt weird at first. It’s just the three of us sitting in the conference rooms. It feels earned,” Sutton Foster tells Glamour. But just because it feels earned doesn’t mean the women of Younger are ready to celebrate.
The first episode of the season opens with Lauren (Molly Bernard) shooting social videos of Kelsey as she enters the office and telling her, “You are a role model for every young girl with an English degree who wants to believe she didn’t throw away four years of her life. You are the youngest publisher in New York right now, and you are defining a cultural moment.” But Kelsey, who’s normally the type to shout about her successes, seems nervous. Like, really nervous. Gone is the girl who fought to launch her own imprint and treated winning manuscripts out from other editors like a sport. At first, it seems like she just needs to get her sea legs and adjust to her new title—but about halfway through the episode, we find out why Kelsey isn’t displaying her usual confidence.
Miriam Shor, Sutton Foster, and Hilary Duff on Younger
When an author comes in to talk to Liza and Kelsey about a business book called The Glass Cliff, the issues stacked against Kelsey begin to crystalize. The author begins her pitch with, “Research shows when companies invite women into their C-suites, they experience a 27 percent decline in revenue. Why? Why are women underperforming? Or maybe we shouldn’t be blaming the women at all. Maybe they’re being set up to fail. Women inherit distressed companies far more often than their male counterparts. When an institution is in crisis, the next man up usually gets the axe, so why not make him a woman?”
This isn’t just a fictional premise. The term “glass cliff” was first coined in 2005, and according to research, is just as prevalent of a problem today. With Kelsey’s promotion coming on the heels of a new, risky stakeholder taking financial control of the company, her appointment feels like an opportunity to make her a scapegoat in case Empirical goes under. And it’s not lost on her.
Elle Woods may not have thought getting into Harvard Law School was hard, but saying goodbye to her and the Legally Blonde movies on Netflix sure will be. It’s true, even the sequel—Legally Blonde: Red, White & Blonde—will no longer be available come June 1. So get your fill of Bruiser, Paulette, and the “bend and snap” while you still can.
Also leaving the streaming service this month are a slew of Disney movies like 101 Dalmations and The Fox and the Hound, the classic ’80s teen movie Pretty in Pink, both Kill Bill films, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, and one of Ryan Reynolds breakout movies, National Lampoon’s Van Wilder.
Below is a breakdown on what’s leaving when so you can plan the next week or so of viewing accordingly. The good news is, this is Netflix, so your feed will never be without a bazillion new shows and movies to stream at will all summer long. Check out what’s coming here.
An Extremely Goofy Movie Apollo 13Cold in July Disney’s 101 Dalmatians Disney’s The Fox and the Hound 2 Disney’s The Jungle Book: Mowgli’s Story Doom Freddy vs. Jason Friday the 13th Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves I Am Legend In the Army Now Inspector Gadget 2 Jason X Kill Bill: Vol. 1 Kill Bill: Vol. 2 Legally Blonde Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde My Bloody Valentine Playing It Cool Pretty in Pink Reindeer Games Stargate Terminator Salvation The Bone Collector The Constant Gardener
District 9
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
The Soloist
Grand Designs: Australia: Season 4 I Own Australia’s Best Home: Season 1 I Own Britain’s Best Home: Season 1 Mother
Apocalypse Now Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things National Lampoon’s Van Wilder The Pianist
Death Race
Disney’s Mulan 2
The only silver lining here is that Legally Blonde 3 is officially a go. Reese Witherspoon confirmed the news last June.
On May 10, Kim Kardashian West and Kanye West welcomed their fourth child, via surrogate. Upon his arrival Kardashian tweeted, “He’s here and he’s perfect.” Now, a week later, Kardashian West has revealed the name of her new son: Psalm West.
In true Kardashian style, the reality star shared her baby’s name on Instagram. Kardashian West posted a screenshot of a text from her husband that read, “Beautiful Mother’s Day. With the arrival of our fourth child. We are blessed beyond measure. We have everything we need.” The photo was simply captioned, “Psalm West.”
The West’s are known for their unique baby names (along with the rest of the Kardashian clan.) But the name Psalm is in keeping with the biblical theme they drew from to name their older son, Saint West, 3. Psalm also joins his older sisters. North West, 5, and Chicago West, 1, whose names both come from a more geographic origin. And while fans were here for baby West’s name, many took to Twitter to express their confusion over how to properly pronounce it.
According to People the West’s long had a name in mind for their son, “but wanted to meet the baby before they decided.” Kardashian West also told Jimmy Kimmel, “I usually go about three or four days nameless until I feel like it really connects with the baby.”
And while Psalm might have the name most similar to Saint, Kardashian West has made it very clear that he’s the most like his sister Chicago. She called Psalm, “Chicago’s twin.” “I’m sure he will change a lot but now he looks just like her,” she wrote. But from what we can tell of Kardashian West’s photos, Psalm looks like a happy and healthy newborn.
Congratulations to the Kardashian West clan. Bible, we think this is your cutest baby name yet.
Eighteen months ago, I was in the throes of some of the darkest moments of my life—but on paper, it didn’t look like that. I had just finished a national tour for my first book, The Crowdsourceress, and positive coverage had started rolling in. My company, which launched crowdfunding campaigns for stellar creators worldwide, had raised a combined $20 million to help bring their creative projects to life. Journalists were calling me a wunderkind and a guru; my name was even added to Forbes’ “30under30” list. By the looks of things, I was killing it.
But alone one day soon after the tour ended, I couldn’t leave my bed. Sobbing on the phone to my mother like a terrified child, I was deep in a spiral of repetitive, fearful thoughts. My skin was crawling with anxiety.
This wasn’t my first total meltdown. I had suffered from these obsessive thoughts of uncertainty for almost two decades of my life.
I grew up a happy kid—spunky, opinionated, and incredibly curious. But something happened in my pre-adolescent years: I became painfully afraid of bad things happening to me. From what I remember, it started when I was around 10. After watching a nineties horror film, I became wildly obsessed with the idea of being abducted by aliens. I would lie in bed every night imagining all the ways I could be abducted, and then rush into my parents room, begging to sleep near them for protection.
The author with her mom.
Courtesy of Meg Daly
I didn’t just have these terrorizing thoughts at night though; on some idle weekends, I would find myself pacing back and forth indoors, thinking about the various ways I could be tortured by the aliens that would eventually abduct me. I remember so clearly one Saturday morning my Dad pointing to a painting and saying, “This painting exists. Aliens don’t. You have a higher probability of being abducted by this painting!” I laughed, relieved, but still uncertain.
When I eventually let go of my alien obsession, I moved onto another fixation: perfection.
I was finishing fifth grade, and applying to a prestigious middle school. I told myself that I had to get in—in my mind, if I failed, it would irreparably derail my entire life. Fixated, I would complete all my homework, organize it neatly in my sparkly folders, and get into bed early. But I couldn’t go to sleep: instead, I would pray relentlessly, pleading for straight A’s. Fearful that my homework could suddenly disappear into thin air while I slept, I’d anxiously jump out of bed to check that it was still there. I would do this about twenty times a night.
By the time I turned 12, my obsessions shifted again, this time to a subject on many a pre-teen mind: sex. But I wasn’t fantasizing about a new crush or exploring pleasure as my body went through puberty. Instead, I was terrified of anything related to sex—it got to a point where I didn’t want to be touched fearing any unpredictable sensation in my body. My obsession became so paralyzing that I would retrace the most innocent of past interactions, analyzing them for the slightest improprieties and confessing whenever I felt something could have been perceived as wrong. Whenever I did have a sexual thought—all of which felt weird and deviant—I would fixate for hours on end about what it meant about my identity as a person, rocking back and forth into what seemed like a hole of darkness.
At first, like my other moments of catastrophic crises, I implored my parents for reassurance, describing my graphic fears in detail. But I realized that this new obsession felt different—it was too taboo. I stopped sharing and began internalizing my rituals, while another obsessive idea set in: I really believed that if my parents knew my thoughts, even though they had been my biggest supporters so far, they would disown me forever.
When I started high school, I became really good at hiding my internal battles—so began my years of trying to cope on my own. I would power through episodes of distress by throwing myself into piles of work as a necessary distraction, or avoid situations that triggered the anxiety. The intense dedication to my work helped me excel but it masked the obsessive thoughts playing on loop in my mind. In college I had two majors, a minor, and an honors thesis but I remember thinking I could have—should have—done so much more.
Emilia Clarke is pretty serious in character as Game of Thrones‘ Daenerys Targaryen, but offscreen, she’s shown time and time again that she loves a good prank. On Friday, the star posted an Instagram video that involves her best one yet: She walked around Times Square trolling people and pretending to be co-star Kit Harington‘s character Jon Snow.
The whole thing was actually for a really great cause: Clarke is giving people a chance to watch the series finale with her in London. Fans who want a shot at the opportunity have to donate to her charity, SameYou, which is working to raise $1 million to study ways that young people can recover from brain injury and stroke. The issue is super-close to Clarke’s heart—she revealed in March that she almost left Game of Thrones after suffering two brain aneurysms.
Even though it’s an intense topic, Clarke approached it with a sense of humor. She announced the contest through an Instagram video, which shows her running around New York City doing her best King of the North impression (we’ll be honest, she’s actually really good at it). The people in the video aren’t too amused by her antics, which makes the clip even funnier. She approaches one woman, who deadpans, “I’m a Walking Dead fan.”
“Oh yeah, I am Kit Harington without the (any) abs. Maybe I’ll wear this outfit when I host your Game of Thrones finale party! Maybe I’ll let you wear the beard!!” she wrote on Instagram. “That’s right—you and three friends could come hang with me in London, take lots of fun photos, ask me all your burning GoT questions (yes I kept the dragons, no kit didn’t keep his hair) and enjoy a private screening of the final episode.”
Earlier this month, she had offered up another meet-and-greet with fans who donated to the Royal College of Nursing Foundation.
Although Harington, who plays Jon Snow, has been known to tease her on the show’s set, we have a feeling he’d bend the knee after watching this. Well done, Mother of Dragons.
