What a bleak week and honestly, entire year it's been. Multiple ongoing genocides, Lebanon being attacked by Israel, US state sanctioned murders of innocent civilians, and shitty economy with folks being laid off left and right. The only thing that made me laugh this week was Eric Adam's indictment last night.
If you're a footwear enthusiast, designer, or collector, be sure to stop by this lovely event featuring our good friend David Filar and hosted by Vaughan Lewis Carman of Laceless Design!
Named the Nicest Footwear Designer You'll Ever Meet by Highsnobiety, David is currently the Director of Product Creation and Design at ENDSTATE and was previously with Vibram for 7 years as their Design Creative Director. If you love inspiring podcasts and hearing about the non-linear career journeys of footwear designers and creatives, check out his series titled An Untold Narrative or come meet him in-person tomorrow! Details below. 👟👟👟
Last week I was having one of those days that involved a city fuckaround. If you're chronically online like me, you might remember that tweet that went viral a few years back that summed a city fuckaround up perfectly.
Anyways, the day started with grabbing lunch with a friend. I arrived early and ordered the most refreshing drink—a Suntory gin cocktail. Who knew they made gin? Y'all it was 11:45am and I'm not sure what possessed me to order a drink that early in the day but needless to say, this set the perfect tone for a city fuckaround day. 😎
After getting my nails done, I walked up towards Bryant Park with the full intention of heading home but no city fuckaround is complete without spending 2 hours perusing a bookstore. So I made a quick detour over to the Japanese bookstore, Kinokuniya. (If you're an anime/manga fan, this spot is for you.)
Y'all know I love my yakuza series namely Giri/Haji and Tokyo Vice, so when I saw this paperback at Kinokuniya titled Confessions of a Yakuza I had to take it home. This 1989 memoir by Japanese doctor Junichi Saga recounts a series of stories or deathbed confessions from the life of his patient Eiji Ijichi, a former yakuza boss. Unlike the usual, sensationalized yakuza stories around murder and hitmen, this story focuses on the old school yakuza domain—gambling dens of the early 1900s.
I'm halfway through and it feels like a nice time travel. Let me know if you grab a copy or tell me about your most recent or favorite, city fuckaround! 🍹📚🍿
NYC's favorite club promoter is being charged with acting as an unregistered foreign agent after receiving donations from foreign sources including Turkey but the probe will extend to his connections to Israel, China, Uzbekistan, Qatar, and South Korea. 🕺🏾
I'm glad they called attention to the current issues with luxury marketplaces—fascinating read on the Dutch auction method employed in the past by folks like StockX and Vestiaire Collective. 💐
The US is a horrific carceral state. The Midwest Innocence Project who took on Williams case said his execution illustrated “Missouri’s grotesque exercise of state power." Our government is aiding and abetting genocide overseas while soft genociding Black and brown folks domestically.
