Are Matching Face Masks Summer’s Biggest Celebrity Couples Trend?

 Masks have become an essential part of our daily routines, but choosing the right one isn’t just about safety, hygiene and comfort. Once those boxes are checked, you can think of your mask as an extension of your outfit. Given the array of exciting options currently on the market, the temptation to turn a mandatory accessory into a means of expression is high. And many designers are rising to the occasion—adorned with bold patterns, spikes, or lace, the pieces stand out. But we’ve noticed another trend: people are matching masks with their significant others. You can see how it happens: you buy a pack of masks and dole them out evenly, or you figure that, while you’re paying for shipping on a mask, you may as well get a stylish mask for your loved ones, too. Is this cheesy? No, because if the choice is between maintaining your well-being or verging into cringe-y couple territory, nothing outweighs health. But it is noticeable.

Nowhere is this trend more evident than Hollywood, where celebrity couples have turned wearing matching masks into mini-statements. In May, Alex Rodriguez and Jennifer Lopez biked through their Miami neighborhood in neon-accented grey masks before updating Instagram with snapshots. June brought photos of Justin Bieber and Hailey Baldwin cruising through Venice, California, in coordinated bright blue face coverings. Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas, who have spent summer 2020 perfecting their paparazzi stroll, are frequently spotted in versions featuring pastel prints. Although they do switch things up from time to time breaking out fresh pairs to compliment their respective outfits. Whether it’s a case of utility or a show of unity, it’s become part of the new normal.

As with any couples-based trend the line between cool and cringe is negligible. Celebrities dress for the cameras even when they’re casual, so it’s natural to see some higher levels of coordination than you would see just walking down the street. As for trying it out yourself, as a non-celebrity couple, if you and your partner wouldn't step outside in his and hers denim jackets or the same Chopova Lowena tartan top, maybe skip on the coordination. But ultimately, the important thing is just wearing a mask, any mask, but if you need a cutesy moment or J-Rod-inspired Instagram update, a little matching never hurt.

This Indie Label’s Virtual Runway Show Is the Lo-Fi, Inspiring Content We’re Craving Now

Barcelona label Paloma Wool has never staged a runway show—nor has its founder Paloma Lanna ever wanted to. This is a brand that doesn’t call itself a brand at all, but rather a “project on clothing, photography, and other experiments,” with artist collaborations and photo series featured alongside the actual clothes on its website. Lanna makes fresh, unserious pieces that are easy to wear and nod subtly to vintage. They’re the kind of clothes you see on stylish girls in Brooklyn, not on a runway—which might be precisely why Lanna’s latest project feels so clever.

Pragmatically titled “Paloma Wool Virtual Runway,” it’s a three-minute video starring artists, musicians, dancers, models, and Paloma Wool customers from all over the world. Each submitted a video clip of themselves in self-styled items from the new collection, strutting through their living rooms and backyards as if they were catwalks to upbeat electronic music by Toro y Moi’s Chaz Bear. The first model wears beachy crochet separates and smizes for the camera; a few women in bright ribbed knits sashay and pop their hips like ’90s supers; another enters the frame in a red slip with a baby on her hip. Some guys sport Paloma Wool’s unisex line, and one wears a pair of the “women’s” citron jeans.

It’s happily low-tech and unpolished, and the reason you can’t stop watching is because you’re genuinely interested in everyone’s style. In our era of #sponsored posts and million-dollar social media campaigns, it’s gotten harder and harder to separate “personal taste” from marketing. That’s partly why brands like Paloma Wool exist—as a counter to all of that. It’s also why the brand has grown such an engaged, organic community, one that’s remained active throughout the pandemic.

“We’ve never felt closer to our community than we do now,” explains Tana Latorre, Lanna’s collaborator. “The quarantine has made us stop and pause, and this project was a really nice way to reconnect with people.” Loosely inspired by her team’s own penchant for shooting campy “catwalk videos” at the office, they simply reached out to friends and customers on Instagram to see if they’d be willing to participate. “We didn’t send them a brief or anything,” Latorre adds. “It was very simple and honest. Seeing people all over the world of different ages, with different bodies, wearing the clothes however they want… I think that’s something everyone can relate to.”

It also highlights how small, indie labels with sincere followings might be better equipped to adapt to the changing fashion landscape than big brands or luxury houses. The idea for a virtual show came naturally to Lanna, and she and her team acted on it quickly; there was none of the number crunching and rigamarole you might go through at the corporate level. And, of course, you can’t fake community. All the marketing dollars in the world won’t guarantee that a video or campaign will actually resonate with people.

None of this was particularly intentional for Paloma Wool. It’s mostly common sense. This is a millennial-run brand that conducts most of its business online, produces locally, and doesn’t adhere to the retail calendar. By distancing itself from mainstream fashion and designing affordable, wearable clothes for its tight-knit community, Paloma Wool has more or less safeguarded itself against the economic downturn. “We haven’t really seen a loss in sales,” Latorre says. “Our clients feel really connected. If anything, I think our community has actually grown bigger and stronger.”

Gucci’s Alessandro Michele on What Comes Next: “We Will Go Back to Life. But, I Hope, to a Different Life”

Alessandro Michele is the creative director of Gucci. He submitted a self-portrait and was interviewed for Vogue’s June/July portfolio. His conversation with Hamish Bowles has been condensed and edited.

This crisis is causing terrible suffering that in Italy we are seeing unfold in front of us through terrible loss of life and an economic impact that has yet to be fully understood. This must therefore also be a learning moment for everyone, on a personal level but also on a collective level. Personally I’m learning to slow down. I’m learning to freeze that furious and accelerated time that, before everything exploded, was running out of control. Our world was running out of control. It almost feels as if something happened to make us conscious of that.

These days are the occasion for me to live at a different pace, making room for emotions and thoughts that were often concealed under my performative life. Hours are now beautifully filled with readings. I try to nourish myself with poetry books that were laying somewhere, unseen: I’m hungry for meaningful and intense words that are able to awake my inner self. I rediscovered knitting, appreciating the sacredness of manual work; knitting is my way of praying. I’m also learning how to play my classic guitar, feeling the connection with my dad’s love for music: a way to be closer to my roots.

These activities help me to concentrate, to enlarge my mental horizons, to embark on visionary journeys while standing still. The forced immobility is a powerful occasion to find even more unexpected ways to escape with fantasy. After all, this is the essence of my work: an imaginative ride. So it has no constraints; it never stops. It can be constantly refilled with stimuli and motivations even if you’re locked in your house.

So my work goes on, enriched by my daily sightings, but at the same time deeply reshaped according to this demanding present. I’m so lucky to have an incredible and passionate team that is showing resilience and adaptive capability. We are apart, but maybe closer than ever. We are consciously living this dense moment: questioning what we have done so far, planning new experimental projects, trying to imagine a different future, facing the biggest challenge we could have ever imagined.

I’m totally aware of the privilege I have. I can slow down, while lots of other people are working tirelessly to take care of everybody. My thoughts always go to the brave humanity that helps each and everyone to go through these agonizing times. We would not be here, thinking about what this pandemic is teaching us, without their priceless effort.

What we are living today is unprecedented. But if we will not be able to take advantage of this learning moment, we will miss something very important. This crisis shows us that neoliberal policies in the last decades have dismantled our health systems, that are now struggling painfully to face this pandemic. This crisis shows us that the mantra of economic growth has destroyed our environment and the coevolutionary relationship between man and nature. This crisis shows us that the world we lived in was running in directions we need to deeply question.

In this moment we finally discover that fragility is a core part of our collective destiny. A destiny that we need to embrace with solidarity and environmental consciousness. Let’s never forget that. The discovery we are making can be a gift. Some friends keep asking me: When will we go back to “normal”? I hope we will never go back to that “normal.” Because the life we lived before has been fearfully unsustainable. So, yes, we will go back to life. But, I hope, to a different life.

From my windows, I can clearly hear the birds singing, as I’ve never heard before, the level of pollution is decreasing, seawater in Venice is clear once again. These are the little signs we need to look at, once we go back to inhabiting this fragile world.

Marc Jacobs’s Extreme Heels Spark Joy

As the coronavirus outbreak intensifies across the globe, it’s safe to say many of us are currently feeling stressed and uneasy. (Today, the World Health Organization even officially declared it a pandemic.) That being said, the need for a spark of joy is high, and designer Marc Jacobs is using fashion to do so—both for himself, and for his many outfit spectators.

Taking his love for heels to the extreme, Jacobs posted a new fit today that was all about bringing a smile to one’s face in these uneasy times: “Today’s forecast: Sunny with a chance of mass hysteria,” the designer wrote, seemingly acknowledging the public panic surrounding coronavirus at the moment. “At least I’m dressed for spreading some cheer and good will.” He slipped on Rick Owens mega platform boots in a sprightly yellow color, with lucite heels and soles. They are certainly wondrous shoes: they offer a dash of escapism from reality, while reminding one of fashion’s mood-boosting powers, too. He styled the statement footwear with refined pieces from Celine, Prada, Lacoste, and A.P.C., including a double-breasted blazer, jeans, and a silk scarf tied around the neck into a bow.

As a matter of fact, Jacobs has been perfecting the fashion selfie at home all week long. Just this Tuesday, he mixed a graphic sweater with a printed overcoat. (Jacobs loves himself a bold print.) Last week, he also wore a green tee that simply read, “My Own Worst Enemy.” But his attention-grabbing shoes today are perhaps his biggest mic-drop fashion moment yet.

Telfar Announces a Collaboration With Gap

Telfar is a brand aspiring toward anonymity, accessibility, and affordability through basics. “The idea of basics is how we think about clothes,” says artistic director Babak Radboy. “We just happen to put three basics into one garment, so it’s like a hoodie, a sweater, and some leather pants.” Those hybridized pieces will have a new home in 2020 at the Gap. Yes, the mall’s most ubiquitous store is linking up with one of fashion’s utmost provocateurs. The collaboration will be celebrated tonight in Paris at Gap’s flagship store with performances by Yves Tumor, Hirakish, Crystal Mess, Hawa, and Total Freedom and will launch with product drops later this year.

“We met with the team at Gap almost a year ago now,” says founder and designer Telfar Clemens. “The type of brand that I am, I’m influenced by the Gap way of merchandising and designing things. It’s like we’re stuck in this luxury market when what inspires us is—”

“—regular clothes!—” interjects Radboy.

“And being on regular people, and that kind of ubiquity and accessibility,” Clemens finishes.

Putting their asymmetric tank tops and embossed faux-leather shopper totes on everybody—literally every body—is Clemens’s and Radboy’s ultimate goal, one that was, in fact, inspired by the Gap. “If you look at the first two seasons Telfar and I did together, it is Gap. The Gap customer was supposed to be everybody, literally anybody,” Radboy says. With universality as their goal, Clemens and Radboy have spent more than a decade cutting unisex jeans, splicing together tees, and fusing hoodies with puffa coats.

It’s their ability to reimagine the world of everydaywear that made them ideal collaborators for Gap. “The brand values of accessibility, democracy, universal basics, and affordability came up really quickly in our initial conversations. Within the first five minutes of meeting them I knew it was right,” says Gap head of design John Caruso. “The most important thing when we find collaborators is to make sure they relate to our brand values and that they relate to our customers.”

While the collaborative product won’t be released for some time, both Clemens and Caruso are hinting at what’s to come. The designer is keen on expanding his sizing and color options. “[Being available in more sizes] is something that will strengthen the impact of what we want to do with the brand. Sizing is going to be a huge thing,” says Clemens. Caruso meanwhile is focused on reworking the Gap codes in Telfar’s language. “One of the things that drew me to him as I was following his design work was denim. That’s a connection point for the brand and what he was doing with denim in terms of combining things, the mixture, and the reconstruction was point one. The other thing was graphics. I thought a lot of his graphics were genius,” says Caruso.

Expect to see all this and more when the collaboration debuts later in 2020.