Letter of Rec #094: What is the right spring shoe?
Plus remote notes from Paris, and two great launches.
I launched a third collab with the Mexico City-based tailoring brand, Chava Studio, on Tuesday. It’s a brown silk set (shirt and slip dress) that riffs on the style of our first two collaborations (embroidery) but feels more whole in that it’s an entire outfit—
I think this is all you are going to want to wear this summer. Or no, better to say that it is all I’m going to want to wear this summer, which was true for me last year when I conceived of the idea, and I am relieved to find that I still feel EXACTLY THE SAME WAY.
If you are less inclined to show your legs, we made the dress real short so it could feel like a long top/tunic to style with cotton pants.
You can view the pieces here, then keep reading for some thoughts on fashion week in Paris, ideas on what to wear these days and some shopping notes to take or leave at your leisure.
Fashion week
I think I will start covering fashion shows again. It’s a unique season to be missing Paris (emotionally speaking) given that there are basically no designers at houses right now (next season — in September — Matthieu Blazy will take over Chanel, Michael Rider will debut his Celine in July and Loewe will get a new designer as Jonathan Anderson moves on to Dior men’s), but from what I’ve insofar as been able to glean from the internet and some of the already-in-motion new placements, Julian Klausner’s Dries van Noten looks pretty good in that wearable magpie way so unique to the Dries archetype and I love Haider Ackerman’s Tom Ford.
He seems like a good successor in that his expression of style is as sleek and sharp and archetypically sexy as Ford’s was but there is an undeniable fashion-ness about Ackerman that softens the clothes, makes them approachable, gives them some kind of anchoring in the broader conversation. (Not to mention that no one does a skinny pant like Ackerman can.)
This idea — that maintaining a level of “fashion-ness” and how it infers a modernity and cultural presence reminded me that these are the ingredients that make clothes sticky. The blessing of sticky clothes is that people pay attention. The curse is that they can feel over before they’ve even really arrived (see: The Row’s jelly flats from last Spring).
Chemena Kamali’s Chloe has had the stickiness going for it elsewhere on the style spectrum since Kamali took over, and the broad consensus on yesterday’s viewing was praise but I think I’m done with the soft dresses. Far more intriguing (conceptually) to me were those gigantic, closing shoulders and the ruffle hem, low rise skirts that were styled with flowy belly tops.
If you take just one off-kilter rec from me now, let it be: while clothes are getting less exaggerated, proportions are not. Shoulder pads are coming! Get this shirt! I style it under everything.
One last note, just to draw attention to the architectural marvel that was Alaia —
Not the most wearable artifacts here, but the colors and fantasy have given me something nice to move through the stale end of winter.
Getting dressed
Speaking of stale, is anything firing you up lately? One thing I am coming to love about this time of year is that there is almost no desire at market — it’s too late to shop for winter but too early to be thinking seriously spring. It’s kind of like being in a sensory deprivation tank — you and your clothes, alone in your oneness.
You get more creative about what’s in your closet, squeezing the last bit of life out of knits, dusting off old hits, resuscitating what you may have thought was dead. It can be very satisfying. In my recent rotation there is:
This specific utility belt. I have liked it styled over a mini skirt (skort)/dress with boots or knee highs and flats, or a tunic/long turtleneck (could be a dress for more versatility) with straight but flowy pants.
Norma Kamali’s shoulder pad t-shirt mentioned re: Chloe above, styled under Leset turtleneck and Me + Em sweater, Jujuvera choker, Aritzia skort, Polo RL boots and Khaite suede clutch 
Vintage Michael Kors dress (a totally different vibe, but a great one for this use case), Missoni pants, Gianvito Rossi sandals, Little Liffner suede bag Gigantic boots (old Bottega) with tailored trousers and tank tops or vice versa, underwear and jackets
Cordera crochet halter top (this one from Peter Do on sale is very flattering and more tame; this one’s for a spirited good times gal!), Aflalo pants, Bottega Veneta cowboy boots, Hunting Season straw bag, Jennifer Fisher ‘puffy’ bracelets and Marisa Klass necklaces — here’s a close up: Actually, this one-two punch of boots and micro-shorts has been the combo that feels most fresh these days.
Rohe jacket, Skall Studio denim shirt, Kallmeyer white t-shirt, Dice Kayek white shorts (close comp), Maria la Rosa sheer red tights (here from Calzedonia), another pair of wild n crazy Bottega boots you can find in the 200’s on TRR/Vestiaire
But per those tank tops to wear with trousers: I got and have been wearing the shit out of this one from Christopher Esber.
Styled her here with a Blooming Dreamer jade fish and a vintage gold collar (she makes a good case; but she is still The One) but if you are in the market for the Michelin standard of classic tanks, I cannot more effusively suggest one better than this one, from the newly launched All Three Studio.
‘Claire’ tank styled with Marisa Klass necklaces; full look below: 
Have been wearing leggings under bermuda shorts often lately. This brand belongs to my friend Tal, and embodies another form of the subtle but particular femininity and sexuality I was getting at earlier this week. Like if Rick Owens was caught in a sensual dream.
Shopping
Meanwhile, what is the right spring shoe?