If there’s one thing Taylor Swift loves, it’s an Easter egg. So when fans noticed that a new limited-edition shirt from the singer’s merch line had a typo, they had a field day. Was it an honest mistake…or a clue about her forthcoming album?
The just-released shirts appear to have a misplaced apostrophe that makes the text read, “Your’e the only one of you.” Now, you may remember how, in her latest song, “Me!,” Swift happily exclaims, “Spelling is fun!” Now, technically, this is an issue with punctuation, not spelling. Still: Could this possibly be a callback to the single? Or did the merch just skip the copyedit stage?
A fan caught the error and alerted Twitter, writing in a tweet: “EXCUSE ME! I’ve had this shirt for nearly a month and you’re telling me it’s had a typo THIS WHOLE TIME!!”
But there’s a twist: Not every shirt features the misplaced apostrophe on it, according to BuzzFeed, bolstering the hypothesis that there might be a reason for the grammar snafu.
Still, the fans ran with it.
For most people, the whole”you’re”/”your’e” thing was more funny than anything. (“So much for ‘Spelling is fun,’ am I right?” one person tweeted.) But lots of dedicated Swifities latched onto the idea that the typo’s actually meant as an Easter egg and began putting forth ideas about what the shirt could mean.
“Your’e’ on @taylorswift13 ‘s merch is because it closely resembles ‘Urie’ to reference @brendonurie??? #ConspiracyTime,” one fan guessed.
It wouldn’t be a total surprise if it was indeed an Easter egg. As Swift revealed when she appeared on the cover of Entertainment Weekly, she really likes leaving fans a trail of bread crumbs that offer insights about her music projects. And we’ll admit she’s gotten really, really good at them as well: She basically turned the entire EW cover into a secret puzzle by wearing a jacket with dozens of buttons on it that each provided some kind of hint about her upcoming seventh album (our eyes still hurt from trying to figure all of them out). She’s planted so many other clues recently that fans have come up with a seemingly endless list of theories about her latest release.
“I love that they like the cryptic hint dropping,” she said. “Because as long as they like it, I’ll keep doing it. It’s fun. It feels mischievous and playful.” We’ll just have to see if this is another example of her being playful or just a very public “whoops” moment.
The Academy Awards haven’t always favored female directors. In the 91-year history of the show, only five have ever been nominated for Best Director, and this year, once again, the category is made up of solely men. It’s not entirely dire, though, if you turn your attention to other categories. Take, for example, Period. End of Sentence., which is nominated for Best Documentary – Short Subject and was directed by a woman: Rayka Zehtabchi, a 25-year-old Iranian-American director.
Period. End of Sentence., a documentary that tackles the stigma around menstruation in rural India, is currently available for streaming on Netflix. The 26-minute film follows a group of women who use a new machine to create low-cost sanitary pads to create financial independence while also improving feminine hygiene in their village. Now, according to TIME, their pads are being used in 40 nearby villages. The doc also gives viewers a peek into how taboo menstruation is in these communities, where 23 percent of girls drop out school when they hit puberty due to their periods.
For Zehtabchi, seeing just how ingrained period stigma was for the women was the most life-changing part of making the film. Zehtabchi tells Glamour, “Some of the craziest moments during filming would be when we talked to older women—who had gone their entire lives menstruating and should have been talking to their daughters about menstruation—but couldn’t even tell us why it happened every month, or why they got it. It breaks your heart because if they’re so afraid of the thing that makes them women, then I can’t imagine what else you would be afraid to do or talk about.”
[embedded content]
Zehtabchi was approached to direct the documentary by The Pad Project, the incredible organization that first brought this story to light. In 2012, Los Angeles-based teacher Melissa Burton brought students and staffers together to travel to Kathikhera, India to set up the pad-making machine that is featured in the film. But after their trip, they wanted to do more than just install a machine: They wanted to start a conversation about period stigma around the world. And thus, the documentary was born.
Even though the film has now received such incredible recognition, Zehtabchi and the Pad Project’s mission has stayed the same: to spread as much awareness about this issue as possible. “After seeing the film I hope people understand this period stigma doesn’t just effect those in India, we experience it in the United States and in other cultures as well,” Zehtabchi says. “I also want viewers to realize that empowering women worldwide really starts with beginning with opening up the conversation around menstruation. We can implement feminine hygiene, but first we have to break the taboo. I also want people to realize this isn’t just a film for women, it’s for men too. They’re 50 percent of the population and men need to be having these conversations and championing the film just as much as women are.”
As for being one of a few female directors nominated by the academy, Zehtabchi says, “Why does it have to be so amazing? Why does this have to be shocking that I’m a female director and that I’ve made a film about a women’s issue, in a country we don’t think much, and that the film is getting attention?” We couldn’t agree more.
Samantha Leach is an assistant culture editor at Glamour. Follow her on Twitter @_sleach.
One of the biggest trends from the last few years wasn’t a type of hemline or a specific color, but rather a marked change in the way shoppers acquire their clothes. Increasingly, people aren’t buying, they’re renting.
Rent the Runway (with its “unlimited” monthly service) and Stitch Fix (itself a $3 billion business) are the Goliaths paving the way. Jennifer Hyman, co-founder of Rent the Runway, frequently points out how the American woman buys sixty-eight items of clothing year, some of which they never end up wearing. (According to the company, the subscription part of its business has grown 150 percent year over year since it launched in 2016.)
“Social media has created an atmosphere in which, yeah, you could wear the same thing twice, but you’d rather not,” Rachel Saunders, strategy director of retail strategy firm Cassandra, tells Glamour. “So how do you do that without spending a fortune? It’s all contributed to this idea that it’s okay to share clothes with strangers.”
Allied Market Research estimates the clothing rental market will reach $1.856 billion in global value by 2023, with more and more players in the game, like Le Tote and Gwynnie Bee. Naturally, individual brands—ones you’d normally shop at their stand-alone stores or at a mall—now want a piece of that pie, especially as brick-and-mortar shopping continues to decline.
Classic workwear purveyor Ann Taylor, fashion-forward brand Vince, and even trend-focused label Express have all launched subscription services over the last few months that allow shoppers to test a curated selection of pieces at home before either buying their favorites and sending back the rest (and then being replenished with different options.) Many of these ventures are being managed by the same company: New York-based CaaStle, which seems to have a lock on the back-end management of fashion subscriptions, at least for now.
This new development in fashion subscription boxes, cutting out the third party, begs a lot of questions for shoppers. Are these services really worth it when weighed against buying clothes outright? How easy is the rental process, really? How good is the selection? And does this mean the end of shopping as we know it?
We weighed five of the big brand options (all of which, coincidentally, are being managed CaaStle) to see how they stack up, what’s worth it, and what’s not. These might be early adopters, but judging by where the industry is growing, it’s likely you’ll see even more of your favorites jump into this space over the course of 2019.
PHOTO: Courtesy of Vince
Known for its minimal but still fashion-forward pieces, Vince enters the subscription game with Vince Unfold. To get started you create a virtual closet with at least ten items (though, it’s recommended that you add over 24), from which the brand creates your first box. Each shipment comes with four pieces. When you’re done with it, you send it back and get four new ones in a brand-new box.
The biggest difference between Vince Unfold and other brand-specific subscription boxes comes down to one thing: inventory. Vince is much more high-end than other single labels dipping their toes in this market, with most pieces featuring three-figure price tags—think silk tank dresses ($345), shaggy bear coats ($695), and oversized cashmere cardigans ($495.)
Price: $160 a month. You can exchange your four-item box an unlimited number of times, but you must return your whole box to do so. If you want to keep a piece that you’re renting, you can purchase it at a discount, between 20 and 60 percent off.
Pros: Vince clothes are gorgeous and luxurious, which means that every single item that comes in your box can easily be mixed and matched with whatever’s in your wardrobe. Additionally, the selection of products is pretty vast. You’ll get tons of mileage out of these clothes.
Cons: The price point is high, especially when you weigh it against Rent the Runway’s unlimited offering (which has Vince on its roster.) Also, you can’t return pieces individually, only as a whole box; and you don’t pick what you’re getting in each shipment.
TL; DR: While this subscription still makes sense from a cost-benefit standpoint if you’re a big fan of Vince, the fine print could be improved. Try it here.
PHOTO: Courtesy of Ann Taylor.
Infinite Style by Ann Taylor lets you rent three pieces from Ann Taylor (excluding Loft and Lou & Grey) at once. You have to select a minimum of eight pieces to add to a queue. It takes about three days to process and another two days to ship; you find out exactly which items from your edit are being shipped to you in an e-mail with tracking information for your package.
Where Ann Taylor’s service really shines is in its abundance of workwear. At the moment, you can rent pieces like houndstooth ankle pants (which retail for $98), a tweed sheath dress ($159), and a sequin fringe jacket ($129.)
Price: $95 a month. You can return the complete box for a new one as many times as you’d like throughout the month.
Pros: This is one of the best subscription box options out there if you need a big rotating closet of professional clothing. Plus, you get the option of buying clothes you’ve already rented for 60 to 70 percent off.
Cons: Given the higher price tag compared to comparable services, you have to really love the Ann Taylor look. You also have to return a complete box in order to get sent new product.
TL; DR: This is a solid solution to the what-to-wear-to-wear problem, with some casual attire and cocktail looks thrown in, too. Try it here.
PHOTO: Courtesy of Express.
Called the Express Style Trial, this service allows shoppers to rent three items from the brand at a time for $69.95 a month. There’s a pretty big range of merchandise to choose from, all of which appears to be current season—a striped jumpsuit (which retails for $79.90), a faux-leather-trimmed shift dress (also $79.90), and a satin maxi dress ($88.)
“We see Style Trial as an complement to our e-commerce and store business, allowing our customers to engage with fashion and experiment with new styles and trends that she may not otherwise invest in,” Jim Hilt, Executive Vice President and Chief Customer Experience Officer at Express, tells Glamour. “It provides our customer with easy access to the latest trends, as well as an ongoing rotation of staple pieces at a fraction of the prices.”
To begin renting, you have to add at least eight items to a virtual closet (though it’s recommended that you add around 20.) From that selection, Express creates a box of three pieces to send to you. You can prioritize what you want, through a feature that promises “we’ll try to ship those first.” But once you’re done with those first three, you can ship everything back, and Express will dispatch a box with new product. You can do this as many times as you want. Per Express’ estimates, a super-active user could have 12 different pieces a month (or four boxes); an average user, meanwhile, would probably have about nine (or three boxes.)
Price: $69.95 a month. You can cancel the subscription at any time, and you can return your boxes to exchange for new items as frequently as you like.
Pros: The price, definitely—if you’re already a big fan of Express, you can maximize the amount of returns that you do throughout the month to get the most product.
Cons: The work-appropriate options are on the limited side (in general, the offerings are much better suited for casual wear), if you need to replenish that part of your wardrobe, specifically. Because of the way that Express builds its subscription boxes, you don’t select the exact items that end up in your shipment—rather, the brand picks from which of your pre-selected favorites are available. You also can’t cancel your subscription directly online, only over the phone.
TL; DR: If you are already a big Express shopper, the cost benefit of this is pretty great. Try it here.
PHOTO: Courtesy of Rebecca Taylor.
Rebecca Taylor’s foray into subscription boxes, RNTD, is comparable to Rent the Runway Unlimited in price—Both are $159 a month. The brand grants you access to a rotating closet with four items at any given time; you must add at least 10 pieces to a queue, from which Rebecca Taylor then puts together your shipment.
“The pricing was meant to be realistic and attainable for our customer,” says Janice Sullivan, President of Rebecca Taylor. In other words: It’s hoping this service opens Rebecca Taylor up to a new shopper who otherwise couldn’t afford to constantly and consistently buy its pieces. And the “new arrivals” section has a solid mix of Rebecca Taylor’s signature dresses as well as some of its more trend-forward garments: a silk embroidered ruffle dress ($395), high-waisted plaid pants ($395), and a laminated navy trench coat ($1,295.)
“I think consumers value options, the option to rent, to own, to lend, to resell—as a brand you want to move with her and be there on every level that makes sense,” Sullivan adds.
Price: $159 a month. You get four pieces per shipment, and you can send the box back for new items as often as you’d like.
Pros: It’s hard to not love Rebecca Taylor. And while a closet full of its pieces has long been out of reach for most shoppers, it’s suddenly much more accessible.
Cons: Like with Vince, you can’t return individual pieces to get new ones—only the full shipment. That’s really what sets it apart from Rent the Runway Unlimited, which carries Rebecca Taylor.
TL; DR: You’d have a pretty dreamy rotating wardrobe. You just have to love or let go of everything you get as a bundle. Try it here.
PHOTO: Courtesy of New York & Co.
New York & Co.’s NY&Company Closet is one of the most affordable subscription boxes out there, charging $49.95 a month for three items at a time from the brand—return them all, and receive a new selection in the mail.
This offering has a great mix of both work and weekend clothes, making it one of the most versatile single-brand subscription boxes. That being said, it’s one brand—so you have to like the aesthetic to begin with. On offer are pieces like a leopard sweater dress ($74.95), a red striped blazer ($79.95), and houndstooth wide leg pants ($79.95.)
Price: $49.95 a month. You get three items at a time; you can return the full box for new product as many times as you like.
Pros: You definitely get a lot of bang for your buck with this one.
Cons: The unpredictability of not getting to choose exactly what comes in your shipment isn’t ideal.
TL; DR: This is a great value subscription service for someone who wants to test-drive this method of shopping. Try it here.
Finding connections between Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton‘s wardrobes might not be that much of a stretch. It’s much more surprising to recognize a link between the closet of the Duchess of Sussex and that of Calabasas royalty. But it’s 2019, and anything can happen.
The year kicked off with quite an interesting fashion déjà-vu: Kylie Jenner stepped out on New Year’s Eve in a white, long-sleeved, blazer-style dress. Now, we know that the tuxedo silhouette is a favorite of Markle’s… But turns out, Jenner not only has the same taste in dresses as the Duchess, she also favors the same designers. Jenner’s double-breasted, cotton-twill dress was by sustainability-focused, New Zealand-based brand Maggie Marilyn—the very style that Markle wore on her royal tour in the fall.
Here’s how Jenner wore it, with long sleeves and a shortened hemline.
PHOTO: SPW / SplashNews.com
And here’s how Markle wore it, for a party at Courtenay Creative, opting to have the long, structured sleeves from the original removed.
PHOTO: Samir Hussein/Samir Hussein/WireImage
The brand confirmed via Instagram on January 1 that the two women were indeed wearing the same dress: “How amazing to see another incredible women wear our ‘Leap of faith’ blazer dress – So many remarkable and trailblazing women have worn this dress. It is exciting to see someone of @kyliejenner influence choose to wear and support a sustainable brand.”
When Markle wore the dress back in October, Maggie Marilyn wrote: “The name of this dress says it all – Her Royal Highness, Duchess of Sussex wearing our ‘Leap of Faith’ Blazer Dress. It is an incredible honour to have this inspiring woman wear Maggie Marilyn.”
PHOTO: Samir Hussein/Samir Hussein/WireImage
Unfortunately, the $455 dress is sold out—as one might expect—but we’ve found a few similar looks below. Happy 2019 shopping.
On Facebook, Jen Hart frequently wrote about her children, discussing what all six of them were up to in lengthy, paragraphs-long posts. But according to Bruce and Dana DeKalb, the Harts’ neighbors in Woodland, Washington, those posts provide a stark contrast to their own interactions with the six Hart children.
At first the DeKalbs rarely see the Harts, save a few chance encounters in their driveway. But this changes on Thursday, March 15, 2018 when Devonte approaches Bruce while he’s working outside and asks him for tortillas. The following morning, the DeKalbs answer a knock at their door: It’s Devonte again, this time asking for bread. Devonte shows up at the DeKalbs’ home asking for food on seven separate occasions that week.
While Jen is sharing pictures of Devonte on Facebook, smiling and seemingly happy, Bruce and Dana DeKalb are seeing something vastly different: A child who is afraid and hungry. Dana uses each one of those visits to gently prod for more information about the family.
Devonte eventually opens up to the DeKalbs, stating that he and his siblings are being abused by Jen and Sarah. Upon hearing this, Dana DeKalb takes action, calling Child Protective Services on Friday, March 23, to report the information she has collected about her neighbors. Officials show up within a couple of hours, but when they knock on the door, neither Jen nor Sarah answers. That evening the two moms will pack up their Yukon with their six children and leave hurriedly, knocking over their stone wall in the process.
PHOTO: Clark County Sheriff’s Office Incident Report
On Saturday, March 24, the Harts’ phones pinged off cell towers along the Oregon coast into California, and on Sunday, the 25th, Jen shows up in a Safeway surveillance video in Fort Bragg: Alone, wearing eyeglasses and a hoodie, she pays $20.08 in cash for groceries.
PHOTO: California Highway Patrol
On Monday, March 26, a Washington State CPS investigator calls 911 to request that a deputy go out to the Harts’ house.
That afternoon a German tourist spots the Harts’ tan 2003 Yukon XL upside down at the bottom of the cliff in Mendocino County. The bodies of Jen, Sarah, Markis, Abigail, and Jeremiah are found at the crash site; a foot, believed to be Hannah’s, is also discovered. Sierra’s body washed ashore about two weeks later. Devonte is still missing.
PHOTO: AP IMAGES
No one in the car was wearing a seatbelt. Jen’s blood alcohol level was over the legal limit, and toxicology reports show that Sarah and two of the kids had allergy medication in their system that could have made them drowsy. The car’s computer shows that moments before the crash, Jen had stopped on a gravel pullout 70 feet from the edge of the cliff, only to then accelerate. According to a Carfax report, the brake pads had been replaced the previous July. Per industry experts, the average brake pad lasts for around 40,000 miles—implying that the brake pads were likely in working order.
PHOTO: CARFAX
Were Jen and Sarah running from a longer tail of child abuse allegations? Did those who knew them earlier in life have any indication as to what was going on? That, and more, next time on Broken Harts.
Subscribe now to our new podcast, Broken Harts, from Glamour and HowStuffWorks and based on this story from the October 2018 issue of Glamour. New episodes will air each Tuesday; find them on Apple, Google, Spotify, or wherever you like to get your podcasts. For the full transcript of this episode, click here. Have any tips, feedback, or questions? Email us at brokenhartspodcast@gmail.com
During a grueling eight-hour hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford detailed the alleged assault she faced at the hands of Brett Kavanaugh while both were in high school, opened up about moving out of her home because of the death threats she’s received, and even managed to explain how the hippocampus works.
And what did Supreme Court judge nominee Brett Kavanaugh discuss when he finally took the stand? Beer, mostly. How he really, really, really likes it. So much so that he brought it up over 30 times during his testimony, according to a Buzzfeed count.
When we were first introduced to Kavanaugh, he was touted as a boy scout of sorts. A family man. A Christian. A virgin. But the version we met on Thursday was a beer-drinking, fun-loving guy, as Kavanaugh described his younger self (around the time of Ford‘s reported attack) as just a typical boy who loved basketball, getting good grades, and going to the occasional party.
As he put it, “I drank beer with my friends. Almost everyone did.”
“Sometimes I had too many beers. Sometimes others did. I liked beer. I still like beer. But I did not drink beer to the point of blacking out, and I never sexually assaulted anyone.” Meaning, he was just a boy being a boy, doing boyish things—nothing more.
Driving home his preference for ales over harder liquors could have been a device to downplay the allegations that Kavanaugh was known as a heavy drinker. A college friend of his, Liz Swisher, recently told The Washington Post that “Brett was a sloppy drunk, and I know because I drank with him. I watched him drink more than a lot of people. He’d end up slurring his words, stumbling. There’s no medical way I can say that he was blacked out.… But it’s not credible for him to say that he has had no memory lapses in the nights that he drank to excess.”
How could the allegations against him be viable, if he was only casually drinking brewskis with his bros? is what Kavanaugh could have been hoping we’d wonder. Well, if he spends anywhere close to the amount of time he talks about beer actually drinking the damn beverage, let’s just say gravity wouldn’t be his friend.
But regardless of Kavanaugh’s motives—there’s one thing we can actually all agree on: Kavanaugh f*cking loves beer!
So in this spirit of bipartisan agreement, we’ve compiled a list—without comment—of the top 10 times Kavanaugh spoke about his beloved drink of choice while testifying:
1. “Listen to the people I’ve grown up with, and worked with, and played with, and coached with, and dated, and taught, and gone to games with, and had beers with.”
2. “When I was in town, I spent much of my time working, working out, lifting weights, playing basketball, or hanging out and having some beers with friends as we talked about life, and football, and school and girls.”
3. “The calendars show a few weekday gatherings at friends’ houses after a workout or just to meet up and have some beers.”
8. “Anyone who’s known me like a lot of these people behind me, have known me my whole life, know, you know, I got a weak stomach, whether it’s with beer or with spicy food or anything.”
9. “I like beer. I don’t know if you do. Do you like beer, Senator, or not? What do you like to drink?”
10. “No…. We drank beer and…so did, I think, the vast majority of people our age at the time. In any event, we drank beer and still do, so, whatever, yeah,”
Ah. Boys will be boys. Enjoy your beers this weekend.
.png)
.jpg)
