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OCTOBER 2021

ALESSIA CARA’S NEW ALBUM AND OUTLOOK

THE RETURN OF

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Nikon Lenswear allows you to see the details capable of awakening your imagination, even harnessing life-changing possibilities, like the fleeting beauty of a cherry blossom dress on a haute-couture runway.

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OCTOBER 2021

ON THE COVER 38

PROFILE Alessia Cara on her latest album. BY MELISSA VINCENT

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CELEBRITY Selena Gomez is back.

BY CARINA CHOCANO

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LIFESTYLE Canadian spas you’ll want to visit this fall.

BY TRUC NGUYEN

PHOTOGRAPHY, INEZ & VINOODH. DRESS (GUCCI) AND EARRING (CARTIER)

STYLE & FASHION 23

SHOPPING Bag it.

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STYLE Fashion’s flashback to 2001.

BY RANDI BERGMAN

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STYLE The Find.

BY ESTELLE GERVAIS

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STYLE Markoo’s point of view.

BY ERICA NGAO

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SHOPPING A night on the town.

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STYLE Max Mara’s iconic coat.

BY MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN

78

FASHION Cool country chic.

96

FASHION All-out Gucci glam.

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DOUBLE SERUM DOUBLE POWER NOW FOR YOUR EYES

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BEAUTY & WELLNESS 52

BEAUTY Forest-inspired scents.

BY MANON CHEVALIER

54

HEALTH The art of restorative nipple tattooing. BY ELISABETH MASSICOLLI

57

SHOPPING Meet the new bob.

BY THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

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78

BEAUTY Jonathan Van Ness spills his secrets. BY THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

60

BEAUTY Understanding sensitive skin. BY INGRIE WILLIAMS

FEATURES 32

PROFILE Mohawk actor Devery Jacobs is leading the way. BY PATRICIA KAROUNOS

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HEALTH Misogyny and the

PHOTOGRAPHY, LEEOR WILD. COAT, BRA, PANTS, HOOD, SCARF AND BOOTS (MIU MIU)

medical field. BY CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET

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SOCIETY The fall of women in charge. BY ANNA FIELDING

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SOCIETY Do early risers have

EVERY MONTH 15 17 18 31 47 112 113 114

PUBLISHER’S NOTE JOANIE’S PICKS FRONT ROW DEBUT ELLE ONLINE SHOPPING GUIDE HOROSCOPE ESCAPE

an advantage? BY KATIE O’MALLEY

106 LIFESTYLE These Canadian winemakers are setting new standards. BY STEPHANIE MERCIER VOYER

109 DESIGN Up your dinner-party game.

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TRAVEL A Rockies road trip.

BY CHLOE BERGE

ON THE COVER Selena Gomez is wearing a T-shirt, skirt, choker and belt by Chanel, a necklace and rings by Cartier, fishnets by Falke and mules by Giuseppe Zanotti; the jacket on the bed is by Chanel. Photographer Inez & Vinoodh Stylist Alex White Makeup artist Hung Vanngo (The Wall Group) Hairstylist Orlando Pita (Orlo Play) Manicurist Lisa Peña-Wong (Chanel) Set designer James Chinlund (Magnet Agency) Producer Gabe Hill (Ge Projects)

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PUBLISHER’S NOTE

THE PRIVILEGE OF BEING ABLE TO EARN A LIVING

PHOTOGRAPHY, ALEXIS BELHUMEUR

I

WAS AT A DINNER PARTY with some girlfriends recently.

Over the course of the evening, one described the macho behaviour of her male colleagues, another vented about not getting the promotion she’d been hoping for and a third spoke about going back to school to get her M.B.A. As for me, I’d begun to realize that I work too much. The proof? I had to leave the dinner party early to write this editorial, which was due the following day.

Staring at the blank page on my computer screen, I thought back to the evening’s exchanges, and it struck me that our challenges as women in the West are so different from those of women in other parts of the world. If this editorial were for a publication in Kabul, Afghanistan, you wouldn’t see my face alongside it because that would be too dangerous. The content would be totally different. A magazine such as this one, put together mainly by women, might not even be allowed to exist. Since the Taliban recently regained power, Afghan women fear that they will no longer be able to earn a living or have access to education. The rights they have worked so hard to gain since 2001 are being taken away.

Since mid-August, Taliban sympathizers have been destroying images of women, tearing up posters on which they appear and painting over storefront and beauty-salon

windows that have photos of female faces. And they’re not hiding their actions. A few days before I sat down to write this, a popular Afghan TV presenter, Shabnam Dawran, was restricted access to the station where she had been working for the past six years. Women are being erased from the public sphere.

I feel powerless in the face of what’s happening to these women and like I have a visceral closeness to them despite the 10,000 kilometres that separate us. When I think of them—imprisoned in a culture that flouts their fundamental rights—I know that adopting indifference to their reality is unacceptable.

Every woman, even a Western woman, suffers setbacks and has to deal with all kinds of injustices throughout her career. But let’s not forget how fortunate we are to have our freedom and the ability to go to school, earn an income, speak our minds and participate in the world economy. In spite of everything, we have to appreciate what we’ve gained over time and carefully preserve it.

Above all, let’s communicate with our elected representatives and let’s come up with concrete ways to support those women who do not have the same opportunities as we do simply because they were not born here.

Sophie Banford , publisher

@sophiebanford

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PUBLISHER SOPHIE BANFORD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF JOANIE PIETRACUPA CREATIVE DIRECTOR ANNIE HORTH ART DIRECTOR ISABEL BEAUDRY ASSOCIATE EDITOR JOANNA FOX BEAUTY DIRECTOR THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU GRAPHIC DESIGNER LAURENCE FONTAINE EDITORIAL COORDINATOR CLAUDIA GUY DIGITAL DIRECTOR CYNTHIA QUELLET DIGITAL CONTENT MANAGER CAMILLE CARDIN-GOYER DIGITAL CONTENT ASSISTANT ALEX GONTHIER FASHION & MARKET EDITOR ESTELLE GERVAIS FASHION FEATURES WRITER MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN CONTRIBUTORS CHLOE BERGE, RANDI BERGMAN, GUILLAUME BRIÈRE, MANON CHEVALIER, CARINA CHOCANO, MARIE-EVE DUBOIS, MARJORIE DUNHAM-LANDRY, ANNA FIELDING, JANE FIELDING, PATRICIA KAROUNOS, ELISABETH MASSICOLLI, STEPHANIE MERCIER VOYER, ERICA NGAO, TRUC NGUYEN, CÉSAR OCHOA, KATIE O’MALLEY, CIARA RICKARD, CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET, ALEX VALLIÈRES, MELISSA VINCENT, AMIE WATSON, INGRIE WILLIAMS TO REACH EDITORIAL editors@ko-media.ca TO REACH CUSTOMER SERVICE 1-866-697-3776 or ellecanada@kckglobal.com ADVERTISING SALES SENIOR DIRECTOR, STRATEGY, GROWTH & PARTNERSHIPS MÉLISSA GARNIER, 514-914-3605 DIRECTOR, CONTENT & STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS KARINE MARQUIS, 514-941-4067 NATIONAL SALES DIRECTOR (TORONTO) MARCELLE WALLACE, 647-404-4035 SALES DIRECTOR (TORONTO) MARNI ARMOUR, 416-508-8784 NATIONAL DIRECTOR, DIGITAL EXPERT PAULA CEBALLOS, 514-791-8296 SALES DIRECTOR (MONTREAL) SANDRINE DAHAN, 514-449-7438 MULTI-PLATFORM PROJECT MANAGERS TAMMY HURTEAU, VANESSA RISCH PRODUCTION COORDINATOR LINDA DESJARDINS KO MÉDIA INC. PRESIDENT LOUIS MORISSETTE GENERAL DIRECTOR SOPHIE BANFORD FINANCE DIRECTOR SEAN REES MARKETING AND CIRCULATION DIRECTOR MARIE-ANDRÉE PICOTTE MARKETING AND CIRCULATION PROJECT MANAGER GABY BEAUDOIN ACCOUNTING TECHNICIAN GENTA CIKA ACCOUNTING CLERK SANDY ESSOMEYO

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Registered user: KO Média Inc., 651 Notre-Dame West, Suite 100, Montreal, Quebec H3C 1H9. Contents copyright © 2021 by KO Média Inc. ELLE Canada is published 9 times per year except for occasional combined, expanded or premium issues. May not be reprinted without written permission. Single copy price: $5.99+tax. Full subscription price: Canada, 1 year, $19.99+tax; for subscription inquiries, call 1-866-697-3776. Digital editions are available on Zinio, Apple News, Press Reader and Ebsco. Printing: TC Transcontinental Printing, 1603 Montarville Blvd., Boucherville, Quebec J4B 5Y2.

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JOANIE’S PICKS

LUXE

The cult bag After the Fendi First, available in supple leather or sheepskin, made a notable appearance on Kim Jones’ debut runway show for Fendi, it didn’t take very long for it to become a coveted fall accessory. ($4,980, fendi.com)

October Envies Editor-in-Chief JOANIE PIETRACUPA

BEAUTY

The perfect shade

This season, everyone’s nails will be lacquered in this gorgeous rich khaki brown.

PHOTOGRAPHY, MAUDE ARSENAULT (J. PIETRACUPA) & PETER KRAMER, HBO (SUCCESSION)

Chanel Le Vernis in Brun Fumé ($38, chanel.com)

TELEVISION

The series to binge-watch

After a two-year wait, Succession—one of my all-time favourite shows—is coming back for a third season. To say I’m excited to find out what happens next in this HBO drama about a lying, backstabbing wealthy family led by a terrifying patriarch would be a serious understatement.

ELLECANADA.COM

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FRONT ROW

October

40 CANDLES

MICHAEL KORS is celebrating 40 years of fashion this fall, and he’s pulling out all the stops to mark the occasion. For his fall/winter 2020/2021 show, held in April, he took over Times Square in Manhattan. Under the bright lights of Broadway, the collection paid homage to the effervescence of New York City and the designer’s glamorous style,

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drawing from the fashion house’s archives for a modern interpretation of 16 iconic looks. Unveiling these elegant designs required exceptional casting; Kors called upon top models of the past and present, including Naomi Campbell, Bella Hadid, Shalom Harlow and Adut Akech, to help honour this milestone. michaelkors.ca

TEXT, THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU, JOANNA FOX, MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN & CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET; PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE (RUNWAY), PHILIP HARRIS (J. REYEZ) & COURTESY OF 20TH CENTURY STUDIOS & TFD PRODUCTIONS ( THE FRENCH DISPATCH)

What’s on the ELLE editors’ radar right now.

STOP THE PRESSES Wes Anderson is back and up to his usual hyper-stylized antics with THE FRENCH DISPATCH, out on October 22, after making a splash with the film’s Cannes debut in July. This time around, the detail-obsessed filmmaker turned his symmetryloving eye to a fictional chapter of the newspaper world, told through three intertwined short stories set in the cheekily named fake French town of Ennui-surBlasé. Many of the director’s darlings, including Bill Murray and Owen Wilson, stylishly take their place in this nutty story of art, intrigue and revolution alongside Tilda Swinton, Timothée Chalamet, Elizabeth Moss and too many others to list here.

Local Sounds OSHEAGA, Montreal’s go-to summertime festival, got pushed back to October this year, and, for the first time, it has an allCanadian lineup. There might be a nip in the air from October 1 to 3, but Parc Jean-Drapeau will be on fire with the songs of headliners Charlotte Cardin, Jessie Reyez and Half Moon Run as well as those of countless other local bands that will be playing their hearts out for three days straight. osheaga.com

BAG IT

Our new back-to-school fashion obsession? The Jacquemus Ciuciu bag. With its slim silhouette, minimalist lines, rigid leather and removable chain, this accessory is the perfect way to move into the new season in rebellious style. $1,240, jacquemus.com

Jessie Reyez

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RICK OWENS X CONVERSE DRKSHDW, the diffusion line launched by American designer Rick Owens in 2005, brings a Gothic aesthetic to a new collaboration with Converse.

With the TURBODRK CHUCK 70, the collab’s first release, Owens has taken the rounded toe of the iconic high-top basketball shoe and made it square with a triple cap plus added an extended tongue and a double sole. Accompanying the shoe is a striking black-and-white otherworldly global ad campaign by Montreal multidisciplinary artists Hannah Rose Dalton and Steven Raj Bhaskaran of Fecal Matter. These visuals might not be for everyone, but, like these new kicks, they certainly make a bold statement. converse.com

BOOT UP

For nearly 60 years, Canada Goose has made it its mission to protect us from the cold with its parkas, which have made their way from the city streets all the way to Antarctica. Now, the Toronto brand wants to keep our feet cozy and dry thanks to its very first collection of winter boots, hitting stores on November 12.

ART AFTER DARK Creatures of the night can unite for the return of the contemporary-art festival NOCTURNE, held in Halifax from October 13 to 16.

After being on hiatus last year, the free independent nighttime annual event is back with tons of installations and projects all over town. It celebrates the visual arts scene in Mi’kma’ki/Nova Scotia with sustainability, innovation, inclusion and diversity and actively holds an anti-oppression framework as part of its vision. nocturnehalifax.ca

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PHOTOGRAPHY, JAMES MACLEAN (NOCTURNE: DE-POSITION BY THE WOODS AT NOCTURNE, HALIFAX 2020: ECHOLOCATION CURATED BY LINDSAY DOBBIN)

canadagoose.com

FRONT ROW

TWISTED STYLE

With its new Tiffany Knot collection, TIFFANY & CO. is breaking the rules by manipulating, folding and distorting gold to create sharp, swollen knots and adorning bracelets, rings, necklaces and earrings with them. These bold pieces—their design a nod to the chain-link fences found around New York City—showcase elegant lines and have a contemporary style. To celebrate this collection, the jewellery brand called on multidisciplinary artist Daniel Arsham, who’s already accustomed to blurring the boundaries between visual arts, architecture and performance, to reinterpret the Tiffany blue box by way of 49 sculptures in eroded bronze. “I wanted to present the blue box in a different way, giving it a worn and aged look to illustrate its history and to show how important it is in our world today and how important it will continue to be in the coming decades, if not centuries,” says Arsham. “My job is to imagine a contemporary object as if we had transported ourselves into the future and brought it back. And this time around, the dislocation creates a kind of paradox in the object itself. We have this thing that we know from our current time, but it looks worn.” An exclusive white-gold, diamond and tsavorite bracelet, which is part of the new Tiffany Knot collection, also came out of the partnership between the brand and Arsham. tiffany.ca

Funny Pages PHOEBE ROBINSON’s latest essay collection, Please Don’t Sit on My Bed in Your Outside Clothes , delivers a laugh-packed stroll through the comedian’s mind during the Zoomand-sweatpantsfilled year that was 2020. Things get up-close-andpersonal as The New York Times Best Seller writer gives us a peek behind the curtain of her life, sharing embarrassing moments she had quarantining with her boyfriend, her experiences with the Black Lives Matter movement and why you should always have a wig on hand for online meetings. penguinrandomhouse.com

WORLDLY SCENTS “I’m constantly writing notes, and I have this sentence on my desk at my Miami studio: ‘Take me to a place I’ve never been to; show me something I have never seen,’” says Daniel Kaner, president and co-founder of luxury hair-care, bodycare and fragrance brand ORIBE. “I use this adage when it comes to creating something unique, and it has quickly become the cornerstone of the creation of our fragrances.” Following the dazzling success of Côte d’Azur, the brand has launched two new fragrances: Valley of Flowers and Desertland. The first was inspired by a trip Kaner took to Marfa, Tex., and has notes of cedar, juniper berries, desert wildflowers and musk.

The second is a fresh and modern version of rose complemented by peony, bergamot, lemon and amber. Although each fragrance has its own non-gendered personality, they share a common sensory experience that is both fresh and unique. $156 each for 75 mL, holtrenfrew.com

ELLECANADA.COM

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FRONT ROW

GOOD-HAIR DAY

BRASCHI

Since the resounding success of its Supersonic blow-dryer, launched in 2016, DYSON has continued to develop compatible attachments that work for different hair textures and styles. The latest one is a flyaways attachment, touted as the accessory to tame “rebellious hair.” It uses the Coanda effect, an aerodynamic phenomenon, to attract longer hairs to the surface and bury flyaways, which tames frizz and provides a glossy finish in a single pass—no product needed. $50, dysoncanada.ca

IN FULL COLOUR

British electro-soul singer-songwriter Tirzah is set to release her second album, Colourgrade, on October 1, and, like her popular debut, Devotion, it’s sure to send a shiver or two down your spine. In the video for her first single, “Tectonic,” scenes of bodies swapping places with cavernous geological formations are overlaid with distorted sounds made tense by a looping synth line that’s both menacing and sexy. smarturl.it/colourgrade

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Artificial intelligence is now becoming part of our beauty ritual with LANCÔME’s launch of e-Youth Finder, a free virtual-analysis tool that performs a real-time examination of our skin in order to target eight key skin concerns and offer a personalized routine. With 85 years of expertise, Lancôme is helping us achieve the most technologically precise—and effective—skincare regimen. lancome.ca

Lancôme Advanced Génifique Youth Activating Concentrate ($189, lancome.ca)

PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE (MODEL)

Connected Beauty

STYLE Kassl Editions ($360, matchesfashion.com)

Stand Studio ($448, standstudio.com)

Rudsak ($425, rudsak.com) Source Unknown ($55, thesourceunknown.com)

Turn Up the VOLUME A.W.A.K.E. MODE

This season’s best bags in our favourite fall colours.

Mango ($60, shop.mango.com)

STYLING, ESTELLE GERVAIS; PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE (RUNWAY)

Maison Margiela ($2,990, farfetch.com)

Saint Laurent ($2,770, saksfifthavenue.com) ELLECANADA.COM

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VERSACE

DION LEE

BLUMARINE

TOM FORD

style

PARTY LIKE IT’S 2001 EARLY-AUGHTS fashion is back.

But what it signifies this time around is much different.

By RANDI BERGMAN

PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE

THE INEXPLICABLE WILD STYLE of the Y2K era, both beloved and maligned for its

thong-exposing low-rise jeans, bedazzled pastel sweatsuits and logo-covered designer everything, has finally eclipsed the reign of the ’90s. Overt tackiness is back, baby.

And that means even Ed Hardy.

As we cautiously emerge from the great upheaval of the past year and a half, we’re craving all-out glamour, especially of the ostentatious variety. In a post-9/11 world, we had similar fashion leanings. Traumatic times are typically followed by conservative, practical fashion choices, but sometimes it’s the complete inverse. The Roaring Twenties, for example, celebrated the end of the First World War with flapper dresses, pixie cuts and Gatsbyesque bacchanalia. The post-9/11 fashionscape saw Louis Vuitton transform its iconic monogram into a Murakami cartoon confection, Versace trade exclusively in ruffles and silk and Destiny’s Child wear the quintessential looks of the era—from tropical-print bustier tops to rhinestone belts—in threes. Meanwhile, Carrie Bradshaw taught everyone the art of overaccessorizing.

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STYLE

“WHEN WE’RE THINKING ABOUT , THERE IS DEFINITELY THIS RENEWED SENSE OF EVERYONE’S AND EVERYONE’S AND .”

fashion

post-trauma

body individuality physicality

“When we’re thinking about post-trauma fashion, there is definitely this renewed sense of everyone’s body and everyone’s individuality and physicality,” says Rachel Seville Tashjian, a GQ fashion critic. Enter Blumarine, whose millennial creative director, Nicola Brognano, mined his own teen years to deliver a gorgeously cacophonous ode to the excess of the early aughts for his fall/winter 2021/2022 collection: low-rise bell-bottoms that were paired with oversized butterfly-motif belts; scarf tops and faux-fur-trimmed cardigans; cascading ruffled dresses and lace-trimmed slips that were paired with newsboy caps; and matching beaded sets that felt worthy of Britney Spears’ performance of “Oops!... I Did It Again” at the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards. “I think that this is the right moment to talk about the 2000s because now more than ever, people need happiness, joyfulness and a sense of lightness—and these three elements with a touch of extravagant glamour describe those years perfectly,” says Brognano. Meanwhile, Tom Ford referenced his own sexed-up archive from his influential days at the helm of Gucci. Über-low-rises and daring hemlines were back in the form of leather hot pants and miniskirts so short that—as your grandma might say—you could see what the models ate for lunch. Even Prada, with its sequin-lined shrugs, suggested the type of impractical glamour that hearkens back to fashion’s most OTT decade.

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Nostalgic reboots typically follow a 20-year cycle. So for those who track the coming and going of trends, it’s no surprise that we’re shopping for Fendi baguettes and celebrating the reunification of Bennifer (the emblematic couple of the early aughts) with the fire of a thousand suns. But something about this style resurgence hits different. It’s been fuelled by not just fashion’s power players but also those who were too young to experience the decade the first time around. On TikTok, videos tagged #Y2Kaesthetic and #Y2Kfashion have a combined 440 million views and counting. These videos—which range from sharing thrift-store hauls to a 2000s-pop-star challenge that asks users to create outfits for an imaginary day in the life of Britney or Xtina—live beside ones that explore the fashion of the ’60s, ’70s and beyond. “When I look on TikTok, I see a flattening of time and a buffet of available styles,” says Seville Tashjian.

“It really is an expression of pure interest in a certain aesthetic that just feels right right now. It’s not that enough things have changed that now that [aesthetic] looks good, because it never looked like anything to a lot of these people.”

This resurrected aesthetic has also been stripped of the fat phobia that those who lived through it the first time around will remember. A quick flashback to tabloid headlines of the early 2000s reveals the endless skewering of female stars for weight gain, the celebration of drastic diets and the chastisement of those who went past the ideal level of skinny. “Nicole Richie, Anorexic Again,” “Sandra Bullock, Obsessed With Being Skinny” and “Mary-Kate, Going to Extremes” are just a few toxic examples. Fashion at the time was made for one type of body: impossibly thin. “I remember being incredibly self-conscious while shopping in the ninth grade even though I was a size 4,” says Lauren Chan, a plus-size model and founder of size-inclusive brand Henning. “I was looking for pieces that hid my arms or lower belly because I was still much heavier than the size 0 models and celebrities I adored.” By contrast, in 2021, models Paloma Elsesser and Hailey Bieber both proudly rock the whale tail and receive equal levels of praise.

Late last year, Seville Tashjian launched “Opulent Tips,” a newsletter that celebrates glamour, lavishness and all things antithetical to athleisure-heavy influencer culture. In it, she waxes poetic about everything from archival Tom Ford for Gucci to splurging on expensive china as a way to show off one’s style.

“There’s going to be a big shift toward expressing yourself in a very lavish and obvious way over the next decade,” she says.

“And I feel like there isn’t anything anymore that looks bad or is a faux pas. Right now, there’s this sense that you can make anything look great with the right attitude.”

As I scroll through the feed of Adriana Hot Couture, an eccentric Italian fashion brand that sells lace- and rosette-trimmed ice-skating unitards in neon hues and feather-trimmed Juicyinspired velour bustier tops, I can’t help but agree.

STYLE

TEXT, ESTELLE GERVAIS; PHOTOGRAPHY, XAVIER TERA

Wearable

Art

ONCE AGAIN, LOUIS VUITTON’S CAPUCINES has been reinvented by six leading contemporary artists from around the world who have used the coveted piece as a blank canvas. This time, the iconic bag, named after Vuitton’s first store (which opened on Rue Neuve-des-Capucines in Paris in 1854), was reinterpreted for fall/winter 2021/2022

by Donna Huanca, Huang Yuxing, Vik Muniz, Paola Pivi, Zeng Fanzhi and Gregor Hildebrandt. Hildebrandt’s version, pictured here, features screen-printed leather and inlay crafted from vinyl records. The bags are limited edition and will be available worldwide at the end of October, making wearable art a reality. ca.louisvuitton.com

ELLECANADA.COM

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STYLE

Tania Martins and Mona Koochek of Markoo

MARKOO The design duo behind the Canadian label’s instinctually cool, effortless aesthetic.

By ERICA NGAO

I

N THE EVOLUTION of Toronto-based label Markoo—a portmanteau of

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STAYING POWER “It’s not possible to know how many

challenges there really are [in starting a brand] until you’re actually in it,” says Koochek. “For us, the biggest challenge has been that we jumped into creating a label without any financial backing and are still totally financially independent, making it very challenging to get exposure. Fashion is a very expensive business to get into and operate in, so keeping your head above water is a big struggle and takes a lot of commitment and grind.”

BRIGHTER DAYS “We’re feeling optimistic,” says Koochek.

“We want more than ever to make clothing that is beautiful and moves to its own beat. I think when someone starts a designer brand, they are actively protesting the idea of fast fashion and this overarching homogenized culture of cheap disposable clothing. We’re looking forward to creating, pushing our own boundaries and hopefully being a part of a generation of designers that pushes the industry to become more sustainable and produce ethically while aiming to be more accessible than, say, the really big fashion houses.”

PHOTOGRAPHY, SHAYNE LAVERDIÈRE (MAIN IMAGE) & CLAUDINE BALTAZAR (T. MARTINS & M. KOOCHEK)

co-founders Tania Martins and Mona Koochek’s surnames—the city itself has played a strong supporting role. Both Martins and Koochek immigrated there as children with their families, from Portugal and Iran, respectively, and the friends-cum-collaborators met during the early-2010s heyday of the Queen West neighbourhood, when the then cheap rent fostered a vibrant haven for all things art and design. Martins had recently closed the boutique she co-owned and Koochek had just graduated with a background in environmental studies when the pair took a leap of faith and started their brand.

Nearly a decade later, Markoo has acquired a cult following for its modern spin on nostalgic elements and pieces that exude a cool, no-fuss attitude. “Our references often come from the subcultures of the ’80s and ’90s, which we then translate through a more contemporary lens,” says Koochek. “In the city during those decades, hip hop, skate culture and even the grunge scene were big parts of growing up, so those aesthetics definitely find their way into the designs, albeit indirectly.” The result is effortless, special pieces that have TRUE TEAMWORK authority on their own but can also act “We design everything together,” says as the building blocks of a wardrobe.

Koochek. “One of us might throw an The brand’s latest collection acknowidea on the table, and then we’ll start ledges the heaviness of the world this year dissecting it. The idea might start with with a stronger focus on practicality—looks a silhouette or a detail we feel could be that feel easy and have presence but in a interesting in the collection, or it might quieter way—while continuing to incorstart with a print or specific fabric. Once porate intricate and bold elements. “We we have a direction that feels good to actually kept going back and forth on us and a few core ideas, we chip away, whether we should just make a collection piece by piece, designing what we hope that’s even more directional than usual are items that people will love and buy to counter the mood the pandemic had and keep in their wardrobes for years. set, but really there was more truth and There is always a core aesthetic that we inspiration in being aware of and in tune work around, and each collection is a with where people and life were really dance of staying true to that aesthetic at,” says Koochek. “Fashion is, after all, while evolving and making sure the a reflection of the culture and times.” collections feel fresh and relevant.”

Top, Area ($755, farfetch.com)

STYLE

Clutch, Luxy Moon ($75, luxy-moon.com)

Pumps, Amina Muaddi ($1,238, ssense.com)

Dress, Undress ($669, wolfandbadger.com) Earrings, Saint Laurent ($675, italist.com)

Umbrella, Alexander McQueen ($585, luisaviaroma.com)

Tom Ford Fucking Fabulous Eau de Parfum Spray ($454 for 50 mL, holtrenfrew.com)

Skirt, Sage the Label ($70, lulus.com)

ABOUT LAST NIGHT Earrings, DANNIJO ($300, dannijo.com)

SAINT LAURENT

STYLING, ESTELLE GERVAIS; PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF SAINT LAURENT (MODEL)

A little glitz, a lot of glam and, of course, your favourite pair of heels.

Jabot, Kimnewport ($328, pinktartan.ca)

Pumps, L’intervalle ($80, lintervalleshoes.com)

STYLE

An Iconic

PIECE

Max Mara’s 101801 is celebrating its 40th anniversary, and in honour of the occasion, we’re looking back at the history of this exceptional coat.

First and foremost, it’s about the cut. Double-breasted, with a beltcinched waist and perfectly draped kimono-style sleeves, the 101801 coat is incredibly flattering and has remained unchanged since it was first created in 1981. It’s also about the colour (a warm camel brown that you can pick out in a sea of beige) and the material (an undeniably soft felt made from a blend of wool and cashmere). But above all, it’s the iconic nature of the piece, baptized not with a name but with a number.

MAX MARA FALL/WINTER 2021/2022

By MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN

When Italian fashion entrepreneur Achille Maramotti launched Max Mara in 1951, the aim of the brand was to provide both functionality and beauty by combining artisanal luxury and new ready-to-wear-fashion techniques. This ambition gave birth to high-quality, well-fitted clothing that cost less to produce than tailor-made pieces. The customer Maramotti had in mind was the well-to-do upper-middle-class woman on the hunt for new styles— “the doctor’s wife,” he liked to say. Thirty years later, Maramotti presented a coat that would become emblematic of the Italian house: the 101801. It required 73 steps—and precisely 168 minutes—to make, from cutting the material to hand-finishing. Behind this cornerstone creation were the pencil strokes of French designer Anne-Marie Beretta. This “fashion architect” contributed her talent as well as her vision to the label, as other couturiers would do in the years that followed, their identities staying carefully guarded for the most part—think Karl Lagerfeld, Giambattista Valli and Jean-Charles de Castelbajac. But for Max Mara, the clothes—and teamwork—have always come first.

Katie Holmes

THE REBIRTH OF A CLASSIC Max Mara’s fall/winter 2021/2022 collection, shown in February, marked its 70th anniversary. To celebrate, creative director Ian Griffiths, who has been with the brand for more than three decades, paid homage to the house’s signature piece with a presentation of perfectly tailored coats. There’s the Teddy Bear, whose popularity has boomed since its launch in the fall/winter 2013/2014 collection. The 101801 also appeared on the runway

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for the occasion, of course, in its original and oh-so-recognizable camel colour—despite the variety of shades that are now available. Without any form of excess, Max Mara relies on its triedand-true designs and the elegance of timeless pieces that are still in demand 40 years later.

PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE (RUNWAY) & SHUTTERSTOCK (K. HOLMES)

MODERN LUXURY

DEBUT

Nesta Cooper The star is coming into her own.

W

HEN I HOP ONTO ZOOM WITH NESTA COOPER,

the Canadian actor has just gotten back to her Toronto home after getting a new tattoo.

The ink depicts a small series of faces, most without distinct features, surrounding another face with a third eye. She had been eagerly anticipating her appointment but couldn’t decide what image she wanted to put on her body until she came across the art on TikTok. “All of my tattoos are really personal, but the ones I like the most are the ones I got kind of haphazardly,” says the 27-year-old, whom you might recognize from her roles in the sci-fi series Travelers and coming-of-age dramedy The Edge of Seventeen. “I was like, ‘I need to stop caring so much.’ Then I saw this cool doodle, and it just moved me.”

It’s that willing-to-try-anything attitude that makes Cooper so compelling as Haniwa (opposite Jason Momoa, who plays her father) in the Apple TV+ dystopian drama See, currently in its second season with a third one on the way.

TEXT, PATRICIA KAROUNOS; PHOTOGRAPHY, VICTORIA STEVENS (N. COOPER) & COURTESY OF APPLE TV+ (SEE )

WORLD BUILDING “Season two [of See] was less daunting

because when season one came together, I felt like I had proven to myself that I could do what I had set out to do. It was a really big undertaking, and I was excited to continue that legacy. But it was also more daunting in a sense because my character falls in love this season. I was used to playing a bratty teenager, but she grows up a lot, so I had to think about her psychology.”

OWNING IT “I really had to come into my own [this season]. I felt a strong need to protect my character’s integrity, and I felt like I had to take charge and know exactly what I was doing and where I was coming from. I’ve never had the confidence to take up space in that way, especially on a project this big. I wasn’t perfect all the time—actually, I was never perfect—but I’m proud of myself for stepping into it instead of shying away from [more responsibility].”

ROLE MODEL “Haniwa is such a physical role. I learned a lot from watching Jason [Momoa] because he is such an amazing stunt person and incredible fighter. I’m in awe of the way he’s able to move his body. I really tried to pick [up some] of his mannerisms.”

STYLE MOMENT “I would describe my personal style as ‘eclectic leisure.’ I love mixing bold prints and using all kinds of colours. I kind of lean into that fitted, layered, cut-out, asymmetrical look. And I’ve been obsessed with [designer] Charlotte Knowles lately; I love the way she layers and that she uses sheer stretchy fabric. I think she’s so, so cool.”

From top: Nesta Cooper; a scene with Jason Momoa in See

CONTENT CORNER “Right now, I’m reading [the novel] Circe

by Madeline Miller. I’m only halfway through, but it’s pretty heartbreaking. I’m also watching [Marvel series] Loki with Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson, with whom I did the movie Bliss.

I love Owen—he’s so amazing and funny.”

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Leading

the

Way

Mohawk actor DEVERY JACOBS on her new role in Reservation Dogs, working on an Indigenous set and being an activist for her community.

PHOTOGRAPHY, MAURICIO J. CALERO

By PATRICIA KAROUNOS

PROFILE

I

T WAS LIKE A SCENE FROM A MOVIE: Groups of

happy people filled a New York City boardwalk on a not-too-hot summer evening as the sun set and, a little later, fireworks lit up the night sky. But for actor Devery Jacobs, that picturesque scene was reality, and it was unfolding at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere of her highly anticipated new comedy series, Reservation Dogs, earlier this year. “I finally allowed myself to get excited—usually I am so focused on the job at hand and can’t think about the outcome,” the Mohawk star says over a video call from her home in Toronto. “[The show] was my first project [on-set] during the pandemic, and it was such a welcome back to the industry.”

Reservation Dogs—which was co-created by Academy Award winner Taika Waititi (a New Zealand actor, screenwriter and director who is of Maori descent) and his close friend Sterlin Harjo, a Native American filmmaker from Oklahoma—has been a long time coming for the 28-year-old who grew up in Kahnawà:ke Mohawk Territory, which is on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in what non-Indigenous folks know as Quebec. Jacobs broke onto the scene in the 2013 indie drama Rhymes for Young Ghouls (which earned her a Canadian Screen Awards nod) and has been working steadily ever since, appearing in projects like Netflix horror fantasy The Order and Amazon Prime Video’s buzzy adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. Reservation Dogs, which debuted on FX on Hulu in August and will air later in Canada on Disney+, shines a much bigger, well-deserved spotlight on the actor.

Jacobs stars in the comedy as one of four Indigenous teenagers who start stealing in an attempt to save up enough money to flee to California from their rural Oklahoma town. While Jacobs is no stranger to starring in Indigenous-created projects or taking on roles for which her Indigeneity is instrumental, Reservation Dogs marks the first time she has worked on something that features a majority Indigenous cast and crew. “It was such a breath of fresh air,” she says. “I was feeling a bit frustrated with the industry before [this show] and exhausted by the idea of going back to set and being the only Indigenous person—let alone the only queer Indigenous person—for miles.”

It’s not that Jacobs was unhappy on all the sets she has worked on, but it had been a while since she’d shot something with many other Indigenous creators, and the difference was palpable. Harjo made sure to fill even the smallest roles with community members (including a few family members), and he eschewed the traditional hierarchies typically seen on film sets—like, say, who got to eat lunch when and with whom. “There’s this level of understanding and respect on Indigenous sets—they operate in line with our values and our cultures,” says Jacobs. “I had been craving that sense of community and that sense of home within my work. There’s just something so inherently comforting—something that makes you feel safe in your body—about being surrounded by other Indigenous people.”

It’s also worth noting that it took an American project that was backed by a major star (Waititi) for Jacobs to be able to work on a predominantly Indigenous set. Although the actor is proud of the diverse group of talented creatives she has met and worked alongside north of the border, she is frustrated

“There’s this level of understanding and respect on Indigenous sets—they operate in line with our values and our cultures.”

with the way the Canadian film system operates, especially when it comes to the productions that receive grants. “We don’t have to be marketable to the masses,” she says. “Why aren’t we taking more chances in our storytelling? Why aren’t [we creating] the most groundbreaking and revolutionary projects out there? It’s not for lack of talent. It’s up to the funding bodies and decision-makers to take a chance on diverse voices and provide them with that first opportunity.”

This lack of ambitious thinking in the industry is a driving force for Jacobs, who is also a vocal activist for the Indigenous and queer communities and aims to do more work behind the camera, having already co-written and directed a few short films. She cites filmmaker Ava DuVernay—someone who has gained power in the industry and, instead of sticking to the status quo, is using it to uplift Black and other less represented voices—as an inspiration. It’s exhausting having to constantly advocate and educate, she says. When it’s really wearing on her, she loves going back home to Kahnawà:ke to refuel, surrounding herself with friends, family and people who aren’t asked to examine their own Indigeneity for the outside gaze. It’s something she loves about Reservation Dogs too: The comedy is a fully drawn depiction of Indigenous life and the very unique senses of humour, joy and grief that are specific to the communities being portrayed.

Though there’s still much work to be done, Jacobs isn’t without hope. “What I’m trying to leave behind is so much bigger than just myself,” she says. “While it’s an accomplishment, the fact that Reservation Dogs is a ‘first’ on so many levels is also hugely embarrassing for this industry. It shouldn’t have taken until 2021 for decision-makers to let Indigenous people tell their own stories on a mainstream show. So while this may be a first, I don’t want it to be the last. My goal is to open as many doors as I can. At the end of the day, when I leave this industry behind, I want to see a whole industry of Indigenous creatives out there.”

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PHOTOGRAPHY, RENE ASMUSSEN/PEXELS (MAIN IMAGE)

HEALTH

Medical Misogyny Sexism and undiagnosed female pain are part of gynecology’s long history—and they’re still present today.

By CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET

M

y first IUD had to be put in twice. To my total horror, I pulled out the copper device while removing my menstrual cup in the shower.

When the female gynecologist reinserted it by manually dilating my cervix (a more common practice for women who haven’t given birth), a deep pain I’d never experienced— like a lightning bolt of a period cramp— shot through my pelvis and made me dizzy.

The doctor cut the strings entirely to ensure accidental removal wouldn’t happen again and compassionately reassured me. Five years later, I was back at the gynecologist for an IUD replacement, and the memory of that pain sent my stress levels through the roof. When I entered the examination room, I started talking about my previous IUD complications with the male doctor on call, to which he responded—eyes still down on his paperwork—by wordlessly raising a hand to indicate that I should stop speaking. It wasn’t until he had inserted the speculum that he paid attention and, in an accusatory tone, asked me why I didn’t have strings, seeming upset that he would have to dilate my cervix. This painful situation left me embarrassed—with my legs up in stirrups, no less—a feeling that could have been avoided if he’d bothered to listen.

For feminist-culture historian and author Elinor Cleghorn, it took nearly a decade of having the pain in her legs dismissed, being told she was “just hormonal” and having her symptoms questioned or glossed over before being properly diagnosed with lupus. Cleghorn’s disease came to a head when she was pregnant with her second son and doctors discovered an in utero heart irregularity linked to her own illness. Though she is infinitely grateful for the care given to her son, the situation made

her wonder why her pain hadn’t been worth taking seriously until her body was fulfilling its so-called biological function.

“I was suddenly worth caring for, I was suddenly a priority, I was suddenly valued in a way I had never been valued before,” says Cleghorn. This experience pushed her to dive into the history of misogyny in medicine and write Unwell Women, which was published last spring and shows how intrinsic sexism is to gynecology’s very foundation.

In her book, Cleghorn details absurd Ancient Greek ideas of the uterus wandering in the pelvic cavity if it were “unemployed,” the Middle Ages treatise Secrets of Women, which propagated myths about conception and female anatomy, and Victorian England’s diagnosis of hysteria (the name of which is derived from the Greek word for “uterus”), considered a nervous-system disorder that was a result of women’s “excessive” emotions.

Misunderstanding and distrust of the female body got passed down through the ages and can still be seen in the care that women receive today. Though diagnosing hysteria is long gone, its legacy isn’t, and it lurks in other common language used to discount pain—think about the sharp dismissiveness of being called “hormonal.” This long-standing braiding of emotional and psychological states with physical health still has the measurable effect of women’s discomfort not being taken at face value. A study published in the Journal of Pain just last March revealed that when shown images of men and women experiencing pain, observers estimated that the women’s suffering was less intense and were more likely to suggest that women should receive psychotherapy instead of medication.

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It can be hard to parse where these prejudices stem from, though part of the issue is that up until the 19th century, women weren’t admitted to medical colleges in many countries, which had a direct impact on what was considered worthy of research and study (and, therefore, funding). Now, for the first time ever, women are outnumbering men in admissions to medical school in the United States, but it remains to be seen to what extent gender diversity in the field can change age-old systemic sexist practices. Cleghorn recounts that after experiencing severe tearing during childbirth, her female doctor gave her what is commonly referred to as “the husband stitch.” “The surgeon said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ve done you up really nice and tight.’ I remember at the time not really registering these words and then looking into it later and realizing this was a thing that often happened in the ’60s, like a handshake between doctor and father.” Not only is this extra stitch often not consented to but it can also lead to complications like infection and painful sex (another female symptom kept under wraps).

Lack of consideration of our pain means that women often have to fight for diagnoses while also suffering on a regular Elinor Cleghorn basis. “There’s a huge sense that you need to be your own advocate, you need to inform yourself and you need to push [for care],” says Katelyn Luciani, executive director of the charity The Endometriosis Network Canada. “It’s not right, but the only way you’re going “I REALLY THINK THAT THE BEGINNING to get help is if you’re confident with everything you need to say.” Endometriosis is when tissue similar to OF IT IS TO JUST LISTEN TO PEOPLE.” the uterus’ lining (the endometrium) implants itself outside the uterus, causing lesions, cysts and other growths on organs in the pelvic cavity, often producing debilitating pain. This Canadian network strives to provide The Endometriosis Network Canada believes that a key step support for those who have endometriosis and fight common in helping those living with endometriosis is raising awareness myths and misinformation surrounding the disease that are about the disease. It affects one in 10 Canadian women and an still being spread throughout medical institutions, like the unmeasured number of trans and gender-diverse people, but oft-suggested treatment of pregnancy. Though gestation’s considering data gaps and diagnosis issues, the actual numbers hormonal changes can stabilize symptoms, it’s not a proven are probably higher. Though there’s evidence that endometrilong-term solution. It’s also a bit of tough luck if you can’t have osis was written about in Egypt around 1550 BC, we still don’t kids (a cruel Catch-22 since endometriosis can cause infertility) know what causes it, and there’s no cure. One of the network’s or, gasp, if you don’t want them. main goals is to educate people about the disease’s telltale signs, In her book, Cleghorn describes the work of American gynewhich often start during puberty, beginning a cycle that can cologist Joseph Vincent Meigs, who in the 1940s claimed that exclude sufferers from socio-economic prosperity in countless endometriosis was a disease tied to too frequent menstruation ways. Teens with endometriosis are 10 times more likely to miss and that “unless [women] want to become ‘abnormal,’ they school because of symptoms that include intense cramping, should procreate as soon and often as possible.” This conclusion back pain and vomiting and even effects on the nervous system, conveniently placed blame for the disease back on patients since it can grow on places like the sciatic nerve. Luciani herself rather than looking for external solutions, a dynamic those has endometriosis and experienced the return of chronic pain affected by endometriosis struggle with constantly. Meigs also after extrusion surgery removed the tissue, and she was forced falsely characterized this disease as an affliction of white and to leave her job. She estimates that it takes approximately five middle- or upper-class women, a bias that still affects diagnosis years for people suffering from endometriosis to get a diagnosis of and education about the disease today. His theories slide in in Canada, though it’s often longer. alongside the ingrained racism that’s also inseparable from Many of us grow up accepting the fact that our bodies will the history of gynecology—the speculum, for example, was betray us in some way by causing pain—that this is part of the developed through experiments on non-consenting enslaved tacit contract that comes with having a uterus. It doesn’t need Black women without anaesthesia. to be the norm, though. Change needs to start somewhere, and, as Cleghorn points out, getting the ball rolling should be simpler. “I really think that the beginning of it is to just listen to people,” she says. “[We need to treat them] as humans in that first medical encounter when they say ‘I’m in pain.’”

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PHOTOGRAPHY, LARA DOWNIE

HEALTH

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PHOTOGRAPHY, SHERVIN LAINEZ

PROFILE

Seeing the Light

Canadian Grammy-winning artist ALESSIA CARA is back with a new album—and a new outlook on fame, fans and healing.

By MELISSA VINCENT

T

HERE’S A VIDEO ON ALESSIA CARA’S INSTAGRAM that functions slightly above a simple social-media asset. Posted a few days after the dual release of “Shapeshifter” and “Sweet Dream”—offerings from her first album since 2018’s The Pains of Growing —the video walks the viewer through her songwriting process with intimate detail. Wearing an oversized Grey + Sloan Memorial Hospital sweatshirt and with her long brown locks tied up in a messy bun, Cara works through the mechanics of a melody with producer Jon Levine, sometimes from the side of a grand piano or with an acoustic guitar in hand. She unloads some stream-of-consciousness musings and eventually dozes off. There isn’t a blood-pressure-raising or even meme-able moment in its nine minutes and 15 seconds. Watching it is almost like stumbling upon slow TV or going down a rabbit hole of offbeat ASMR videos. It’s obviously part of a marketing campaign, but it feels aligned with the lore of “1,000 true fans”—the theory that you can make a living as a creator if you have 1,000 people who truly believe in your work.

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PROFILE

This video was just one of many released to complement the launch of her new singles. Ranging from playfully self-deprecating to unselfconsciously sincere, all were expansively produced and serve as extended liner notes. The approach is in stark contrast to today’s music ecosystem, in which the success of top-tier musicians is contingent on an easily identifiable personal brand, rapid-fire content creation and the ability to manufacture virality in 15 seconds or less.

“I feel like it’s very easy for artists to feel disposable, especially artists who, like me, aren’t putting out content all the time,” Cara says via Zoom from a sleek, brightly lit condo on Toronto’s unfailingly trendy Queen Street. “I’m not really good at the influential side of the internet, so I feel very lucky that I am still able to have a voice and a place in this world.”

There’s no doubt that over the past six years, Cara has cemented her place in the music industry. In 2013, as platforms like YouTube were eroding the barrier between artists and audiences and replacing traditional A&R as the most effective tool for scouting new artists, Cara’s covers of Amy Winehouse and The Neighbourhood songs caught the attention of the iconic star-making label Def Jam. In the years that followed, breakout singles like “Here” and “Scars to Your Beautiful” would earn her a reputation for bouncy, soul-baring “anti-party” anthems that ask questions about the legitimacy of experiences both routine

and ubiquitous, like whether house-party small talk is worthy of your earnest introspection, why heartache operates on its own languid schedule and—the ever-present through line in much of Cara’s work—why growing up will always be a painstaking fulltime job.

By 2018, Cara had a string of stadium tours under her belt, chart-topping collaborations with Logic, Zedd and Khalid and high-profile song placements in blockbuster films. When she made history as the first Canadian artist to win a Grammy Award for Best New Artist, it seemed like the logical next phase of her career. But stacking up an impressive list of accolades is different from figuring out how to relish your accomplishments without being too critical of yourself. Cara has had to negotiate finding stability as her star has continued to rise. “The more eyes that are on you, the more exposed you are to the world,” she says. “You get stretched thin when there are more people relying on you. As I get older, I’m learning how to say no and really take care of myself.”

For her third album, In the Meantime, out on September 24, Cara continued to build on a well-honed practice of using her own experiences to inspire creativity. The result is a body of work that’s indicative of an artist who has never stopped trying to understand the world around her with humility and precision. We spoke with Cara about her musical inspiration, learning to heal and coming into her own, as both a person and a performer.

Can you pinpoint the exact moment you encountered something momentous enough to devote an entire album to?

“The impetus was a lot of mental and emotional challenges that I was going through. I was in an existential-crisis situation, even pre-pandemic, and starting to feel super lost. It’s hard to find your purpose when your purpose relies on connection. Because when that’s taken from you, it’s like, ‘Well, what am I good for?’ I’m not used to sitting with myself for that long, and I had to face a lot of things that I thought I was over but had actually just been suppressing. I wrote all these songs out of necessity, to get my feelings out. Then I realized, ‘Okay, I think this could be a full project.’”

It sounds like there were a lot of emotions you had to learn to wrestle to the ground. How did that play into your process?

“A lot of songs came out of a purging of emotions, and a lot of the confidence came out of understanding who I am. I guess the thesis would be ‘Healing: making your way through the mud and finding a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.’ I don’t think I’m out of it fully, but now that I’m at the end of this project, I do have one foot out the door.”

As you get older, figuring out how to care for yourself becomes more complicated. The song “Sweet Dream” is about fighting for your right to rest. How’s your relationship with sleep?

“I’ve struggled with my relationship to the nighttime for a very long time. I rely so heavily on distraction just to get through the day and navigate my life. Anytime there isn’t a distraction, everything kind of pours out because I have nothing to do other than lie in bed and think about everything that’s ever happened to me.”

I imagine the past several months exacerbated that.

“I think having that happen every single day during the pandemic—having nothing to do but think irrational thoughts—got to me to the point where I was having full-blown anxiety and panic attacks every day for hours on end. It became a cycle because it meant I was sleeping less, which led to more panic. It felt like I’d opened this portal that was never going to close. The healing came when I completely hit a wall and realized that I really needed to stop trying to play the tough guy. That’s when I surrendered, for lack of a better term. I started going to therapy and taking medication. I think healing is more cyclical than anything. I’m in a place now where my steps backwards don’t feel like leaps backwards.”

PHOTOGRAPHY, SHERVIN LAINEZ

How do you navigate being at a stage in your career where you have access to the resources to fully bring your vision to life?

“I think of the leverage I have as an artist; the more your team trusts you, the more you trust yourself. I’ve been doing this for almost seven years now. I think it’s important to touch on areas that I haven’t necessarily touched on before, for both myself and my audience. I’ve always considered myself an album artist, and I’ve always adored albums where artists create a whole universe with their music. Now, I’m glad to have the time and experience to do that.”

“THE HEALING CAME WHEN I COMPLETELY HIT A WALL AND REALIZED THAT I REALLY NEEDED TO STOP TRYING TO PLAY THE TOUGH GUY.” How did you learn how to defend that vision?

“It’s definitely something I had to instill in myself. When you’re young and going through the motions and everything’s happening so fast, you’re afraid to say no or stand up for yourself or even share your opinion. I feel like I’m in a place now where I can trust my voice and trust myself to speak up and know that I’ll be heard, which is very important.”

I wonder if there’s something your fans see in your music that the rest of the world overlooks.

“I think the way people view me in the mainstream is very different from the view that lives within my fan base. There’s a large group of people who don’t even know that I’m still making music. If I could be seen, heard and perceived by just [my fans], that would be wonderful. I know that they trust me and I trust them. My songs feel safer in their hands.”

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SOCIETY

The

DOWNFALL of the GIRL BOSS

The past 12 months have seen myriad FEMALE LEADERS step down following a series of very public reckonings over accusations of TOXIC WORKPLACE CULTURES. Is this the deserved consequence of their own failings or proof that we still hold WOMEN IN POWER to impossibly high standards?

COLLAGE BY ANTHONY GERACE

By ANNA FIELDING

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COM

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A

FTER YEARS OF LOOKING fruitlessly—and furi-

ously—at the unsmashed glass ceiling, women in business decided to paint it pink instead.

Suddenly, the start-up world was female-led, female-friendly and female-focused.

The Wing opened its first all-female co-working-space club in Manhattan in 2016 and soon grew to 11 locations serving 10,000 members in the U.S. and the U.K. If you’d visited the Wing around that time, you might have worn your dress from Reformation and sung sweetly about its ethical manufacturing practices. That dress might first have been spotted on one of the many female-focused websites—Refinery29 and ManRepeller among them—that blend fashion with feminism and mental-health advice. And you could have used an Away suitcase, which debuted in 2016, to pack it up in.

Each of those companies had a charismatic female founder, and suddenly these women were everywhere—styled and smiling and telling their success stories. The naysayers mostly focused on price: The online publications were free to read, but everything else required a significant disposable income.

Were they really inclusive? But these comments were eclipsed by the overall rosy glow. Here was the representation we’d all been clamouring for.

It was the “golden age for women in power,” Wing founder Audrey Gelman told The Washington Post of the moment the company launched its first space, when it still looked like Hillary Clinton would be the 45th U.S. president. Clinton wasn’t the only woman forced to concede a powerful position. In one week in June 2020, as the Black Lives Matter movement gathered strength, Gelman stepped down from her role, publicly apologizing for “leadership mistakes,” as did Refinery29’s Christene Barberich, who wrote on Instagram: “I’ve read and taken in the raw and personal accounts of Black women and women of color regarding their experiences inside our company. What’s clear [...] is that R29 has to change.” Yael Aflalo of Reformation and Jen Gotch of clothing company Ban.do resigned around the same time for similar reasons. In the same month, Leandra Medine Cohen moved away from ManRepeller, issuing an Instagram mea culpa for “failing to deliver” on her mission. In June 2019, Shannon Spanhake left Cleo, a company designed to help working parents, when it was revealed that she had fabricated her professional background, taken six years off her age and created a toxic work environment. And in December

It was as if EACH FOUNDER were REGINA GEORGE and the buses just kept on COMING.

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2019, Away’s Steph Korey resigned as CEO after a report by The Verge exposed, again, a “toxic workplace” and “a culture of intimidation and constant surveillance.” (She later returned as co-CEO before announcing in July 2020 that she was stepping down again.)

Men in senior positions also stepped down in 2020. Reddit’s Alexis Ohanian—often seen cheering as his wife, Serena Williams, wins tennis games—left his company’s board so he could be replaced by a non-white board member. CrossFit’s Greg Glassman resigned after saying that he wouldn’t mourn George Floyd. Adam Rapoport, editor-in-chief of Bon Appétit, stepped down after staff spoke out about discrimination and a picture of Rapoport and his girlfriend, both white, dressed as stereotypical Puerto Ricans for a costume party circulated.

But, Rapoport aside, male resignations attracted much less attention.

Meanwhile, the death of the girl boss was analyzed in countless articles. Sometimes the focus was collective; sometimes it was on individual companies. Screenshots of Korey’s demands on staff circulated on Twitter. Gelman issued an apology on Instagram. The general tone of the cultural response was one of shocked glee, as if each founder were Regina George and the buses just kept on coming.

It’s also worth noting the wild disproportion behind these numbers: There are far fewer women in senior positions. In the U.S., only 14 percent of start-ups have a female CEO. A study published in the Journal of Management showed that female CEOs are far more likely to be fired than their male counterparts, even if the company is performing well.

Should 2020’s fallen women have stayed in their roles?

Probably not. Did they deserve to pick up a disproportionate amount of attention for their failures? That’s where it gets

SOCIETY

There’s a FREEDOM FOR MEN to fail that’s

COLLAGE BY ANTHONY GERACE

NOT EXTENDED TO WOMEN.

complicated. The women in question are alleged to have behaved badly or, at the very least, thoughtlessly. There is a real need to address inequality and damaging work cultures.

But the invisible hand of sexism was also present, as were the usual questions about money: who has it and who doesn’t and what that means.

So, how does this break down? First, there was betrayal. All those brands that had a female CEO step down had traded on their ethics, either explicitly, like the Wing, or implicitly, as Away did. They were supposedly feminist companies run by supposedly feminist women, and, between them, they promised everything from ethical supply chains to mental-health support.

“There’s a metaphor used in marketing called ‘brandas-person,’” says Cleopatra Veloutsou, professor of brand management at the Adam Smith Business School at the University of Glasgow. “We give brands a character the same

way we do with humans, ascribing a social class, values and so on. There’s also recent research showing that when firms are based on one entrepreneur, the company will take on their personality—they will make decisions as though they are the brand, so the brand then becomes consistent with the characteristics that that person has. As consumers, we look for brands that share our values. They form part of our emotional life.” So when brands fail to live up to the ethical standards that first made them appealing, we feel betrayed in the same way we would if a friend were to lie to us.

“There’s a very real emotional disappointment when we feel that we’ve been sold a line,” says Catherine Connors, a California-based serial entrepreneur and CEO of the League of Badass Women. “I may be overstating it, but part of the reason this [feminist] marketing works is that we really want to hear it—to hear that we can do it, can chase our dreams—because we haven’t been hearing it for very long.”

This, says Connors, leads to elevated expectations of women. But, she continues, women are also “expected, for the most part, to use a feminist lens or a female-empowerment angle because a business opportunity is recognized. Look at Away. It’s a suitcase brand, but nothing about suitcases screams feminist. And no one cares if [a male] CEO is rude to his employees.”

Male leaders attract criticism too, of course, but rarely the same absolute censure that female CEOs get. WeWork attracted billions in investment and never made any money, and CEO Adam Neumann was forced to step down just before the company made 2,400 of its staff members redundant. But he still walked away with a payout of more than $2 billion. Peter Thiel, one of the founders of PayPal, has funded former president Trump and is open about his right-wing political views. While this puts him at odds with Silicon Valley’s largely liberal outlook, he still holds a lot of sway in the technology world. Facebook has been criticized for everything from dismissing employee concerns to killing the media and even destroying democracy, yet Mark Zuckerberg, who strongly contests any such claims, remains in place. There’s a freedom for men to fail that’s not extended to women.

“Women do trend more toward ethical and socially responsible businesses than their male counterparts,” says Tara Sabre ELLECANADA.COM

45

SOCIETY Collier, who specializes in gender-led investing. There are many reasons for this; as Sabre Collier points out, it’s partly because women are more likely to experience inequality in the world and wish to change it. But selling feminism is also a way to attract investment. We know that consumers respond well to feminist marketing. So it’s a clever move, whether genuine or cynical, for a woman seeking venture-capital funding to stress her ethical credentials. But having principles baked into your business model means that the world expects more from you, and so it becomes much easier to fail.

“Venture-capital money can come with weird strings,” says Sarah Drinkwater, director of beneficial technology at philanthropic investment firm Omidyar Network. “Look at the Wing. It tried to be all things to all people. To some, it was a venture-backed start-up; to others, it was a social-justice organization. It was not clear about its mission. For many founders, there’s a core tension that’s hard to overcome.”

Several of the women interviewed for this piece said that since venture-capital companies consist mostly of white men, people who do not match the pattern find it difficult to convince funders that their ideas have merit. June Angelides has worked as a banker and an entrepreneur and is now an early-stage-tech investor. She says women are often not taken as seriously. “As a Black woman, I am conscious of the fact that products for the Afro-Caribbean society may not get as much investment.

That’s a large market to miss out on. We need to invest in women because it’s the only way we will break this cycle of tech products that are by men, for men.”

When investors do meet with women, they are often the women who are most like them: white and already wealthy.

These women then become poster girls for female success.

“The reason these women are visible is that they’ve raised a certain amount of money,” says Drinkwater. They are also photogenic and often operate in retail and lifestyle spaces that consumers can relate to. They “became the very public faces of their companies,” Maria Aspan wrote in an article for Fortune.

“In a way, that’s more common if you’re selling leggings than, say, cloud-based enterprise software.” This increased visibility means that the “female founder” stereotype gets compounded and the patterns repeat.

A high profile also means that when a female founder fails, she fails in public—it isn’t just the business community watching.

Part of this is understandable: We feel it is right and fair for the “mean girl” to be taken down. We all become Janis Ian, not realizing that this delight in failure makes us mean too. “We have an immense appetite for watching women suffer,” says Drinkwater. “Look at our films, our music.”

“It has to do with the way we hold women accountable in public, capitalist, democratic spaces—in a way that we don’t with men,” says Connors. “For thousands of years, women have been confined to the private sphere. We have so much socially ingrained self-doubt about being in the public sphere, so we look at women who move into it with some degree of suspicion—even hostility.”

There’s also a disconnect between supposedly feminine traits—compassion, empathy, nurturance—and those that we traditionally associate with CEOs: drive, ruthlessness, a willingness to break rules. Cleo, the company that was run by Spanhake, has a website full of smiling parents and children 46

ELLECANADA.COM

THE GIRL BOSS was almost SET UP TO FAIL, and we enjoyed watching HER DO SO.

that tells employers it will help them “take care of [their] modern workforce.” Contrast this with a slide Spanhake showed staff. Forbes reported that one of the bullet points told them to “expect to work 50 to 60 hours a week.”

“There’s a cult of the male founder, where we expect them to have this boyish Peter Pan quality,” says Connors. “They’re rebels, right? They defy the system—Han Solo, Tony Stark— refusing to be grown-ups and profiting from it. The problem is that that kind of entrepreneurial hero’s journey doesn’t apply to women. They’re expected to be Wendy, not Peter, making sure everything is maintained and managed behind the scenes.

Look at Sheryl Sandberg compared to Mark Zuckerberg.”

Silicon Valley has become our dream factory, edging out its neighbour to the south, Hollywood. It shapes our thoughts, our desires, our politics. Even the language is mythic: Investors are “angels,” start-ups valued at $1 billion or more are “unicorns” and rapid growth is termed “blitzscaling.” But are we expecting too much when we expect business leaders to be role models as well?

“We are looking for heroes in all the wrong places,” says Carl Rhodes, co-author of CEO Society: The Corporate Takeover of Everyday Life. “With neoliberalism in the 1980s and 1990s, business became a lot more prevalent. The idea that private enterprise would lead us to a brighter, shinier future was linked to the political agenda. Do we want to look for heroes in that realm of life or is there a broader sense of what we might look for socially, politically and personally?”

In 2017, the Me Too movement showed men that the old ways would no longer work. Last year, Black Lives Matter turned the same spotlight on white privilege. The demands of the COVID-19 crisis and the increasing pressures of climate change mean that caring is no longer just for activists. The girl boss was almost set up to fail, and we enjoyed watching her do so. But she shouldn’t be excused because the system around her was wrong. The female founders started marking out a path, a different way of doing things. That path shouldn’t be abandoned just because they failed. We need to expect more from women and men. We should learn from the girl boss, even as we bury her.

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BEAUTY AND CULTURE.

RISE and SHINE

Set your alarm: Whether you are networking with entrepreneurs at dawn or dating before you start work, sunrise is the new time to be seen.

‘M NOT SURE HOW LONG I’ve been staring at my feet in the shower. A cloak of water trickles down my shins and between the crevices of my toes. The thought of moving my limbs right now fills me with dread. They’ve been through enough today. I’ve done a load of washing, run 10 kilometres, replied to last night’s emails and prepped for tonight’s risotto—and it’s not even 7 a.m. yet.

For the past six weeks, I’ve been setting my alarm for 5 a.m. in an attempt to reboot my energy levels. While I have long prided myself on being a morning person and consider sleeping in on the weekend wasteful, it’s rare for me to intentionally wake before dawn. But after 18 months of working from home, I had found that the spring in my step had been reduced to a shuffle. So filled with Zoom meetings and Slack notifications are the hours of my day that I was left feeling too fatigued to

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exercise or meet friends come sundown. I had endless time on my own but seemingly none for myself.

To find a solution, I did what any millennial does in times of uncertainty and took to social media, where I found that the answer might lie in not lying in bed. The #morningroutine hashtag has amassed more than 4.2 billion views on TikTok, while vlogger Lauren Snyder’s “6am Morning Routine” video—which shows her journalling, exercising, doing her skincare regimen and making breakfast—has accrued more than 3.4 million views on YouTube.

Of course, waking up at first light isn’t exactly a new phenomenon. For millennia, farmers, labourers and religious communities woke with the rising sun, long before the alarm clock was invented. But recently, those early hours have become a magical window—the key to productivity and self-realiz-

PHOTOGRAPHY, VLADA KARPOVICH/PEXELS

I

By KATIE O’MALLEY

SOCIETY

ation. Leadership expert Robin Sharma, bestselling author of The 5am Club—336 pages extolling the virtues of rising early—is spearheading the movement. For ultimate well-being and success, readers are instructed to start their day at 5 a.m. with exercise, reflection and personal growth, with each session lasting 20 minutes. “The way you begin your day has an outsized effect on the quality of your day,” he explains. “If you look at many of the greatest creative leaders and sages of the world, most of them have one thing in common: They are daybreakers.” He notes early birds such as Michelle Obama and Apple CEO Tim Cook as examples.

But as the pre-dawners quietly get on with their 5 a.m. ice baths (Twitter CEO JackDorsey), green powders with brain-octane oil (Orlando Bloom) and 95-minute workouts followed by cryo-chamber recovery (Mark Wahlberg), everyone else gets more sleep. More and more of us are using the extra hours in our days to take meetings, network and even socialize with likeminded peers, leaving the well-rested lagging behind. Sharma is not surprised. “We’re looking for the game-changing hack that frees us from our slavery to technology,” he says. “The morning routine is the answer.”

The idea of speaking to colleagues pre-caffeine would have most of us pulling the duvet over our heads. But in Miami, before-work networking is as common as jogging along Ocean Drive. Thanks to low taxes, a hot climate and pro-business mayor Francis Suarez, the coastal metropolis is making a name for itself as the next Silicon Valley. Consequently, the city has ushered in a new wave of early-rising techies, venture capitalists and former Wall Street financiers itching to share ideas at breakfast lectures and on networking bike rides around the town of Key Biscayne before clocking in at the office. After all, time is money.

It’s a culture that inspired Brandon Evans, co-founder of technology community Miami Made, to launch the Thrive Together Tuesday event. Once a month, members, all of whom are founders, meet at 7:30 a.m. to share their knowledge and find support from like-minded moguls. The eye-watering start time was “very intentional,” says Evans. “Being a founder is hard and often isolating work. To start your day with 100 people who want to see you succeed is a game-changer.”

But it’s not all work and no play for early risers. The morning is getting a makeover, with some viewing it as the new “happy hour” (without the gin). “My friends and I regularly have 6 a.m. calls,” Natasha Hatherall-Shawe, founder of communications agency TishTash, tells me from Dubai. The entrepreneur initially began setting her alarm for 5 a.m. for work (“I want my inbox empty by 9 a.m. so I can focus on clients”) but has tailored her morning routine to accommodate time with friends too. “We end our calls and feel energized for the day,” she says. Anna McLeod, athlete and team and partnership manager at cycling brand Rapha, is another fan of starting work early. She meets her mentor for a weekly 7 a.m. “bun run” cycle in the countryside with a pit stop for coffee and pastries. “I’ve had meetings on the bike before, and I find conversation is more casual and relaxed than it is in a meeting room,” she says.

Could morning meet-ups really become the alternative to post-work drinks? Yes, says George Rawlings, who co-founded the dating app Thursday in April. Having had more than 110,000 users sign up in London and New York prior to its launch, the platform is now looking into a feature that enables users to show their available time slots, which Rawlings believes will benefit early risers who want to date before work. “I think people will be more inclined to give half an hour of their time for a morning coffee and make dating more low-key,” he says.

The cultivation of relationships early in the morning is something Aurelien Schibli and Brenton Parkes have seen first-hand. In 2018, the former roommates launched the 5.30 Club in Sydney for individuals who were interested in meeting in a café on weekdays at 5:30 a.m. It has expanded across Australia, with attendees socializing, working and even dating.

“We’ve attracted people who value connection on a sober level,” says Vani Morrison, who co-founded the club with the pair. “Anyone can get up early and have a morning routine, but there’s a difference when you have a community to hold you accountable.” And you don’t even have to wait until the sun sets to party. Morning Gloryville, which is based in the U.K., has had worldwide success with its pre-dawn alcohol-free raves, which start well before 7 a.m.

But while waking at an earlier hour may benefit some, sleep expert Els van der Helm isn’t so sure it makes you more successful; it may even be counterproductive. One major drawback is the myth that waking early means you’re getting ahead. “In believing this, you’re basically misaligning your sleep with the rhythm of your biological clock,” she says. Humans have different chronotypes that determine our ideal sleep times, van der Helm explains, and with morning types making up just 14 percent of the population, most people who wake up early will be forcing themselves into a schedule that doesn’t naturally fit their chronotype, especially if they’re going to bed early to rise early. “Eventually you’ll adjust, but you’re never going to be completely optimal,” she says.

Does that mean you’re free to stay in bed? Don’t bet on it. In an age of comparison culture, earlier-than-you routines are on the rise. Hatherall-Shawe has already seen it happen.

“We’ve got an entrepreneurial community in Dubai, and people are competitive,” she says, noting that she often finds herself comparing how she uses her “power hours” with her early-bird colleagues. And as Sharma says, “We’re fundamentally tribal animals.” We’re not only fascinated by the chief of the tribe’s practices; we’re inclined to copy them, he adds.

There’s nothing inherently better about packing the early hours with activity, but there’s no doubt that the purity and simplicity of dawn fit with this generation’s focus on wholesome self-improvement. And in a time-starved world, what rising early gives daybreakers over night owls is a feeling of achievement before the day has really begun.

Pre-dawn networking and breakfast bike rides might not replace the hedonism of a night out with friends. But post-pandemic, when working from a spare room is the norm and the term “office hours” has lost all meaning, perhaps it’s time we wake up to the potential of mornings. Just don’t hit “snooze.”

ELLECANADA.COM

49

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beauty

TOUCH Base Take advantage of the new season to slow down, breathe and be kind to yourself from the inside out.

Forest-inspired scents are more popular than ever this year. Here’s what you need to know about these lesser-known, harder-to-define fragrances.

By MANON CHEVALIER

PHOTOGRAPHY, TRUNK ARCHIVE

Into the WOODS

BEAUTY

I

MAGINE you’re walking in a dense, dark forest, breathing

in the aromas of plant life, resin, pine needles, damp soil and leafy branches. That’s essentially the olfactory family of wood. Its most common raw materials include vetiver, sandalwood, patchouli, cedar, pine, cypress, guaiacum and the bark of the fig and agarwood trees, all of which provide structure, character and hold to a perfume when worked into its base notes. There’s no question that over the years, some cult masterpieces for women, including Bois des Îles by Chanel, Samsara by Guerlain and Féminité du Bois by Serge Lutens, have played with woody notes, but the movement has remained relatively quiet. And while there have been some standouts—Dolce Vita by Dior, Miu Miu by Prada and Women by Calvin Klein—wood is taking centre stage at both boutique and larger perfume houses this fall.

“Wood is an infinite treasure source,” says Isabelle Michaud, Montreal perfumer and founder of Monsillage. “Its vibration can be warm, creamy, resinous and even earthy but also fresh and transparent. That’s what makes it so beautiful.” Michaud, whose scents include the vetiver-forward Eau de Céleri, has a vision that’s shared by Barnabé Fillion, the French perfumer behind the fragrances from Aesop. “Wood is among my favourite materials,” says Fillion. “It brings texture and depth to blends while interacting well with other materials, making them sparkle.” Delphine Jelk, a perfumer at Guerlain and the woman behind its intoxicating new woody floral, Santal Pao Rosa, agrees. “There’s nothing like an exceptional wood to trigger strong and contrasting feelings,” she says. “In my latest creations, sandalwood—a precious Indian wood—highlights the rose in a totally unexpected, carnal way. It anchors it and gives it the creamy power I’ve dreamed of.”

While traditionally reserved for men, woody fragrances are now being appreciated by anyone in search of a unique and assertive scent. “The predominance of woody notes in a fragrance combination enriches the feminine dimension of the person wearing it,” says Michaud. “Maybe it’s because of the juxtaposition of masculine-feminine codes. One thing’s for sure: Their presence transports us. One whiff of vetiver or pine and you’ve got one foot in nature.”

Perhaps our deeper appreciation of nature over the past couple of years explains the welcome return of woody scents; during these uncertain times, we’ve been turning to things that bring us comfort. “A scent creates a world that’s both real and imaginary,” says Fillion. “It’s also an open window that looks out onto nature and invites us into a dialogue with what’s around us—something we no longer pay attention to.”

Wood has this strange power to soothe us and renew how we see the world; it also offers us a collection of scents that touch both our hearts and our skin. We’re definitely warming up to a little more wood in our lives.

The

WORLD of Wood

It smells like sandalwood (Guerlain’s favourite wood) meets rose, queen of the flowers.

It’s for lovers of velvety, heady, head-turning aromas.

Guerlain Santal Pao Rosa Eau de Parfum Spray ($431 for 100 mL of customizable eau de parfum, guerlain.com and at Holt Renfrew)

It smells like warm spices and incense (Miraceti) and green notes with a combination of galbanum and iris (Erémia).

It’s for perfumistas looking for a poetic, indefinable, intoxicating style.

Aesop Miraceti and Erémia Eau de Parfum Sprays ($255 each for 50 mL, aesop.com)

It smells like the perfect balance of cinnamon, vetiver and patchouli, creating an exceptional floral woodiness.

It’s for aficionados of sensual and complex compositions that are far from boring.

Gucci A Gloaming Night Eau de Parfum Spray ($375 for 100 mL, gucci.com and at Holt Renfrew)

It smells like Virginia cedar, violet and sandalwood, evoking the bright freshness of the Adirondacks in autumn.

It’s for lovers of fragrances that are warm, amber and exuberant.

Aerin Cedar Violet Eau de Parfum Spray ($155 for 50 mL, esteelauder.com and at Hudson’s Bay)

ELLECANADA.COM

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Restorative

HEALTH

Tattooing This little-known art is helping breastcancer survivors put their experiences behind them.

By ELISABETH MASSICOLLI

PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY

ABOUT ONE IN EIGHT CANADIAN WOMEN will develop breast

cancer in their lifetime and, as part of their treatment, might have to undergo a mastectomy. Fortunately, today there are a number of breast-reconstruction innovations, including tattoos of the areolae using a 3-D or trompe l’oeil technique, which creates an optical illusion that makes them look real.

Restorative-tattoo specialists blend a large number of pigments and use diverse methods to attain a final result that looks natural; the tattoos are entirely personalized and return the breasts of survivors to an almost normal state in about an hour. They can be done on all skin tones and on smooth skin or faux nipples that have been reconstructed with skin from other parts of the body.

“I got this tattoo as the last step in a long process,” says Majoly Dion (@majolydion_officiel on Instagram), a director, author and life coach who was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 47 and underwent a double mastectomy. “It really helped me mourn the loss of my breasts. Even though technology today allows for reconstruction, there’s still a part of yourself that no longer exists. That’s hard to swallow, especially since cancer treatments leave you feeling weak, both physically and emotionally.”

In 2016, the then 55-year-old produced and directed the documentary Quand sert la vie...au-delà des frontières du cancer, which follows the process of her mastectomy, reconstruction and areola tattoos. Since then, she says, she has received a lot of questions from other women suffering from breast cancer—proof that there’s a lack of essential information around what’s offered and what’s possible, including nipple tattoos.

Often, it’s surgeons who recommend nipple-tattoo artists to their patients. Some hospitals even offer the service on-site, albeit with varying results. Since the skin being tattooed is often scarred and sensitive, it’s very important to choose a specially trained professional with years of experience.

“Women need to have access to all the information concerning this practice so they can make informed decisions and heal properly,” says Karina Osorio, a paramedical dermopigmentation specialist. “Skin on reconstructed breasts isn’t as resilient. It’s often uneven and covered in scars, which is why it’s important to choose your tattooist carefully. The tattoos aren’t done the same way or at the same depth as a regular tattoo.” Originally educated as a nurse, Osorio says she worries that the training is too brief—it’s given over the course of a weekend in some cases—and that it’s provided to aestheticians who want to start offering this kind of procedure. “At this stage in their healing process, survivors are vulnerable, physically and emotionally,” says Osorio. “They want to be done with the reconstruction, so they’re more likely to choose a professional as fast as possible. But they need to do their research because this practice isn’t regulated yet in Canada. Medication, chemotherapy and operations have an impact on the skin and on the risk of infection. You shouldn’t choose your tattooist on the fly. I can’t stress that enough.”

Osorio adds that patients have already been through a lot and they’re at risk of being traumatized by further intervention, so whether to offer the high-end service is an ethical question on the part of professionals—and it’s a decision that should be based on the well-being of their clients. “Above all, it’s ELLECANADA.COM

55

HEALTH

A breast reconstruction done by Dr. Paul Schembri, an Edmonton surgeon (top), and then completed with an areola tattoo done

by Carmelina Baccari and Kacie Rainey (bottom)

a very intimate procedure in addition to often being a highly emotional moment for a woman,” says Osorio, who provides her clients with psychological support so they have realistic expectations of the end result. She’s also able to reduce the appearance of scars when she tattoos.

People who go into nipple tattooing have different training and experience, whether it’s in health care, aesthetic services or regular tattooing. It’s best to ask your surgeon for references, browse portfolios, read comments from past clients online and ask questions about the options available.

Above all, make sure you feel comfortable and safe around the artist you choose. “When you’ve just built a house, you don’t want to put the cheapest paint on your new walls or work with any old painter,” says Dion. “It’s sort of the same principle. I believe that you have to take the time to stop, reflect and ask yourself who you want to finish this long and perilous journey with.” Since you need to wait a minimum of six months after a reconstruction and a year after remission before getting a tattoo (this is approximate and differs from patient to patient), you can take advantage of the time to find the right artist for you. Once you have some names in mind, ask for a consultation to talk about your medical history and expectations. “You can even do virtual consults these days, which is really good,” says Ingrid Zschogner, a long-time artist and the owner of Timeless Tattoo Company in Whitby, Ont. “Then we can decide on the most appropriate techniques according to the distinctive features of the breasts—and health—of the client. These are skills that come with experience, practice and years of training and mentorship.

It’s never improvised. After everything that these women have gone through, we want to offer them the gentlest, safest and

most positive experience possible. Empathy and respect are fundamental concepts of our practice.”

Carmelina Baccari (@carmelinabaccari on Instagram) and Kacie Rainey (@kacierainey on Instagram) agree. These two restorative-medical-pigmentation specialists in Alberta joined forces in 2016 to improve the areola-tattoo world and launched Procedures With a Positive Purpose. With the help of anonymous donors, this initiative allows women to access Baccari’s and Rainey’s services even if they don’t have the means since restorative nipple tattooing isn’t covered by Canadian health insurance. “We try to create an ambience that’s like a spa, as if clients are coming in for a face treatment,” says Baccari. “It’s often an emotional moment for them. They’re vulnerable and physically exposed, so we do everything we can to make them feel comfortable and relaxed. They’re often surprised by how quickly we work.” Adds Rainey: “When we see the happiness in their eyes when they look in the mirror, that’s when we tell ourselves we really found our calling.”

Baccari and Rainey, who’ve jokingly nicknamed themselves “the nipple sisters,” are fighting for this service to be recognized as essential, like breast reconstruction, by trying to educate people about it and democratizing it. They travel around the country—and sometimes the world—helping survivors for free in the last step of their rehabilitation. “For us, it’s important to make the procedure accessible because all survivors deserve a complete reconstruction up until the very last needle, if that’s what they want,” says Rainey. “This tattoo is a victory,” agrees Baccari. “It’s a celebration.”

This article speaks specifically to women, but it’s important to note that men can also get breast cancer.

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RESOURCES Kacie Rainey kacierainey.com

Carmelina Baccari carmelinabaccari.com

Timeless Tattoo Company timelesstattooco.ca

Majoly Dion’s documentary (only available in French) vimeo.com/ondemand/ quandsertlaviemajolydion

CELINE

SHOPPING

The New

BOB

By THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

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PHOTOGRAPHY, IMAXTREE (MAIN IMAGE)

1. Babyliss Pro C-Style Curved Flat Iron 1 ½" ($135, tradesecrets.ca). 2. La Biosthétique Paris Soft Texture Spray ($36, labiosthetique.ca). 3. Groom Styling Cream ($27, thegroomindustries.com). 4. R+Co Television Perfect Hair Shampoo ($36, etiket.ca). 5. Authentic Beauty Concept Nude Powder Spray ($31, authenticbeautyconcept.ca). 6. Redken Volume Maximizer Thickening Spray ($33, redken.com). 7. Hot Tools Black Gold One-Step Detachable Blowout ($110, matandmax.com).

Whether it is ear-length or brushing your collarbone, straight or wavy, the bob is still making heads turn. “I’m a fan of a short, round, ear-grazing bob with longer locks in front, which was inspired by ’90s boy bands,” says Yannick Brisebois, hairstylist and co-owner of Salon U Boutique and brand ambassador for La Biosthétique Paris. Model Kaia Gerber was an early adopter of the trend, as was actor Brigitte Lundy-Paine from the Netflix series Atypical. Its main appeal? It requires minimal styling after washing, no matter your hair texture. If you’re not quite ready to adopt this shorter 2.0 version of the style—inspired by the likes of Nick Carter and Leonardo DiCaprio—Brisebois suggests opting for a longer wavy bob, which is achieved by “creating waves with a flatiron and then tousling with a texturizing spray.”

Other great hair tools? A blow-dryer brush to smooth out locks while adding volume, a shampoo that imparts maximum shine and a styling cream to structure the bob while giving it flexibility.

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THE ART OF AUTHENTICITY After taking care of countless people over six seasons of Queer Eye, JONATHAN VAN NESS is now focusing on feeding their own well-being.

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OMBI N I NG BE AUT Y ADVIC E

with humour, sensitivity and empathy—as well as the occasional iconic and resounding “Yass queen!”—Jonathan Van Ness has been capturing hearts on the hit Netflix series Queer Eye since its debut in 2018. Their bubbly personality and legendary repartee are palpable in the large number of often hilarious, engaging and touching photos and videos they share on Instagram (where they’re closely followed by some 5.2 million people). So it’s completely natural for them to now be embracing the role of global self-care ambassador for Biossance, a skincare brand they’ve had a close relationship with for years.

“When the first season of Queer Eye came out, I started getting so many products sent to me from skincare companies, and I was like, ‘I’m in heaven!’” says Van Ness. “But I was having psoriasis flare-ups all the time from trying everything. Then my skin got torn up from this topical steroid I’d been using for flare-ups because it makes it really thin and tender. So I got the Squalane + Omega Repair Cream from Biossance, and my skin

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started to calm down. Once that happened, I was like, ‘Sold!’”

Van Ness’ support of the brand also has to do with the fact that it creates its own eco-friendly squalane; the active ingredient is usually extracted from shark-liver oil, which contributes to the massacre of thousands of marine animals every year, but Biossance makes its version from fermented cane sugar.

“Biossance is just so smart and knowledgeable in the way it has brought sustainability and this paradigm shift to skincare and hair care,” says Van Ness. “[Its philosophy is that] clean can be efficacious and also the best of the best.” That belief in the brand is part of why the hairstylist, host and activist chose Amyris, the parent company of Biossance, to develop their own hair-care line, which has just hit store shelves. “I think hair care has room to get a lot cleaner; there are still too many products made with silicones and other ingredients that can plasticate hair,” they say. “It was so exciting to see the line come together.”

Van Ness’ passion for hair was sparked early in life, when they watched the 1991 Miss Universe pageant. “All this scrunchy hairspray, all this volume, all this hair of the late ’80s and early ’90s really threw my little non-binary queer self into a tailspin,” they recall. “I was just like, ‘I need this big old hair

PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF BIOSSANCE (J. VAN NESS)

By THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

BEAUTY

on my head.’” Though known for their long, lush locks, love of colourful manicures and creative wardrobe—their style is considered both traditionally masculine and feminine— they insist that their non-binary identity isn’t based on their gender expression.

“My gender identity is so much more than whether my skin and my hair and my clothes look feminine or masculine,” says Van Ness. “Me identifying as non-binary really means that on the inside, I’ve never felt like I was fully a man or a woman; it’s a complete system that I’ve never felt that I fit into. I just feel like there’s this expectation of non-binary people and even trans people to explore our gender expression through the clothes we wear and what’s on our outside, but it’s on my inside—it’s a way of feeling.”

That feeling has been with them since they were young, but back then they didn’t have the words to describe what they were experiencing. Van Ness’ hope is that as a society, we sever this connection binding gender to what we look like and embrace the broad spectrum of identities. “A cisgender man can totally dress the way I do, and you can also look like a cisgender man [according to our society] and use they/them pronouns,” they say.

This desire for change was already guiding Van Ness’ actions before they stepped into the limelight. They’d always been politically and socially engaged, but Queer Eye’s explosion in popularity since its debut has allowed them to reach more people. “I’m more comfortable with [having a mainstream] platform and using my voice and staying connected to authentic parts of myself,” says Van Ness. “I just put so much pressure on myself sometimes—I always feel like I could do more and say more. That can really cause me to feel depressed and anxious.

But this platform is still an evolving relationship because we are always evolving the relationship we have with ourselves.

I’m just trying to be more aware of when the pressure feels too much or when I’m feeling like I’m not connected with my peace, my compassion or my clarity—like when I’m cussing out some Trump supporter over DMs [on Instagram] but I know I’m not going to change their hearts and minds that way.”

In addition to posting on their personal Instagram account (@jvn), Van Ness also posts for the podcast they host, Getting Curious With Jonathan Van Ness (@curiouswithjvn).

Overall, though, they spend more time celebrating the amazingly positive effect Queer Eye has had. “It’s still mind-boggling to me that my life is my life,” says Van Ness. “Some days, I just can’t believe I’ve had all these opportunities, like reuniting with the other members of the Fab Five to film the sixth season of Queer Eye last spring. So much has changed! Tan’s expecting, and I’m married.” Maintaining those human connections complements their self-care routine, as do two new hobbies they picked up during the pandemic, when gymnastics and figure skating had to be put on hold: needlepoint and gardening.

“It’s our relationship with what we do that makes us feel well and makes us feel connected, authentic and joyful,” they say.

“IT’S STILL MINDBOGGLING TO ME THAT MY LIFE IS MY LIFE.”

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1. Biossance Squalane + Omega Repair Cream ($75). 2. Biossance Squalane + Marine Algae Eye Cream ($71). 3. Biossance Squalane + BHA Pore-Minimizing Toner ($37). sephora.ca

JVN’S BIOSSANCE ROUTINE

“Every morning, I use Biossance Squalane + Elderberry Jelly Cleanser and Squalane + BHA Toner, which I’ve been using daily since it came out. Then I apply Squalane + Marine Algae Eye Cream—my eyes look like they did when I was 23, and I’m 34 now—and Squalane + Omega Repair Cream. I seal all this in with Squalane + Vitamin C Rose Oil and Squalane + Zinc Sheer Mineral Sunscreen.”

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HANDLE With Care

Struggling with sensitive or irritated skin? Understanding the causes and proper care are the first steps to achieving relief.

By INGRIE WILLIAMS

BEAUTY

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f you’re feeling uncomfortable in your skin, you’re far from alone. A 2019 review of global survey data revealed that 60 to 70 percent of women and 50 to 60 percent of men describe their skin as “sensitive.” But each person’s experience of this condition can be as unique as the features on their face. According to Dr. Renée Beach, a dermatologist and the founder of DermAtelier on Avenue in Toronto, there isn’t one single definition; rather, there’s a spectrum of external and internal symptoms. “Sometimes it’s very clear and apparent,” she says. “You can see redness, swelling, flaking or, in a severe case, blistering of the skin. However, it becomes more challenging when people feel symptoms that are not visible, such as a tingling or burning sensation.” Whether a reaction is seen or felt, identifying the cause to avoid a repeat occurrence is a critical next step for skin health.

MEET YOUR MICROBIOME

PHOTOGRAPHY, UP CLOSE; MODEL, COCETTE (WANT MANAGEMENT)

Naturally occurring and unique to each person, the microbiome is an invisible ecosystem of good and bad bacteria that is essential to a healthy functioning epidermis. “When you have sensitive skin, you have an impaired skin barrier,” says Fabiola de la Mora, a Vancouver-based regional trainer for Eau Thermale Avène.

“Imagine a brick wall with a few gaps in it—it’s more exposed. If you’re able to replenish the lipids and ceramides that build the intercellular cement, you’re going to have better protection and therefore less reactive skin.” Exposure to irritants before repair can exacerbate an unsightly or uncomfortable situation while further jeopardizing your skin’s microbiome. “The microbiome is composed of trillions of bacteria, and it’s mostly healthy bacteria that protect us,” says de la Mora. Skin conditions such as rosacea or atopic dermatitis (like eczema), which approximately 15 to 20 percent of Canadians suffer from, are often associated with an imbalanced microbiome. “It’s something dermatologists are learning more about, particularly with patients [who suffer from] atopic dermatitis, where a breach in the skin barrier acts as a trigger for a flare-up,” says Beach. But according to de la Mora, anyone’s microbiome can become compromised, and when healthy bacteria are destroyed, it affects the skin’s immune system and its ability to defend and protect itself.

ON THE CASE Locating the source of a reaction requires taking several factors into consideration. “The causes can be threefold: The product itself, situational factors and personal factors can all contribute to irritation,” says Beach. Beyond using a skincare formula that doesn’t agree with you, using it in the wrong environment could also cause irritation. “It could be a perfume you’ve used in the past with no issue, but today you’re sweating a lot or wearing a non-breathable fabric and that becomes a mediator,” she explains. “Using too much of a product, using it too often, scratching your skin while it’s on or not washing it off well enough can also contribute.”

CLEAN SLATE To help people identify sensitivity triggers, de la Mora always starts by investigating hygiene choices. “What are you using to cleanse your face, or what are you using in the shower?” she asks. “Anything that contains soap will destroy your skin’s hydrolipidic film. It takes the body about eight hours to rebuild that, and it’s needed to protect skin.”

In fact, the impact of cleansing products has long been an area of dermatological interest. “In 2015, a group of microbiologists conducted a study in which two volunteers were asked to not shower, cleanse or apply any skincare for three days,” says Sherna Bharucha, a Toronto-based medical specialist at Uriage Canada. “After taking more than 400 samples from the participants’ skin, the microbiologists discovered that the most common ingredient found was leftover detergent.”

Harsh detergents, natural fragrance, plant-based botanicals and formaldehyde preservatives are just a few things to look out for. “They can penetrate the skin barrier, disrupting the microbiome and thereby causing sensitivity, fragility and redness,” says Bharucha. If you’re experiencing symptoms, taking a break from your regular cleanser, body wash, shampoo or laundry detergent could offer relief.

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BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY Learning which ingredients to say no to can also help reduce inflammation and discomfort for sensitive skin. All the experts take a stand against fragrance. Bharucha also suggests avoiding harsh detergents and acids, and de la Mora recommends staying away from aggressive cleansers or exfoliators that contain alcohol or soap. “If you’re severely sensitive, consider a switch to a no-rinse formula because harsh minerals in tap water can irritate skin,” she says.

Beach has also found popular botanicals, such as calendula and witch hazel, to be a common source of reactions. “There’s an undeniable demand from patients to have access to products that have natural ingredients, which is a term that has many different interpretations,” she says. “Sometimes I have to dial that back—my goal is to find what I know to be good for your skin from a medical standpoint.” If you’re not sure how your skin will react to a new product, do a patch test on an inner arm before going all in.

STRESS TEST Stress—which many people have experienced more than usual over the past year and a half—might also be a factor. “Stress is so harmful to our cells and organs, and skin is our most important and largest organ,” says de la Mora. Throughout the pandemic, she has noted an uptick in complaints about uncomfortable skin.

“I’ve been approached by a lot of people who say their skin has changed and that it’s now prone to pain, redness, burning and tingling,” she says. Bharucha has made similar observations.

“The pandemic has exposed our skin to conditions we’ve never seen before,” she says. “Combined with mask-wearing, it has created the ideal conditions for traditionally normal skin types to be disrupted, causing an increase in ‘maskne’ [a breakout that results from wearing a mask] and sensitivity.” Beach also points out biological basics. “Under less-than-ideal circumstances, anyone can develop irritation or sensitivity,” she says. “The reality is that your skin changes. It also changes seasonally and throughout the aging process. It can be hard to accept that.”

ROUTINE CHECK To treat sensitive skin, try a less-is-more approach. “Using products that have fewer ingredients overall is ideal because then you really know what the potent players are,” says Beach. “For cleansers, look for one with 10 to 20 ingredients. For moisturizers, I’d whittle it down to 12 or less. When the list includes 30 or 40, it gets dizzying with regard to potential irritants and cross-reactants.” The top ingredients she recommends for enhancing the skin barrier and moisture levels include the humectant glycerine, sodium hyaluronate (a small molecule derived from hyaluronic acid), shea butter and ceramides. “They help to calm skin by effectively acting as softeners while smoothing [it] and trapping moisture in.”

PRODUCT PROGRESS Within the recent expansion of lines dedicated to the needs of delicate and sensitive skin, biotic ingredients—which support a healthy microbiome—lead the charge of innovation. The new Uriage Bariéderm-Cica Daily range combines inulin, a prebiotic

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PRODUCTS WE LOVE 1. Eau Thermale Avène Tolérance Control Soothing Skin Recovery Cream ($36, at drugstores and mass-market retailers). 2. Uriage Bariéderm-Cica Daily Serum ($47, uriage.ca and at drugstores and mass-market retailers). 3. The Beauty of Eczema Moisturizing Cream ($32, shoppersdrugmart.ca). 4. Aveeno Calm + Restore Nourishing Oat Cleanser ($16, at drugstores and mass-market retailers). 5. Embryolisse Lait-Crème Sensitive ($43, embryolisse.ca and at drugstores and mass-market retailers). 6. Tatcha Indigo Overnight Repair ($114, tatcha.ca and sephora.ca). 7. Honest Beauty The Daily Calm Lightweight Moisturizer ($40, shoppersdrugmart.ca).

extracted from chicory root and agave, with Centella asiatica , a trusted reparative plant also known as “cica.” “Centella asiatica , or tiger grass, is rich in antioxidants, and it’s blended with thermal water, hyaluronic acid and vitamin B5 to help reinforce the skin’s barrier on physical, inflammatory and microbiological levels,” says Bharucha. Meanwhile, D-Sensinose, the star of Eau Thermale Avène’s new Tolérance Control range, is a postbiotic derived from the microbiota of the brand’s soothing thermal water. “It has the ability to block the brain’s transmission of pain and inflammation signals and helps provide relief in 30 seconds,” says de la Mora. “It provides an instant calming effect for the tingling and burning of hyper-reactive skin, whether you were born with it or have developed it over the past 18 months.”

AT EASE With a road map of how to navigate your sensitive skin, there’s one final component needed to create the ultimate care strategy: patience. A reaction can happen in an instant, but skin needs time to repair. Be prepared to support it through the process and you’ll ease your skin into a happier place.

PHOTOGRAPHY, ALEX BLACK. JACKET, BLOUSE, SKIRT, BOOT-PANTS, HEADGEAR AND BAG (GUCCI).

fashion

OCTOBER

This fall, more is more.

T-shirt, skirt, jacket (on bed), choker and belt (Chanel), necklace and rings (Cartier), fishnets (Falke) and mules (Giuseppe Zanotti)

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elena Gomez’s favourite place to chill is her glam room. A small space on the ground floor of her new L.A.-area house, it opens onto a stone patio surrounding an amoeba-shaped pool. Inside, there’s a hair-and-makeup station stocked with products from her Rare Beauty line; racks of clothes for her cooking show, Selena + Chef; a selection of shoes on a shoebox dais; a green-leather couch (where I’m sitting); a couple of salon chairs (one of which she’s sitting on); a large-screen TV; a mini-fridge; and a snack station. Gomez meets me there dressed in a light-grey fuzzy sweater, black leggings and white sneakers, her hair pulled back into a ponytail. She, her roommates and her maternal grandparents—who lived with her prior to quarantine—spend a lot of time down here watching basketball and hanging out. It’s the smallest room in her place, and she loves it.

Gomez moved in shortly before the pandemic, having just sold two previous homes. “I tried out a bunch of different neighbourhoods because I wanted to know what was going to make me feel comfortable in a city that doesn’t make me feel that comfortable,” she says. Looking back, she feels like all the hopping around was slightly irresponsible. But she also understands why it happened. “I was like, ‘Oh, maybe I’ll try West Hollywood,’ but then I was like, ‘No, that’s not my vibe.’ Then I moved to Calabasas, and I thought that would be nice and family-oriented, but it’s actually very overwhelming and trendy now. It took me a while to figure out what was best for me.”

The house she finally settled on has a cozy, eclectic, collective vibe—kind of like a ski chalet or a sorority. “I’m a very communal person,” says Gomez. “I find happiness when I’m with people I love.” Considering the challenges she has faced in the past decade, it’s hardly surprising that she feels most at home surrounded by close family and friends. “My lupus,

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my kidney transplant, chemotherapy, having a mental illness, going through very, very public heartbreaks—these were all things that honestly should have taken me down,” she says.

Gomez speaks slowly and calmly in a surprisingly low and uninflected register. “Every time I went through something, I was like, ‘What else? What else am I going to have to deal with?’” So she decided that she was going to help people.

“That’s really what kept me going. There could have been a time when I wasn’t strong enough and would have done something to hurt myself.”

To say the past decade has been hard for Gomez is a massive understatement. But it has also been incredibly generative. During the pandemic, while most of us were in our pyjamas all day eating Double Stuf Oreos, Gomez was busy shooting the new Hulu show Only Murders in the Building (her first series-regular role since Wizards of Waverly Place). Starring alongside Steve Martin and Martin Short, Gomez, who is also an executive producer, plays Mabel, a lonely young woman who lives in a luxury Upper West Side apartment building.

When a resident is found murdered, she meets her neighbours and fellow true-crime fans Charles and Oliver (Martin and Short), and the three of them decide to investigate and create their own podcast, mostly as an excuse to spend time together.

When Only Murders started shooting last November, Gomez was excited, but COVID-19 protocols made the experience stressful. “No one was allowed to be on-set,” she says.

“Everybody wore masks and shields, and if I touched a prop, they cleaned it.” For a kissing scene, she was required to wash her mouth out with Listerine after each take—seven to 10 of them. “It burned my mouth. I was like, ‘I want to throw up.’

I’ve never experienced a set like that.”

“She’s a brilliant actress,” Short tells me over the phone.

“And there’s an immediate warmth and loveliness to her.” She impressed Martin too. “Marty and I were both knocked out by her understanding that quiet acting is powerful acting,” he says, adding, “Marty doesn’t yet understand this.” The three of them bonded instantly, their on-set dynamic reflecting their playful onscreen dynamic. Gomez, for instance, took it upon herself to educate Martin on certain cultural developments.

“There was a line in the script that said ‘She’s an OG,’” she says. “And Steve walked up and said, ‘Can somebody tell me what “OG” means?’ I started dying laughing.” On another occasion, she taught him the lyrics to “WAP.” “Steve said, ‘Marty, I just heard new lyrics to “Top Hat and Tails,”’” recalls Short.

Gomez loved working with the older actors. “I got to be in a space with so much wisdom,” she says. “They became my uncles.” Martin echoes the sentiment: “We ended up feeling very close to Selena.”

CELEBRITY

Only Murders wasn’t the only show she shot during quarantine. Selena + Chef was inspired by the food people were posting and Gomez’s inability to make it. “Everyone got so involved in cooking during the pandemic,” she says. She found herself looking at pictures of food and wishing she knew how to prepare it.

So, as one does—if one is Selena Gomez—she called her team and asked what she could do during quarantine that would allow her to have fun with cooking. Shortly thereafter, Selena + Chef was born. In the intro, groceries arrive on her doorstep, and when she goes to get them, she mumbles, “This is what I’m going to burn today.” Then a famous chef appears (remotely) in her “ I F E L T kitchen. So far, she has cooked with Nancy Silverton, Ludo Lefebvre and W H E N I Antonia Lofaso, among others. Gomez’s kitchen is outfitted with cameras and a large TV with a split screen. One side D E E P B shows the chef’s face; the other the chef’s hands. Gomez tries to keep up while smiling and bantering. “Then I E X P L A I pull [the dish] out of the oven and I’m like, ‘This is what it looks like,’” she says.

She feeds the results to her grandparents and roommates.

The show makes her happy. In addition to contributing to her philanthropic goals (the show raised $360,000 for 23 non-profit organizations during its first two seasons), it has helped her connect with fans in a very authentic way. “It’s the most ‘myself’ I’ve been to the world,” she says. She realizes she may not be the most talented cook, but she does it anyway.

Fans have approached her to say “It’s really awesome that you make mistakes.”

It took time for Gomez, who has lived her life in the public eye since she was seven, to be comfortable showing vulnerability.

The former child star, who became a household name when she starred in the Disney Channel show Wizards of Waverly Place, struggled with the lack of privacy and constant media presence in her life. “For a while, I felt like an object,” she says.

“It felt gross for a long time.”

The first time Gomez sought treatment for mental health, soon after she’d been diagnosed with lupus in 2014, some assumed that she was going to rehab for substance-abuse issues. “I don’t even know what they really believed I was doing—drugs, alcohol, running around, partying,” she says.

“The narrative was so nasty.”

So Gomez decided to flip the script. She posted a caption on Instagram that read “I want to claim back my name.” She

talked openly about her struggles: “Yes, I went away. Yes, I struggle with mental health. I have been depressed. I’ve had anxiety.” In 2018, Gomez was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. “I felt a huge weight lift off me when I found out,” she says. “I could take a deep breath and go, ‘Okay, that explains so much.’”

One way Gomez has taken control of her mental health is by letting go of social media. Four years ago, she was the most followed person on Instagram. And yet, while beloved

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by millions of fans, she struggled with the negativity that often surfaced in the comments. “I suffer from mental illness, and [social media] just wasn’t adding anything to my life,” she says.

She asked herself “What’s the purpose of this?” Visiting kids in hospital wards, having fans come up to her to say that “Lose You to Love Me” had helped them through a divorce—these things meant more to her than, say, posting a random picture of her nails. “I was like, ‘I’ve got to do something [more]. After I’m gone, I want people to remember me for my heart.’” And so, in 2017 she handed the reins (and passwords) of her socialmedia accounts to her assistant. She still provides photos and quotes, but she no longer posts herself. “I don’t have it on my phone, so there’s no temptation,” she says. “I suddenly had to learn how to be with myself. That was annoying because in the past, I could spend hours looking at other people’s lives. I would find myself nearly two years down in someone’s feed, and I’d realize ‘I don’t even know this person!’ Now I get information the proper way. When my friends have something to talk about, they call me and say ‘Oh, I did this.’ They don’t say ‘Wait, did you see my post?’”

Eschewing social media cleared mental space for Gomez, allowing her to focus on projects and causes that speak to her on a deeper level. “It was so nice,” she says. “I felt like I was

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CELEBRITY Sweater and choker (Chanel) and earring (Cartier)

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Sweater and choker (Chanel), skirt (Moschino Couture), earring and bracelet (Cartier), fishnets (Wolford) and slingbacks (Amina Muaddi)

CELEBRITY Dress (Prabal Gurung), tights (Commando for Prabal Gurung), earring (Anita Ko), pendant necklace (Chanel), pearl necklaces (Mikimoto x Comme des Garçons), vintage cuff (Tom Binns) and rings (Cartier)

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Dress and pumps (Louis Vuitton), earring and rings (Cartier), choker (Chanel), fishnets (Falke) and belt (stylist’s own)

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recognize her) called him a “wetback.” Gomez was apoplectic.

“I wanted to show him my Instagram!” she jokes wryly. But her dad talked her down. “‘There’s nothing we can do,’” she recalls him telling her. “‘It’s just going to start more trouble for me, not them. We could get kicked out of this place.’”

Nowadays, Gomez is channelling her indignation into action, using her platform to campaign against misinformation and hate speech and raising awareness about human trafficking and the plight of undocumented immigrants on Living Undocumented, the Netflix documentary series she helps executive-produce. She is also using her power and position to celebrate fellow Latinx superstars. Case in point: She is producing and starring in In the Shadow of the Mountain, a biopic about Silvia Vásquez-Lavado, a Peruvian mountaineer and the first openly gay woman to scale the Seven Summits (the highest mountains on each continent).

In March of this year, Gomez found another way to connect with her Latinx community: Revelación, her first record in Spanish. She had long wanted to create a Spanish-language EP, but the language barrier had always stopped her. The pandemic provided the pause she needed to get the project off the ground. “It was a challenge,” “ E V E R Y T H I N G T H A T I ’ M A T T A C H E D T O she says. “I think speaking in Spanish is a lot easier than singing.” But with a H A S A C H A R I T Y A S P E C T . I F S O M E T H I N G bit more time on her hands than usual, Gomez was able to work with a Spanish coach and really nail it. “I made sure G O O D I S N ’ T C O M I N G O U T O F I T , I ’ M that I didn’t look like a fool,” she says.

“I focused so hard on making sure that the language I was speaking—and the N O T G O I N G T O D O I T . ” way I was speaking it—was authentic.

I wanted it to exude love. I wanted it to talk about pain but in a way that was confident. There is a song about girls saying goodbye to things that aren’t good for us.” micromanaging it every day—she decided to use her account Several months ago, Gomez told a reporter that she was for social good. Prior to the last election, Gomez had never considering quitting music; she didn’t feel like she was being voted, and she began thinking about why it had seemed so taken seriously as a musician. When asked about it now, she difficult. “At first, it was just me educating people on the voting demurs. “I don’t think I’ll ever quit making music,” she says. process,” she says. She became involved with the organization But, she admits, she does still feel like she’s constantly trying to When We All Vote and joined Michelle Obama’s “Voting prove herself to a world that will never take her seriously. “I’m Squad,” lending her Instagram to activists, philanthropists, not saying I want a Grammy. I’m not saying I need certain teachers, therapists and psychologists. The chaos of the last things. I just feel like I’m doing the best I can, and it’s all about administration also led her to reflect on her Mexican-American me. Sometimes that can really get to me.” Music, unlike acting, heritage in ways she hadn’t before. She thought about the is so personal, she says. “It’s just you. You’re pouring yourself racism she’d experienced first-hand with her father. “[When out.” Getting off Instagram has helped staunch the emotional I was] growing up, we didn’t have much and we were treated flow and given her the space to take more creative risks. “This poorly,” she says. “My dad would get pulled over all the time, tiny little phone that had 150 million people on it—I just put and he wasn’t doing anything most of the time.” Once, at a it down,” she says. “That was such a relief for me.”

Shania Twain concert in Dallas, someone (who clearly didn’t suddenly able to be so present.” She began developing Rare Beauty, a collection of makeup that’s all about embracing your natural beauty and rejecting unrealistic standards. “I’ve spent years of my life trying to look like other people,” says Gomez. “I would see an image and be like, ‘My gosh, why don’t I look like that?’ None of that was good for me.” With Rare Beauty, she wants to empower women to wear makeup because they want to, not because they need to. In creating each product, she thought, “What is the easiest way for someone who doesn’t know how to do makeup to learn how to actually do their own makeup?” Like with all her ventures, the brand has a charitable side: the Rare Impact Fund, which aims to raise $100 million over the next 10 years to improve access to mental-health services. “Everything that I’m attached to has a charity aspect,” she says. “If something good isn’t coming out of it, I’m not going to do it. I don’t need money.

I need people who want to fight with me.”

She brought the same fighting spirit to Instagram.

Recognizing that she had a powerful platform—even without

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Bodysuit (Brandon Maxwell), fishnets (Wolford), beret (Eugenia Kim), sunglasses (Parley for the Oceans) and mules (Amina Muaddi) For details, see Shopping Guide. Hairstylist, Orlando Pita (Orlo Play); makeup artist, Hung Vanngo (The Wall Group); manicurist, Lisa Peña-Wong (Chanel); set designer, James Chinlund (Magnet Agency); producer, Gabe Hill (Ge Projects)

Jacket and trench (Alexander McQueen) Creative director, Annie Horth

,

Coat and scarf (Loewe) and hat (Berman & Co.)

THE BEST LOOKS FROM THE LATEST COLLECTIONS COME TOGETHER IN PIECES—A NON-LINEAR INTRODUCTION THAT TRULY CELEBRATES FALL STYLE. Photographer LEEOR WILD Stylist NARIMAN JANGHORBAN

Coat (Ports 1961), dress (Coach) and hat (stylist’s own)

Bodysuit and loafers (Prada)

Coat, skirt and boots (Salvatore Ferragamo) and T-shirt (Uniqlo) Opposite page: Jacket, pants and boots (Schiaparelli) and head scarf and bow (stylist’s own)

PHOTOGRAPHY,

On Elizabeth: Coat (Ports 1961), shirt (Dsquared2), dress and turtleneck (Coach) and hat (stylist’s own). On Herieth: Dresses and cap (Balenciaga) Opposite page: Blazer and pants (Lafaille), trench coats, shirt and tie (Berman & Co.), boots (Alexander McQueen) and socks (stylist’s own)

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Coat (Salvatore Ferragamo)

Jacket, shirt, skirt, necklace, belt and boots (Chanel) and hat (Xtinel)

PHOTOGRAPHY,

Coat (Coach), dress (Erdem), handkerchief (Berman & Co.), boots (MICHAEL Michael Kors) and hood (stylist’s own) Opposite page: Coat (Margot92) and dress (Sportmax)

Coat, jumpsuit and scarf (Kenzo)

Hat (stylist’s own)

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Coat and scarf (Loewe) and hat (Berman & Co.) Opposite page: Dresses, cap and boots (Balenciaga)

Jacket, trench coat, dress and boots (Alexander McQueen) and earring and socks (stylist’s own) Opposite page: Coat, bra, pants, hat and scarf (Miu Miu)

PHOTOGRAPHY,

For details, see Shopping Guide.

Models, Herieth Paul (Folio Montreal) and Elizabeth Davison (Liz Bell); hairstylist and makeup artist, Leslie-Ann Thomson (The Project/Armani Beauty/ SkinCeuticals/Oribe); editorial producer, Estelle Gervais; set coordinator, Laura Malisan; photographer’s assistants, Xavier Hudon-MacDonald and Sierra Nallo; styling assistants, Manuela Bartolomeo and Ana Lontos. Thank you to Le Domaine du Fleuve.

CONCRETE JUNGLE

AS GUCCI CELEBRATES ITS CENTENARY YEAR, CREATIVE DIRECTOR ALESSANDRO MICHELE PROVES ONCE AGAIN THAT THE BRAND’S HIGH-FASHION CULT STATUS IS STRONGER THAN EVER.

Photographer ALEX BLACK Creative director and stylist ANNIE HORTH

Jacket, turtleneck, skirt, boot-pants, headgear and bags (Gucci) Opposite page: Dress, harness, decorative whip, bag and boots (Gucci)

On Mathieu: Jacket, shirt, choker, pants and loafers (Gucci). On Ash: Jacket, blouse, pants and gloves (Gucci) Opposite page: Jacket, turtleneck, vest and pants (Gucci)

Top, boot-pants, baseball cap, bag and gloves (Gucci) Opposite page: Jacket, blouse, collar, skirt and boot-pants (Gucci) For details, see Shopping Guide.

Models, Ash Foo (Sutherland Models), Mathieu Simoneau (Want Management) and Julee Huang (Elite Toronto); makeup artist, Leslie-Ann Thomson (The Project/NARS/SkinCeuticals); hairstylist, Steven Turpin (Oribe); editorial producer, Estelle Gervais; set coordinator, Laura Malisan; photographer’s assistants, Mitchell Wright and Jessy Colucci; styling assistant, Ana Lontos

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lifestyle

RESERVATIONS RECOMMENDED Here are SEVEN EXCEPTIONAL SPAS across Canada that promise some dream pampering.

PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF NIMMO BAY RESORT

By TRUC NGUYEN

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ESCAPE To really get away from it all, consider a wellness-centred stay at the remote fly-in NIMMO BAY RESORT in British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest. Spa treatments such as a full-body scrub using Pacific Ocean sea salts and an Ayurvedic head massage can be done en plein air—perhaps among the trees or even on a floating dock. Services offered in the surrounding forest include an on-the-ground shiatsu treatment and the Gin and Yin yoga class, which ends with a cocktail tasting. After you’ve had your treatment, you can hit the outdoor rain shower, spend time in a cedar hot tub, visit the resort’s scenic floating sauna (only accessible by boat, kayak or stand-up paddleboard) or go swimming under a waterfall. nimmobay.com

RESTORE The Spa at LANGDON HALL , a Drake-approved Relais & Châteaux property in Cambridge, Ont., is just as ideal for a romantic weekend getaway as it is for a decadent spa day—Five Diamond dining experience included. A meditative stroll through the hotel’s vibrant gardens and 30 forested hectares is a must for overnight guests and spa visitors alike. Although the Spa at Langdon Hall is known for its restorative, calming Valmont facials, you might want to book its new L’Elixir Quintessential treatment, featuring products from the Swiss skincare brand’s L’Elixir des Glaciers line.

It’s the perfect pick-me-up for dehydrated skin and an unforgettable two-hour indulgence. langdonhall.ca

PAMPER

RELEASE

Nova Scotia’s first Nordic spa, SENSEA offers a number of traditional spa treatments, including a hot-stone massage, a facial, an Ayurvedic head treatment and a relaxing body treatment. But the main draw of this lakefront destination is the four-season outdoor water features, including saunas, hot and

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cold baths and hammams, all in a beautifully landscaped setting featuring scenic vistas. In the Scandinavian sauna, guests can also experience an Aufguss ritual, which involves essential oils, ice, dancing and music. sensea.ca

Every visit to HAMMAM SPA BY CÉLA in Toronto, whether you’re there for the transdermal JetPeel facial or an invigorating deeptissue massage, should start in the tile-lined, eucalyptusinfused Hammam Steam Room and conclude with treats and a hydrating beverage in the cozy tea lounge. The spa’s languorous 60-minute Hammam Turkish Bath experience is not

to be missed either. It includes hot- and coolwater treatments and a full-body exfoliation, all performed on a heated marble table. hammamspa.ca

LIFESTYLE

INDULGE Opened in 2019, the luxurious Spa at FOUR SEASONS MONTREAL is the perfect place to escape to for an afternoon of pampering. Book a Cinq à Sept Reset massage with friends or try the spa’s relaxing Signature Body Treatment, featuring Hungarian Moor mud and an exfoliating scalp mask. The elegant space, designed by Parisian studio Gilles & Boissier and local designer Philip Hazan, also features a serene indoor pool, steam room and sauna area and a Kneipp hydrotherapy facility—including a stone footpath for reflexology—that you can enjoy pre- and posttreatment. We can’t imagine a more indulgent city break. fourseasons.com

PHOTOGRAPHY, CATHERINE COOPER (FOUR SEASONS), BRITNEY GILL (FIG) & COURTESY OF NIMMO BAY RESORT, LANGDON HALL, HAMMAM SPA BY CÉLA & STRØM NORDIC SPA

UNWIND The original STRØM NORDIC SPA offers a unique experience close to downtown Montreal. Located on Lac des Battures on Nuns’ Island, the thoughtfully designed space features Nordic spa must-haves such as hot and cold baths, saunas, a steam bath, outdoor whirlpools and more. The Rød relaxation room features infrared beds, and there are elevated open-air

massage rooms. Visitors can opt for a Swedish massage or beauty services such as the Boréal Strøm Face Treatment, which includes the use of hot and cold stones and a focus on aromatherapy. stromspa.com

RENEW Fashionable facial bar FIG in Vancouver offers injections and high-tech treatments designed for maximum efficacy.

There’s a focus on clean-skincare products, and the majority of its services take 30 minutes or less to complete— even the Collagen + Texture facial, which combines nano needling with lymphatic massage, a mask and LED-light

therapy. Fig also offers a self-service LED facial if you feel more comfortable going solo, and there are plans to introduce a laser for hyperpigmentation to the treatment menu this month. There are currently two locations in Vancouver (one on Main Street and one in Kitsilano), and two more are slated to open this fall in Toronto and West Vancouver. figface.com

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The New Generation of

CANADIAN WINEMAKERS After years of being given the cold shoulder, the Canadian wine scene is now effervescent with possibilities—and we’re not just talking about pét-nat.

By STEPHANIE MERCIER VOYER

LIFESTYLE

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cuvée made with Concord grapes (Supersonic), a variety traditionally reserved for jams and juices. “I just wanted to see what we could make with these grapes that have been shunned from winemaking,” she says. “It’s like you’re drinking juice with a bit of booze.” In order to differentiate the two lines, the classic-style wines kept their more serious labels while the new wines were stamped with bright and colourful designs.

Breathing new life into the winery’s cellar paid off. The 2019 vintage of Brisbois’ Supersonic sold out rapidly, and so did her Orange Nouveau, a highly drinkable blend of Pinot Gris, Gewürztraminer, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc and Muscat. But she notes that while Montrealers are usually quick to jump on her new releases of skin-contact wines, Torontonians seem to trail a bit behind. “It’s really interesting because I think Quebec does a really good job of supporting Quebec wineries,” she says.

“I feel like in Ontario, we almost need an outside critic to say that Ontario is amazing. If the creativity and playfulness at Trail Estate are any indication of the kind of wines that can come out of the province, I think we can all safely start singing its praises.”

UICK: What’s the first thing

that comes to mind when you’re asked about Canadian wine? If your answer is something vague about icewine or a rustic B.C. Cabernet, you’re not alone. But the times are changing, and Canada is swiftly becoming one of the most exciting places for natural wines and forward-thinking winemakers in North America. Whether they’re working to shift people’s biases one grape at a time, inspiring a grassroots winemaking movement or experimenting abroad to please the taste buds of people back home, these winemakers are helping Canadian wine lovers see that their glass is way more than half full.

REVERSE-ENGINEERING THE DREAM WITH A SUNDAY IN AUGUST

Sometimes a life goal will dictate your path. This was the case for husband-and-wife team Mike Shindler and Sam Milbrath when they decided to launch their natural winery, A Sunday in August, in 2017. “We’ve always been into food and wine, but a big part of it was that we wanted to figure out a way to live in a rural setting,” says Shindler.

When they were starting out, Shindler and Milbrath were told they would need about $2 million. Investing that kind of money was impossible for the couple, but they remained determined to make it work by going grassroots. They got in A Sunday in August’s Mike Shindler and Sam Milbrath

PHOTOGRAPHY, STOCKSY (MAIN IMAGE) & GUY FERGUSON (M. SHINDLER & S. MILBRATH)

TRAIL ESTATE IS REDEFINING ONTARIO WINES

“People have thought for a long time that Ontario wine isn’t good,” says Mackenzie Brisbois, the winemaker at Trail Estate, a small-batch winery tucked away in quiet Prince Edward County, on the north shore of Lake Ontario. “It’s just not true.”

Before landing the winemaker position at Trail Estate, Brisbois studied viticulture and winemaking at Niagara College and honed her craft working around the world, falling deeper in love with fermented grape juice. She was attracted to the industry because it combined many of her interests, including agriculture, chemistry and hospitality. “I like doing lots and lots of stuff, and winemaking is kind of a renaissance-style career,” she says.

When she arrived at Trail Estate, her goal was to help define the winery’s identity. “They were making good wines but nothing exciting—nothing that differentiated them from anywhere else,” she says. Brisbois set out to change that and divided the wine production into two different styles. She stuck with European varietals like Chardonnay, Cabernet Franc and Pinot Noir, treating them in a very classic style with natural fermentation, a bit of oak and no filtration. And she took a risk by producing wines that defied people’s expectations of Ontario, including quirky pét-nats (naturally sparkling wines), juicy skin-contact wines, piquettes (wines made from grape pomace) and even a ELLECANADA.COM

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LIFESTYLE

WEIN GOUTTE IS A LABOUR OF LOVE

Emily Campeau’s love of wine keeps on growing. Born in Quebec, she has been the wine director at Restaurant Candide in Montreal since 2016, has written about wine for various publications and is now making wine in Germany—where she currently lives with her husband, Christoph Müller—under the label Wein Goutte. Its name a play on words—the German term for winery is “Weingut” and the French word for drop is “goutte”—Wein Goutte was born out of two people’s love for wine and each other.

When she first started working at Candide, Campeau made sure she would always have the freedom to continue expanding her wine knowledge. “I really wanted to learn about vineyard practices—but for real, not from a book,” she says. Each year, chef and owner John Winter Russell would let Campeau take time off to explore different wine regions and take part in harvests in places like Germany and California. But it wasn’t until 2018, when she worked at a winery in Austria, that her life changed forever. There, she met Müller, the winery’s cellar master, who would soon become her husband. With the permission of the winemaker they worked for, the couple started crafting their own wines under the label Wein Goutte.

Having worked in kitchens before reorienting her career to wine, Campeau immediately felt at home in the cellar. “It has 108

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Wein Goutte’s Emily Campeau and Christoph Müller

“WE MADE ABOUT 5,000 BOTTLES FOR OUR FIRST VINTAGE, AND THEY WERE ALL SOLD OUT BEFORE WE EVEN TALKED ABOUT IT.”

a bit of the same feeling as being in a kitchen,” she says. “It’s less stressful, but it’s also physical, and you’re thinking about multiple things at once.”

The response to Wein Goutte’s first offering of wines, vermouths and ciders was overwhelming. The playful wines, whose bottles are adorned with witty sticker-like illustrations

by Montrealer Simon Roy, garnered attention from buyers around the world, from Canada to Sweden, Denmark and the U.K. “We made about 5,000 bottles for our first vintage, and they were all sold out before we even talked about it,” says Campeau.

Recently, the couple relocated to an estate in the small German village of Hüttenheim, where they tend to lesser-known grape varietals like Johanniter, Regent and Domina. And while they are constantly learning and growing as winemakers, being able to adapt to whatever life throws at them has always been their plan. Campeau just never imagined that her journey to putting wine on the tables of Canadian restaurants would take her all the way to Germany. Keep your eyes peeled because Wein Goutte’s next release is sure to sell out in a blink.

PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF EMILY CAMPEAU

touch with organic-grape growers, rented a car to pick up the goods in the Okanagan Valley, brought them back to Vancouver, where they currently live, and made their first vintage in their bike shed using a 400-litre tank borrowed from a friend. “The wine was absolutely terrible,” says Shindler.

After that first experiment, he started calling winemakers he admired across Canada to ask them questions. He picked up some skills working at a few B.C. wineries, and eventually Jay Drisdale from Bella Wines in Naramata, B.C., took Shindler under his wing. “He said, ‘Write a really detailed list of how you want these wines to taste—it’ll never totally go that way, but at least then you’ll know what you’re trying to attain,’” says Shindler.

From there, Shindler and Milbrath started building relationships with growers, rented a proper winemaking facility (so long, bike shed!) and worked on developing their brand.

“When Mike came up with [the name] A Sunday in August, he wanted to borrow a feeling—a nice summery feeling that is approachable,” says Milbrath, who handles the marketing side of things. Milbrath commissioned young female Canadian artists to create artwork—including lively floral-filled pieces by her sisters, painters Darby and Claire Milbrath—that would convey the idea that wine shouldn’t be intimidating.

Now, four years into the venture, the couple transforms a range of grape varietals like Gewürztraminer, Pinot Gris and Cabernet Franc into 13 fresh and zippy pét-nats, piquettes, rosés and orange, white and red wines. Even though Shindler and Milbrath are working toward buying their own vineyard, their wines have become so popular that they’ve already sold out their yearly wine club, which they use to finance packaging and bottling each year after spending all their capital on grapes.

But don’t fret—if you missed out on this year’s wine club, A Sunday in August bottles are available through the brand’s website and in select restaurants and shops across Canada.

DESIGN

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DINNER PARTY Time

$24 for a set of 12, goodeeworld.com S

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Now more than ever, keeping track of which wineglass is yours is of paramount importance. But things get busy, people get distracted and suddenly no one remembers who put what where. Enter Wine-O’s, stylish and colourful Merinowool-felt glass markers designed by GRAF LANTZ and available through Canadian-founded brand Goodee.

They’re subtle yet sophisticated, there are 12 shades to choose from and they make a perfect—and useful—host gift.

A

How to level up your return to indoor dining with friends.

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1. MAKE NO MISTAKE

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2. FABLE TO TABLE Based in Burnaby, B.C., FABLE creates sustainable dinnerware that will make any meal look good. Sleek, minimal and made out of recycled clay, the plates, bowls and mugs come in an array of soothing colours—think midnight blue, blush pink and dove grey—that are perfect for mixing and matching for maximum impact. Crafting pieces with a conscience, Fable prides itself on having full price transparency and is on its way to achieving zero-waste production, making it a company we can believe in. From $39, fablehome.co

3. IKEA X SONOS

3

To help get the party started (or keep it going), IKEA has teamed up with audio experts Sonos to design Symfonisk, an affordable collection of multi-purpose speakers that double as bookshelves, table lamps and, the most recent release, picture frames with interchangeable fronts. Dinner music has never been so discreet—or sounded so good.

From $129, ikea.com

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BY JOANNA FOX & CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET

4. SHINE A LIGHT

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After launching in 2014 and seeing its work illuminate restaurants all over town, Montreal lamp and light-fixture design studio JACQUES & ANNA finally has a bricks-and-mortar shop. Stop by the new spot, in the city’s vibrant Mile End ’hood, and check out the current collection, which was inspired by the nautical world, as well as past creations. Your well-lit browse of beautifully textured concrete and ceramic pieces might just lead you to something special for your own home. jacquesetanna.com

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Passing

THROUGH A mother-daughter CANADIAN ROCKIES road trip reveals a rich pioneer history.

By CHLOE BERGE

W

IND STIRS THE TREMBLING ASPENS, their golden

leaves shaking like a thousand little tambourines. Lake Minnewanka shines mirror-like under the late-September sun, steeling itself for the impending cold. In a few weeks, the mountain town of Banff will be blanketed in snow. But for now, my mother and I have been granted a bright window of weather for our trip through the Alberta Rockies to Jasper, where she was born.

The turquoise lakes that dot the vast mountain range in Banff National Park were a draw for early settlers and 19th-century explorers like Sir George Simpson, who made their way over treacherous passes in an insatiable spirit of discovery. Bobbing on the back of our Lake Minnewanka Cruise boat, I find the sentinel mountains just as magnetic. “The lake is full of mysteries,” says our guide as we motor out onto the water. Indigenous peoples lived on the lakeshore more than 10,000 years ago, and the Stoney-Nakoda First Nations named it Minn-waki, or “lake of the spirits,” after the revered spirits that were believed to inhabit it.

Tales of spectres and mythical creatures that dwell here abound, but as our boat glides through the shadow of Mount Inglismaldie along a shoreline dense with emerald spruce 110

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and pine, I find the natural beauty of this UNESCO World Heritage Site equally haunting. It’s easy to see why the lake was one of the region’s first tourist attractions, with boat cruises around Minnewanka dating back to the 1889 steam-powered Lady Brooke.

As we travel to downtown Banff in our rental car, we follow a winding shoreline route that was once the path of turn-of-thecentury travellers making their way to the lake from the railway station and surrounding hotels with Brewster Company, one of the Rockies’ original outfitters. After checking in at the historic Mount Royal Hotel on Banff Avenue, we clamour aboard Open-Top Touring’s replica of the Brewster Company’s open top motor coach. We make our way alongside the aquamarine Bow River and then snake up Tunnel Mountain Drive, which affords a sweeping view of Bow Valley, with Banff etched in miniature below us.

The next morning, we set off on the hour-long drive from Banff to Lake Louise and the Canadian Rockies’ grande dame, the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise. Towering over the lake, the palatial hotel is as commanding as the surrounding mountains and is the birthplace of Canadian mountaineering. Originally built in 1890 as a one-storey log cabin for outdoor adventurers

by Canadian Pacific Railway general manager Cornelius Van Horne, the hotel grew in scale and design to become one of the most luxurious in Canada, drawing guests from all over the world with its cinematic backdrop, afternoon tea served with a panoramic lake view and horseback riding.

I’m lucky enough to experience all of it, starting with a ride on horseback through a fir and spruce forest to the Lake Agnes Teahouse, built in 1901 as a refuge for mountaineers and riders.

My horse kicks up dust as it plods gingerly along our rocky path up into the mountains. At the top, I sit by the water’s edge as the sunrise reveals a perfect mirror image of Mount Whyte reflected in the lake.

These sublime landscapes only grow more dramatic the farther north we travel. The next day, we follow the Icefields Parkway toward Jasper. The 232-kilometre stretch of highway

PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF PURSUIT COLLECTION

Sky Bistro on Sulphur Mountain, Banff

TRAVEL runs along the Continental Divide, skirting the Sunwapta River Valley and the Columbia Icefield’s sparkling glaciers and jagged spires.

As we approach Jasper along the Athabasca River, the primordial power of the majestic mountains that cradle the town is palpable. Once little more than a fur-trading post, the city seems largely unchanged since the 1950s, when my immigrant grandparents met around this time of year at a Halloween dance, the aspens and larches painting the landscape a brilliant yellow.

“There it is,” says my mom, pointing to the Canadian Pacific Railway station where my grandfather worked as a conductor.

My grandparents’ story isn’t uncommon. The town was a hub of commerce and development in the 19th and early-20th centuries—a place where people have always passed through.

Veering left out of the town, the road meanders through a luminous golden aspen forest and ends at Pyramid Lake Resort.

We drop our bags as violet dusk cloaks the mountain peaks and make our way to Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge, where we spend the evening stargazing.

An ode to Canadiana with a grand foyer reminiscent of Kubrick’s Overlook Hotel, the lodge is built in a low-chalet style that mimics the camps of early settlers who braved the Athabasca and Kicking Horse passes by horseback to reach the area. Jasper National Park is the second-largest Dark Sky Preserve in the world, an area where no artificial light is visible and any nearby light pollution is regulated. As night falls, a brilliant vault of stars shimmers.

Heading to Maligne Lake the next day, we follow a road carved by explorer and early outfitter Curly Philips, who also built the lake’s iconic boathouse in the 1920s; visitors can still rent canoes there today. As I stand at the water’s edge, I wonder how much of this place is part of who I am. The Rockies’ summits and sapphire lakes still draw mountaineers and adventurers with a history that’s woven into the fabric of our national heritage. My grandparents weren’t explorers, but the same spirit drove them to Jasper, and although it’s my first time travelling through the region, the allure of these mountains is something I immediately understand.

Even though my grandparents left Alberta for Vancouver in the ’60s, it was as if they never shook the restlessness that led them to the mountains in the first place. They road-tripped throughout North America together into old age and often took

me with them, which sparked my own love of travel. Maybe the energy of certain places is an heirloom I carry with me, a force that seeps into my bones—even if I’m only passing through.

STAY Step into a bygone era at Mount Royal Hotel in the heart of downtown Banff. Each floor of the historic property, which was established in 1908, is dedicated to a different decade in its history, and the lobby functions as a mini-museum, with archival photographs and film footage. En route to Jasper, make a pit stop along the Icefields Parkway and spend a night at Glacier View Lodge, Canada’s only glacier-view resort, at the foot of the Athabasca Glacier. Guests can cozy up with a glass of bubbly in the Scandinavian-hygge-inspired lobby, where floor-to-ceiling windows frame a view of the Columbia Icefield. And there’s nowhere more iconic to stay in Jasper than the chalet-style Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge, where travellers can paddle the surrounding lake during the day and stargaze after dark.

Glacier View Lodge, Jasper

EAT Epic panoramic views of Banff and its surrounding mountains await at Sky Bistro, which is perched atop Sulphur Mountain.

Guests ride the Banff Gondola up to an elegant dining room serving artful, locally sourced plates like Alberta beef tenderloin tartare. In Jasper, chef Martin Brenner of Maligne Canyon Wilderness Kitchen takes inspiration from the hearty comfort food that fuelled the region’s early explorers, including 12-hour-smoked brisket, pickled trout and grilled salmon.

Sky Bistro, Banff

PHOTOGRAPHY,

EXPLORE

Columbia Icefield Skywalk, Jasper

Guests of Glacier View Lodge can enjoy a guided walk on the Athabasca Glacier as well as a private sunset stroll along the Columbia Icefield Skywalk, an architectural glass-floored bridge that is suspended 280 metres above the Sunwapta Valley and offers a thrilling view of the surrounding rivers, glaciers and forest. Before visiting Maligne Lake in Jasper, opt for a walk through Maligne Canyon, where six bridges take hikers through the deepest canyon in the Rockies, surrounded by waterfalls. Once up at the lake itself, visitors can head out onto the turquoise water on the Maligne Lake Cruise and learn about the surrounding wilderness and wildlife, stopping at enchanting Spirit Island.

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SHOPPING GUIDE

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P. 78 LOST AND FOUND ALEXANDER McQUEEN

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PHOTOGRAPHY, ALEX BLACK. ON JULEE: BUSTIER, PANTS, HEADGEAR, SHOES AND DECORATIVE WHIP (GUCCI). ON MATHIEU: JACKET, SHIRT, PANTS, LOAFERS AND CHOKER (GUCCI).

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HOROSCOPE

OCTOBER 2021

Libra SEPTEMBER 23 – OCTOBER 22

If this isn’t the best autumn of your life, I’ll turn my back on the stars. You have everything you need for fulfillment, whether you’re single or in a relationship.

This positive energy is also at work if you’re facing a setback or going through a tough time. Not only do you possess great inner strength but you also have the support of your loved ones as well as the support of those you’d never expect it from. Whatever your situation, you’ll be living happily ever after once again.

By ALEX VALLIÈRES

SCORPIO

AQUARIUS

TAURUS

APRIL 20 – MAY 20 Not only are you putting a lot of energy into a project—whether it’s small or ambitious—but you’ve also added an element of creativity to it that amazes those around you.

Let jealous or malicious people say what they will. They tread water while you move forward.

GEMINI

MAY 21 – JUNE 20 If you followed my advice last month, you should be more focused on what’s really important to you. This doesn’t mean that you won’t need to adapt to external factors, but they are easier to navigate when your mind is clear and you know where you’re going.

CANCER

JANUARY 20 – FEBRUARY 18 Venus’ visit to Sagittarius, the everflamboyant sign, is fuelling your need to love and seduce. And there are no half measures with you.

Make exciting plans and think big— you’ll get what you want. Most of all, never stop dreaming.

JUNE 21 – JULY 22 Since the arrival of Venus in friendly Scorpio (it will stay until October 8), your heart has been open to love. Maybe you’re already smitten with someone or about to fall in love, but one thing is certain: This won’t be a one-night stand; rather, it will be a profound and exciting encounter.

PISCES

LEO

NOVEMBER 22 – DECEMBER 21 Healthy and well rested, you’re ready to get back to things. The only snag?

You’re (secretly) waiting for news that isn’t coming. Stop! Do nothing, especially if you’re prone to impatience or anxiety. Otherwise, you might go headlong into disaster.

FEBRUARY 19 – MARCH 20 Now that you’ve organized your thoughts (and believe me, you needed to), let life take care of the rest. It’s not up to you to decide what to do next—at least not until the end of November. Have a little faith in the planets: They are sending good vibes your way.

CAPRICORN

ARIES

VIRGO

OCTOBER 23 – NOVEMBER 21 Already buoyed by Venus’ heady influence (which can be felt until October 8), you’ll feel the winds of change blowing your way as of the 24th. Meanwhile, go easy on a colleague or loved one who isn’t able to meet all your demands—which you know are sometimes impossible.

SAGITTARIUS

DECEMBER 22 – JANUARY 19 I’m begging you to be more tactful this month, especially if you’re going to disagree with someone about something or bring up a touchy subject.

Luckily for you, the three planets in Libra (the diplomat of the zodiac) will help you communicate with more finesse— and that will make all the difference.

MARCH 21 – APRIL 19 Red alert! Your sensitivity could play nasty tricks on you this month.

There’s no need to be suspicious of your friends’ intentions, especially when they aren’t suspicious of yours.

Cultivate trust instead. If you give your BFFs the benefit of the doubt, everything will be fine.

JULY 23 – AUGUST 22 It’s hard to explain this period of selfdoubt you’re going through; it’s so unlike you. Think of it as a temporary lack of enthusiasm that has made you lose sight of your infinite value. Just don’t let it mess with your head, okay? Instead, resist the negative thoughts so you can get back to being yourself.

AUGUST 23 – SEPTEMBER 22 In life, things can quickly go wrong.

But they can also turn out amazingly, don’t you think? So go on and let that famous skepticism of yours take a back seat while you make the most of the blessings you stumble upon.

And don’t forget to thank your lucky stars.

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ESCAPE

FOR A YEAR-LONG MULTIMEDIA PROJECT at Texas’ Dallas Contemporary, Mexico-born, Montreal-based artist Renata Morales is creating an installation of over 700 drawings and ceramics that will evolve throughout the year. Beyond her artistic practice, Morales is already a well-known fashion designer and art director, having created iconic pieces for Arcade Fire and Grimes and collaborated with directors such as Denis Villeneuve and institutions like the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Venice Biennale, but this is her first solo museum exhibition. The focus of the show, which opens on September 25, is an exploration of the grey area between modernism and craft—the centre of Morales’ creative practice—along with themes of identity, belonging and humanity. Captivating us with her use of bright colours and striking sculptural pieces (her work also explores her Mexican heritage), she is currently an artist-in-residence at Céramica Suro, in Guadalajara, where she’s developing new ceramic techniques. If you can’t make it to Dallas to see Morales’ evolution in person, she will be releasing a limited drop of sweatshirts and a series of Céramica Suro plates, available on the museum’s website. @renatamorales, dallascontemporary.org

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TEXT, JOANNA FOX; PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF RENATA MORALES (CARA AZUL LIBERTAD BY RENATA MORALES)

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