The Year Quiet Luxury Died

0:03Hello and welcome to Fashion People. I'm Lauren Chairman, Redo-Crux fashion and beauty memo line Sheet. And today with me on the show is journalist Marissa Meltzer. We're here to reflect on the biggest fashion and beauty stories of 2024.

0:22Happy Tuesday, everyone. I am back in Los Angeles after a very quick trip out to the desert. This week on Line Sheet, we've got an interview with Virginie Montel, the costume designer of Amelia Perez, and also Jonathan Anderson, the costume designer of both challengers and queer, and also obviously the creative director of his namesake brand, J.W. Anderson, and also Loewe for now. It's from my talk with them at Puck Stories of the Season event back in November. It's a great chat. Make sure not to miss it. Elsewhere, I am answering some more reader questions. And then on Thursday, you guys are obsessed with this lower fish bar product situation, which to be honest, could literally be a nothing situation.

1:09I start to get into it. I'll do more reporting next week, but it's funny how much you guys want to talk about this. Uh, then on Thursday, I am back with a preview of what's to come in 2025. Thanks to everyone who made this year. So great. It was a wild one. I published a book. Big thanks to my coauthor, Chantal Fernandez, Rachel Strugeatz and Sarah Shapiro joined line Sheet. I can't believe Rachel hasn't even been with us for a year. It feels like she's been with with me forever. Did work together before. So maybe that's why. And then starting next week, Line Sheet is going to five days a week from three.

1:44So be sure to sign up if you haven't already. It's still going to be fun. It's still going to be published in the afternoons. It's never going to feel like homework, but it's going to be all the news you need to know. So get on that. And for now, let's get going with Marissa. Marissa Meltzer, welcome to Fashion People. Thank you for having me again. Welcome back. I mean, I've been at home this whole time, but yes, I'm happy to be back in the world of the line sheet Fashion People universe. What have you been up to during this holiday break? I think I thrived too close to the sun during holiday break.

2:23and I was sick. I was actually sick in a way that is not the kind. I have epilepsy and it had a seizure and ended up in the hospital. So I had sort of like a dark and weird Christmas, but I'm fine. Oh my God. During a holiday party or like post-holiday parties? No, of course. No. The most tragic and embarrassing part of it is that it was in front of Jack's wife, Frida. On Lafayette. That one? Yeah. Well, at least you probably knew 15 people standing there. Well, I don't even remember it because part of having seizures is you kind of have like amnesia. So I remember leaving Italy and then I woke up in an ambulance.

3:01But whatever Jack's wife, Frida Angel that called the ambulance also made sure all my Italy groceries were sent home to New York Presbyterian with me. So I was set. So, yeah, I was eating like eggplant parm and recovering for most of the holidays. I'm so sorry. did you buy yourself anything as a, as a reward for great question? Um, I haven't, but that's only because I'm going to Paris in, um, mid January for two weeks and intend to, um, you know, like take out all of my, um, you know, my desire to be nurtured on the French sale season. is there anything you're looking for in particular um well I have a really good sales girl at the Chanel and Campbell and I just like to look forward to however she's going to abuse me and tempt me I feel open to like surprise and delight like I want I don't want a basic like I want I don't know like a skirt that really makes me happy or I mean I always go to Reese's and get something vintage.

4:16Maddie, my girl there, is amazing. And she always brings out an array of things. Yeah, I think, I mean, I always buy underwear. I am going to a certain French dermatologist and, you know, plan to. Fortunately, we cannot share this name with anyone else. No, but I will be. Sorry, everybody. And this is the hard line. I'm starting a beauty sub stack and I do have many other French and American friends who can share the names of their French masseuses, dermatologists, in-house, waxers, whatever. So those will be going in there. Marissa, I'm so excited that you're starting a beauty sub stack. Congratulations.

4:59Can you share any information? Do you have the name of it yet? Yeah, it's called Soft Power. So good. And it's marissamelter.substack.com. Um, it's like I was listening to a podcast, a celebrity book club where Steven and Lily were talking about forehand massages and like wondering if they were good. And the whole time I was like, not only have I had forehand massages, but I've had six hand massages and I actually think forehand is better. And like what's having this whole, you know, conversation with them in my head. And that's when I realized that, you know, the classic thing of expertise that I have that I totally take for granted because I have been to spas on every continent, but Antarctica, that I can share and explore.

5:50And I love fashion. I love shopping sub stacks. There's kind of not anything like that for beauty. And I think, at least for me, I'm a little more omnivorous and open with beauty. Like I'm more open to trying things. It's often a cheaper point of entry. I have more questions. I have more musings, you know, like I like to talk about the new designer at like Balenciaga or Bottega, but I'm I'm not that client. so I'm not actually buying it. Whereas if you tell me any skin tightening or like, you know, freckle reducing or like new sunscreen, I absolutely will buy it and try it. So yeah. So it's, it's for that.

6:37I'm so excited personally. I was actually talking to another beauty editor who DM me last night. I posted something on Instagram that you and I were talking about. I was looking, I Googled like eyeshadow trends. Yes. Over 40. And which I guess the over 40, what does that mean today? It means nothing, but I really couldn't find much about, I found one birdie article, B Y R D I E and one Harper's Bazaar about makeup trends. But I just couldn't find anything like I would like to wear. I have two eyeshadows and thought, oh, it might be interesting. What kinds of eyeshadows are available? There is no information.

7:22And another beauty editor DM me and said, who's around in our generation, I really want to start a sub stack, but she doesn't feel like she can do it really regularly. I said, if you do it once or twice a month, I think it's honestly enough. The one you do weekly. If you can do weekly, it's great. And I think you'll make more money. The one I like is How Not to Fuck Up Your Face. Yeah. Which is, I think she was the beauty editor. Val Monroe. She was at O. Yeah. At O. She's great. Hers is a little more musing oriented. And I think I want this one to be a little more service in the sort of service journalism mode of like, you know, like Jean Godfrey, June and Lucky kind of thing of like, here is this perfume that smells like sunscreen in the most beautiful way possible.

8:16And it's going to make you feel like you're in Saint-Tropez or like, you know, again, like, can you wear blue eyeshadow if you remember the 80s? Exactly. It's not so much for like the aged, even though I am 47. Like, these are things that I'm concerned about, but I also want to talk to other people. And, you know, I want to talk to, like, you know, I have a notoriously wide-ranging social life and friend group. And I have, you know, people that I'm dear to me that are 80 and that are, you know, 18. and so and I think beauty concerns there are less hard lines right like it's not like you can't do this when you're this age but it's for me it's more like does eyeshadow suit me if I'm good if I if I'm gonna go from zero to a hundred with eyeshadow is that what I want to do like you know it's it's more like how do I look like myself but still experiment but also the questions that everyone asks, like where I have to send some, I have to like thank someone and I want to get them a massage in San Francisco.

9:27Where do I go? Sure. I think the big thing for me, because I read magazines a lot, we all grew up reading magazines. I learned to do makeup from reading magazines. And yes, there would be one or two photos, but it was really like, this is, you put blush on the apples of your cheek. I am not watching what I did promptly after searching and could not find any information about what eyeshadows are available in the world. I went on Tik TOK and honestly, everybody looks awful. Like at my friend, I messaged a friend and I said, I can't believe you look at these Tik TOKs all the time. Everyone is so ugly.

10:06Like it doesn't matter the age they look and it's, you know, it's user generated content and I don't want that. Like, I don't want. They all have blush blindness. There's so much blush. They're wearing so much concealer. Like, it just seems it's not the way that would feel good to my skin. They're insane. Like, lip liner is crazy right now. No one, everyone looks wild with lip liner. They look so bad. And it's not. Like, the thing is, it's not. You're right. It's not an age thing. It's just like, I would love to just. It's just an aesthetic thing. Some like really pretty girls putting some fun eyeshadow wash on their eyelids and seeing, and knowing I ended up going to Target and I bought a ColourPop palette.

10:50Okay, great. This can be a future collaboration thing where we can talk about your color. My thing with eyeshadow too is like, where does it go? Like, where does it stop? I have a lot of lid. Yeah. And also like, is, are there dust? Like I would, should I try a blue eyeshadow? but is there some sort of like shimmery one that is subtle or whatever? And there's just no information. And just as like, you're totally right. You look at Laura Riley, Leandra, Becky as the like three, the triumvirate shopping, Amelia, but Amelia is more of a reporter. She does. That's true. She is a reporter. Yeah. But like you, we need people to be writing about beauty in a, like you said, in a, in a constructive way where.

11:37Yeah, I would just like to know what some, and I don't notice that on the street as much as like, Verena von Fetten will wear blue eyeliner, but she's the only person I know who experiments with eye makeup. Yeah. I mean, I want to be able to experiment, but like not either look like a dowager or look like I'm trying to look like a euphoria teen. And yeah. And again, like I, I there's just not a lot of that. And I have plenty. I don't want to, you know, like Rachel Strugratz, wonderful beauty reporter. I'm not trying to do that. I have a lot of outlets to write about to be a journalist. And I'm not going to stop that.

12:18But this is somewhere for me to kind of imitate the conversations I have in my group chats. and totally you know like my best friend who is gay is really into this tinted pink hermes um lip balm stain and like it just makes him look like he has naturally rosy pink lips and it's like i'm really also interested in the conversation of like are men gonna wear makeup where should they start like what's how do you tiptoe into that world like i just think there's a lot of But yeah, it's just I want to replicate fun conversations and also, you know, sort of a rare. People say they always hear my voice in my writing, which is wonderful.

13:03But like somewhere for me to write where I truly just sound like myself. Well, Marissa, I can't wait for soft power. This is also journalism. It's just a different kind. No, it is. It's service journalism. There's just very few of those places left. I'm very excited. Subscribe. Everybody get on that. Thanks. So you are on today to talk about the big stories of the year. And I sent you a very, very long list. We're not going to get through all of these. Some of them are extremely boring. And some of them we're just going to, I think we should just power through the ones that I think we should, you and I should focus on big time.

13:42Well, I know what I wanted to start with. Which one do you want to start with? Favorite purchase of the year. Yeah, I think what we should do is actually go from, no, we should start with favorite purchase of the year and end with the big C because that happened at the end of the year and that one is, and a lot of these in the middle are boring and we're going to just go through them super fast. But so what was the best thing you bought this year? I think the best thing I bought this year was partly because I manifested it a little bit, but before I mentioned best friend, Matthew, I was talking to him about how I needed a bag that was like a daily shoulder bag tote bag, but not like tote bag tote bag.

14:25And he was like, what you need is an Hermes Picotin in a neutral color in like the biggest size possible that you'd have to custom order. So just keep an eye on one on like a resale site. And Reesey had one that then sold, but then the person decided not to keep it. So I got it for a great price. It's like Raison, which is their sort of like purpley brown color. It's huge. I had it with me when I had a seizure. Remains great. I had a Boucher de Noël inside it. It all was fine. And it was great. I got a great price. It's, you know, it's unbranded. It's like, if you know, you know, like a very chic woman stopped me on Lexington a few weeks ago and was like, where did you get a picotone that size?

15:15And I was like, secondhand. So that was my favorite. And also, I don't believe in cost per wear necessarily, but this is a true utility piece for me. You know, I put groceries in it. It's my daily driver. And so it was great because it wanted it. I found it and I use it all the time. What was yours? I also got an Hermes bag. I don't know if it was it was a it was my 2025 let me guess plume i you know i wanted a plume for a long time i want a plume a bolide oh i was gonna be my love bullied in there no in there like in their lipstick red oh i want the um plume in like a red or a burgundy i love the plume i wanted forever I've been looking for a bag to take to lunch in Los Angeles which is a bag to take to the Sunset Tower San Vicente Bungalows and the Polo Lounge the only places I have lunch work lunches yeah and I I wanted something smaller that would not fit a laptop yeah because I have like a very cool Hermes tote from the Margiela era leather that I my laptop fits well in and I have an Isaac Rayna laptop bag.

16:36I don't need that. And also in LA, you don't need that. Pico Tan fits my laptop, which is nice. But yeah, I want, I want a plume in like a non-laptop, more like a lady's handbag, but also not a mini. Yes. So, so this is, I think, it was 25 or 30. It's, it's small and, or 20, 25 or 28. And I said to my husband, and look, like these are, this is still more affordable than buying a bag at retail at any luxury brand. Absolutely. It's kind of wild how, not that they're cheap, but when, but like buying that kind of Hermes is sometimes cheaper than buying like Loewe. It is, it was cheaper than buying a Loewe.

17:22Definitely cheaper than like a Bottega. And just half the price. Yeah. And bless everyone that has and wants those bags. I live close to those boutiques. I walk by them. I get it. But I'd rather have, you know, kind of a low key Hermes than like a Marnie bag any day of the week. A friend of mine, I had it out and she was like, is that back Todd's? Honestly, I was like, you know what? That's kind of a compliment. Yeah, that's actually the kind of compliment I want to receive. It's like if someone is like, wonders if like a shearling coat is like your grandmother's or something. Totally. So what I said to my husband, I was like, look, my husband, God bless him.

18:07One of the best men to ever live. The worst gift giver alive. like is and I'm all straight men the worst no he's really bad actually you know what my friend Chloe's husband Ian is a wonderful gift giver it it's just not he doesn't care like it's not they didn't grow up getting gifts for me like gifts are my I I don't want to use this phrase but love language like it really matters to me and I've as we've been together for eight 17 or 18 years like yeah it doesn't matter as much as it used to and I don't like value them in the same way. But if I didn't buy him a present for Christmas, he wouldn't notice.

18:44Like one year I just didn't buy him anything and it like did not register. So I said to him, I was like, look, you could just buy me this now and then I won't ask for anything else until next Christmas. And he said, great. And bought it. So, but what I would say from my own purchases, I was thinking, I did not buy that much stuff this year. I would say that I bought an apartment this year, which was really a big ticket item. I bought a black Aliyah dress at the boutique last February. And that, I would say, is the thing that I feel like I'll have forever. Yeah, I bought a black Aliyah sweater last January.

19:28It made me feel so good. I love it. Yeah, I'm so happy I bought it. It was like the experience was amazing. the value or whatever. I'm really happy. Wait, your experience was amazing. I have to say, I don't know if it was the time of day, but I was like taking nothing but abuse. But in my masochistic way, I loved having the Alaya people be so sort of like dismissive and like kept forgetting to find sizes for me. And I sort of love that when people aren't obsequious and treat me like trash. Did you go to the one in the Marais or the one? No, I went to the one in the eighth. Okay. That's the one I went to too.

20:09She did say to me, you should try these dresses on, not that one. And I tried them all, but she was right. Like the dress I bought is not a dress I would have ever chosen for myself. And what I would say is it's like a crew neck with, it's not a muscle tee or whatever, but it's that sort of shelf. Like almost like a cap sleeve or like, yeah. It's not cap sleeve. I know what you're talking about. It's just a sleeveless shell. And that is not my silhouette at all. I never, I wear like in the summer, I actually do have a couple of muscles to use, but I would never wear like a fitted t-shirt, sleeveless shirt style dress, but the, it fit me perfectly.

20:49And it, it was, I ended up buying another Alaya dress later in the year that was like more my personal style and that one's great, but it's much trendier and I'll wear it a bunch and I've worn it a lot. I can FaceTime you from Laya in Paris in a few weeks and we can discuss if there's anything that I need to, you know, import. I mean, it's so beautiful. There are two dresses I have my eye on right now. I think I saw one of them and I have, in fact, tried it on or maybe just the skirt version. And honestly, no regrets. The sweater I bought I wear all the time. I'm really into power knits for 2024 and I'm going to get more into a power knit.

21:28I love it. Okay, so I'm really happy for you with your Hermes bag. I'm happy for me with my Hermes bag and my Aliyah dresses. We're Aliyah.

21:42Hi, this is Jill Schlesinger, CBS News Business Analyst, Certified Financial Planner, and the host of the Jill on Money podcast. With the new year upon us, there's no better time to take control of your financial life. And the Jill on Money podcast is here to help. It's your questions that make it possible for me to provide unconventional and I hope entertaining insights on your money, more importantly, on your life. Follow and listen to Jill on Money wherever you get your podcasts.

22:15Let's zip through this. So we're going to do really, really fast. And then there are a few that I want to do go a little bit deeper. So first thing, year in beauty, you mentioned our beloved Rachel Sturgatz. Pucks Beauty correspondent. She broke a million stories this year. The big thing was the Estee Lauder CEO who is starting in early January. She said he was leaving. They denied it, that the current CEO was out. It ended up being true. She did it all. She tracked the whole thing. You should all read her stuff. The thing that I wanted to ask you about was, and you reached out to me about this as well.

22:55And Rachel sort of answered it in our mailbag, but it was about Glossier and Glossier was, they had, they had reportedly engaged a banker last year or 2024. So it's still this year we have one more day and they didn't sell Glossier did not sell, didn't go to public, which I mean, no, no surprise on that front, but what do you think is going to happen with Glossier? Do you think there was a big return of Glossier this year with the hit fragrances and just the idea that the brand was really back. They entered Sephora. You wrote a book about Glossier that was a bestseller and Glossier. And so what did you think about Glossier's trajectory this year?

23:35I think they, you know, did everything right to orchestrate the feel of a turnaround in that they gave very sort of targeted, very sort of on-brand interviews and profiles. They're expanding, you know, new iterations of the fragrance, which is definitely like where their, I think, power is currently coming from. It was a really soft year for, you know, acquisitions. So I don't know that I'm surprised, But I also feel like if I were one of the investors, I would want that return, you know, now. It's been over 10 years. And so I would imagine it would be next year. But again, if you look at some of Rachel's reporting, those numbers, you know, that she's estimating more like a 300 million, they're about sale if you really go by the numbers.

24:39that's not the most, you know, ego boosting or flattering number. And I guess the question I would think is, do you, do you hold on? Do you try to, you know, boost the brand even further, or do you, you know, try to, try to sell now? And I am, you know, I'm glad that's not my decision to make. My guess is that they, they will sell in 2025, assuming that the, um, that the, you know, environment is friendly. Um, but I don't, I don't know. I also think things could go weird this year. Yeah. I look best of luck to them. I'm not convinced that this quote unquote turnaround around is real. Yeah, no, I don't necessarily think it is.

25:30I just, I think the fragrance did well, but I'm not sure that that's enough. And I just don't, nothing's ever going to live up to that, you know, well over$1 billion valuation from whatever it was, 2021. Totally. Look, they should have sold in 2000. Yeah. And I think that's why, you know, that's why Emily is gone. And that's a lesson to, I think everyone, but they're never going to get a number like that. And I guess, you know, the question is, what are they willing to settle for? Yeah. I mean, they might get it, but it's just not going to mean as much as it once did. And then the other thing is, like, the distribution has helped with.

26:08Yeah. I mean, all that. It's like, is the fundamental, the product good? It was, was it, I mean, was it ever good? Is that the point? Will, do they have? Yeah. So, like, who knows? the, if maybe if they have five more years, though, there's always a chance retail is cyclical. You can turn it around. I'm not convinced that the current iteration of Glossier is as on track as they would like to believe. And that like comes, that's not from my reporting. Rachel's reporting is super, um, I would say non-opinionated about Glossier. Like she's very like, This is what's very neutral about Glossier in particular.

26:51And I would say my gut from like a brand building perspective is that the brand is not exactly where it needs to be. So maybe they'll do it. Maybe they won't. Also Marie Souter leaving. That's huge. She's so instrumental to the look and feel of the brand. It's another sort of poor person to go. So, yeah. Okay. Okay, so we got to move on though because we have way more. Okay. Really, really quick one. Department store craziness. Farfetch sold to Coupang. Matches shut down. Uxnetta Porter Group sold to My Teresa. Saks acquired Neiman Marcus Group and Nordstrom is going private. So basically all multi-brand retail.

27:38It was total chaos. Do you still shop in any of these stores and do you care? I mean, that's what I was going to say. Until you can make the experience like shopping at Bon Marche in Paris, I know I'm such a Francophile, but that is truly probably the only department store that is a pleasant and shopping experience where you can also buy a lot of different brands at once. It's peaceful. The people who work there seem knowledgeable. You know, I just don't, that's not replicated anywhere. I was in, I was at Saks the other day and Bloomingdale's the other day just to buy something as utilitarian as hosiery.

28:18And they didn't even, they acted like me asking for ribbed cotton tights was like wild and unheard of. And I know that I'm not the only one. So, you know, until you give me a better shopping experience, I don't know that it matters. What about you? No, I agree. I love Le Bon Marche. Also, I love some of the smaller malchi brand retailers, but even at a place like Le Garcon, which I love, the experience of shopping there isn't great. I think I maybe told the story on the podcast another day or I just was talking to a friend who knows. It all runs together. But when I was last in New York, I went there on Sunday afternoon and we had a very short amount of time.

29:01I was there with my husband and kid and I wanted to try on a pair of jeans from a brand I'd never heard of and a couple shirts and a pair of shoes from the row, honestly, I probably would have bought all of it or at least made one impulse purchase. And the guy was like, it's going to take me like a half an hour to go get this stuff. And I said, see ya. I said, put it together. I'll come back tomorrow. I never went back. So I think the big thing for me is... You don't want me to spend money? Yeah. Yeah. And you're not alone with experiences like that, right? Yeah. And the challenge for these retailers is they don't stock cotton rib tights because they're not going to sell a lot of those in store.