DECEMBER 2023/

JANUARY/
FEBRUARY 2024

WINNIE
HOLIDAY
SPECIAL
HARLOW
IS BREAKING
The ULTIMATE BARRIERS & SETTING
GIFT GUIDE INTENTIONS

TOP MAKEUP
TRENDS of
THE SEASON
FENDI BOUTIQUES 888 291 0163 FE N D I .CO M
ROMA
 DAV I DY U R M A N .C O M

S TA R B U R S T
 N 255
D E C E M B E R 2 0 2 3 /J A N U A R Y/ F E B R U A R Y 2 0 2 4
O

84 COVER STORIES
60 BEAUTY Glam makeup looks

PHOTOGRAPHY, CARLOS + ALYSE; DRESS (BINYA AT SSENSE), CORSET (KNWLS AT SSENSE), LEGGINGS (RENAISSANCE RENAISSANCE), SHOES (JIMMY CHOO) AND NECKLACE AND BRACELET (TIFFANY & CO.)
worth celebrating.
BY KATHERINE LALANCETTE

84 CELEBRITY Winnie Harlow

is ready for her second act.
BY SUMIKO WILSON

105 GIFT GUIDE How to gift more

thoughtfully this holiday season.
BY MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN

STYLE & FASHION

29 STYLE A sheer trend for
high visibility. BY CAIA HAGEL

33 SHOPPING Put a cape on it.

34 STYLE SteMargScot wants to

brighten up your winter.
BY ERICA NGAO

35 SHOPPING Jewellery pieces that

are big on attitude.

36 STYLE Claudia Dey on how fashion

plays a pivotal role in her latest
novel. BY CAIA HAGEL

38 STYLE How hip hop has shaped

the fashion world. BY SADAF AHSAN

42 STYLE Jennifer Lawrence’s

latest role for Longines.
BY KATHERINE LALANCETTE

44 STYLE Where to find the best

second-hand stores from coast
to coast. BY EVE THOMAS

96 FASHION Contrasting shades

and colours bring the drama.

ELLECANADA.COM 15
DISRUPTING DIAMONDS
 BEAUTY &
WELLNESS
66 BEAUTY Scientists have
discovered that you can
actually make your skin
smarter. Find out how.
BY THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

67 SHOPPING The best holiday

beauty goodies to gift
your loved ones (or keep
all to yourself).

68 BEAUTY Colourful
eyeshadow is back and
making makeup fun again.
BY KATHERINE LALANCETTE

70 BEAUTY The barrier is

skincare’s newest darling.

72
Here’s how to keep yours in tip-
top shape. BY MELISSA FEJTEK

BEAUTY The one and only

Lady Gaga lets us in on
60
her makeup secrets.
56 TECHNOLOGY Why now is 125 FOOD Content creator
BY HEATHER TAYLOR-SINGH
the time to get involved in AI. Margaux Verdier wants to
76 BEAUTY A little history lesson BY ROSAMUND DEAN share her love of cooking.
with one of the most fabled BY JOANNA FOX
58 BOOKS Canadian novelist Nita
French cosmetics companies.
Prose enters a new chapter.
BY THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

78 BEAUTY AI-powered skin

BY PATRICIA KAROUNOS
EVERY MONTH
117 DESIGN How to bring extra
devices, robot-like makeup 21 PUBLISHER’S NOTE
joy to your festive decor.
tools and more: a look at
22 JOANNA’S EDIT
what’s to come. 118 TRAVEL Exploring the
BY SOPHIE BANFORD AND Jamaican town of Ocho Rios. 23 FRONT ROW
KATHERINE LALANCETTE BY JOANNA FOX
55 DEBUT
80 HEALTH Got travel plans? 120 TRAVEL A guide to Los
126 ASTROLOGY
Check out these easy tips for Angeles’ coastal west side.
staying active while on the BY RANDI BERGMAN 129 SHOPPING GUIDE
move. BY CAITLIN KENNY
122 LIFESTYLE Canadian bubbles 130 FINALE
to pop this holiday season.
BY AMAN AND JASMIN DOSANJ
FEATURES
PHOTOGRAPHY, LIAN BENOIT; COAT (MARNI) AND EARRINGS (BIKO)

48 PROFILE Poet and activist

Alok Vaid-Menon on a world
beyond the gender binary.
BY AMAN DOSANJ ON THE COVER
Winnie Harlow is wearing a turtleneck and a lace
50 TELEVISION The joys of skirt by Fendi, a bra top by St. Agni x Agmes, a dress
rewatching your favourite by Lauren Manoogian and earrings by Tiffany &
Co. Photographers Carlos + Alyse Creative director
shows. BY PATRICIA KAROUNOS Olivia Leblanc Stylist Jaclyn Bonavota (Cadre
Artist Management) Makeup artist Billie Gene
52 CULTURE A recent line- (Opus Beauty) Hairstylist Dhairius Thomas (Factory
dancing movement has made Downtown) Editorial producer Pénélope Lemay Set
producer Amaya Faria Photographers’ assistants
its way to Canadian cities. Brandon Jones and Jeremiah Cumberbatch Stylist’s
BY JOANNA FOX assistant Amer Macarambon

ELLECANADA.COM 17
 PUBLISHER SOPHIE BANFORD
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF JOANNA FOX
BEAUTY DIRECTOR KATHERINE LALANCETTE
ART DIRECTOR SAMANTHA PUTH
GRAPHIC DESIGNER LAURENCE FONTAINE
EDITORIAL COORDINATOR CLAUDIA GUY
DIGITAL DIRECTOR CYNTHIA QUELLET
DIGITAL CONTENT MANAGER MELISSA FEJTEK

IN-HOUSE FASHION SHOOT CREATIVE DIRECTOR OLIVIA LEBLANC

CONTRIBUTORS
SADAF AHSAN, MACA ATENCIO, RANDI BERGMAN, GUILLAUME BRIÈRE, ROSAMUND DEAN, VANESSA DL, AMAN DOSANJ, JASMIN DOSANJ, THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU,
JANE FIELDING, MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN, ESTELLE GERVAIS, CAIA HAGEL, SRUTI ISLAM, ROBB JAMIESON, PATRICIA KAROUNOS, WENDY KAUR, CAITLIN KENNY,
PÉNÉLOPE LEMAY, ERICA NGAO, JENNIFER NGUYEN, TRUC NGUYEN, ANNE-SOPHIE PERREAULT, CIARA RICKARD, HEATHER TAYLOR-SINGH, EVE THOMAS, SUMIKO WILSON

TO REACH EDITORIAL:
editors@ko-media.ca

TO REACH CUSTOMER SERVICE AND SUBSCRIPTIONS:

1-866-780-3537 or subscription@ko-media.ca

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Registered user: KO Média Inc., 651 Notre-Dame West, Suite 100, Montreal, Quebec H3C 1H9. Contents copyright © 2023 by KO Média Inc. ELLE Canada is published
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 BELLEZZA SENZA CONFINI
Varenna, Lake Como - Italy

The Italian region with the highest number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites awaits you with
its wonderful cities of art, its picturesque villages where time seems to stand still and its
incredible natural landscapes that reveal an unspoiled beauty. Lake Como, Lake Garda,
Lake Maggiore and the other lakes will unfold before your eyes with breathtaking scenery,
while the welcoming valleys and the sumptuous profile of the mountains will encircle you in
a warm embrace.
Treat yourself to the unique emotion of a trip to Lombardy!
PHOTOGRAPHY, ANDRÉANNE GAUTHIER; STYLIST, VANESSA GIROUX; MAKEUP ARTIST, SOPHIE PARROT. S. BANFORD IS WEARING A BLOUSE AND PANTS (NONCHALANT LABEL) AND JEWELLERY (DRAE COLLECTION) PUBLISHER’S NOTE

A Wish for Peace

HE COLLECTIVE MISSION OF ELLE CANADA is to inspire, inform and entertain

T you, our readers, in the hope of spreading some good in the world. These days,
this pursuit feels more relevant than ever. When you flip open our magazine,
we want you to feel at home and lose yourself in our pages—even if just for a little
while. It’s about offering a brief escape from the daily worries, the distressing news
cycle and incessant notifications. A small moment of comfort: That’s what we’re
trying to provide, issue after issue.
At this time of year, when we are all quietly taking stock, I think about our
mission but also about the fact that our team’s work matters for many reasons. It
can surprise and delight, sure, but it can also convey important messages, uphold
values that are close to our hearts and touch on important social issues. Through
pages full of beauty, dreams and ideas, we also want to promote a society and
culture in which respect, tolerance and vulnerability prevail and learning and
curiosity—about ourselves and others—are at the forefront. Yes, we’re trying to
spread joy, but we’re also striving to promote peace.
To be able to navigate all the terrifying things that are happening on the planet
right now, counter the suffering that reaches us every day through our news feed
and overcome the trials that come our way year after year (because that’s how
life goes, right?), we need to stick together, unite in our causes, help one another
and love one another.
For 2024, this is what I wish for: peace—within us and between us.
To health and happiness!

Sophie Banford , publisher @sophiebanford

ELLECANADA.COM 21
 JOANNA’S EDIT

“J” is for the joy I would get in

receiving this lovely necklace,
I’m obsessed with the cool which has a bubbly font that I
vibes this red-hot Freed simply adore.
vegan-leather bomber jacket 14K GOLD BUBBLE LETTER
NECKLACE, JENNY BIRD ($440,
is serving up. JENNY-BIRD.CA)
BILLY, FREED ($395,
FREEDANDFREED.COM)

I’m really digging

coloured denim, and
this one, in Vintage
Espresso, pairs so well
with all the deep, rich
colours we’re drawn
to at this time of
year. P.S. There’s
a matching
jean jacket.
TAZZ MAXI DENIM SKIRT,
REFORMATION ($268,
THEREFORMATION.COM)

Montreal’s favourite
shoe sisters—who have a
brand-new bricks-and-
mortar space on Queen
Street West in Toronto—
have nailed it again with

IT
these stylish, comfortable
day-to-night boots, which
are perfect for the cooler
weather ahead. Keep your seasonal bling subtle with this chic
LORCA HIGH-KNEE coiled ring, which has just a hint of holiday.
BOOT, MAGUIRE ($330,

PHOTOGRAPHY (J. FOX), ANDRÉANNE GAUTHIER; MAKEUP ARTIST, SOPHIE PARROT. J. FOX IS WEARING A BLOUSE BY SILK LAUNDRY, EARRINGS BY MEJURI AND NECKLACES BY DEUX LIONS
MAGUIRESHOES.COM) BOA GEMSTONE COIL RING, MEJURI ($148, MEJURI.COM)

LIST
Here are some
of editor-in-chief
Joanna Fox’s The freshness of Le Labo’s Thé Noir 29
is thanks to its bergamot, fig and bay
top picks for leaves, which are balanced with the
depth of cedarwood, vetiver and musk
holiday gifting. for the most alluring scent.
LE LABO THÉ NOIR 29 ($280 FOR 50 ML,
This season, a cinched LELABOFRAGRANCES.CA)
waist is the best way
to add a little oomph Los Angeles-based designer Anine Bing
to the suiting trend recently posted about how she can’t
that’s everywhere, stop wearing this short-sleeved sweater,
and this belt does and I can see why: It does double duty,
the trick beautifully. making both fall-winter and winter-
24/7 BELT, BEAUFILLE spring transitions seamless.
($385, BEAUFILLE.COM) BRITTANY SWEATER, ANINE BING ($495,
ANINEBING.COM)

Channel your inner goddess

with Montreal-based Deux
Lions’ fierce handmade
button-like studs.
CARMEN EARRINGS IN
GOLD, DEUX LIONS ($145,
These delicious natural
DEUXLIONSJEWELRY.COM)
wines, which come from the
Auvergne region of France,
are produced by Patrick
Bouju and Justine Loiseau at
a winery that was founded by
Rosie and Max Assoulin. It’s
a collaboration that crosses
creative worlds, as Rosie
This textured leather bag ups the Assoulin is also a fashion
ante for any outfit, with bonus designer known for her
points for its buttery colour. Ballet-style shoes are everywhere, but this pair gives
namesake line.
QUILTED MICRO BAG IN LEATHER, COS the style a little extra attitude.
VIVANTERRE (FROM $49, AT SELECT
($275, COS.COM) CANADIAN LIQUOR STORES) WIDE WELT BUCKLE BALLERINAS, GANNI ($495, GANNI.COM)

22 ELLECANADA.COM
 FRONT ROW

December/January/
February
TEXT BY JOANNA FOX, SRUTI ISLAM, ROBB JAMIESON, PATRICIA KAROUNOS, WENDY KAUR, KATHERINE LALANCETTE & TRUC NGUYEN; PHOTOGRAPHY, SØLVE SUNDSBØ FOR IRIS VAN HERPEN (HYPERSONIC SPEED TOP, CAPRIOLE COLLECTION, 2018), IRIS VAN HERPEN PRIVATE COLLECTION

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

FASHION FORWARD
Since kicking off her Renaissance World Tour last May, Beyoncé has served up a veritable parade of
drool-worthy looks. One undisputed standout was the futuristic gown she opened a show in back
in June, a custom creation by legendary Dutch designer IRIS VAN HERPEN. “Beyoncé inspired me
and my team in every stitch, every bead and every petal along the 700-hour journey of creating her
halo-shaped gown, combining innovation and craftsmanship to magnify her emotions,” van Herpen
wrote on Instagram. It appears Queen Bey isn’t the only “institution” who’s a fan. The Musée des Arts
Décoratifs in Paris will pay homage to van Herpen—who’s famed for fusing technology with haute
couture—as one of the most avant-garde figures of her generation in a retrospective running from
November 29 until April 28, 2024. The tribute will showcase 100 of her most iconic looks and blend
together fashion, contemporary art, design and science. Looks like a trip to Paris is in order! MADPARIS.FR

ELLECANADA.COM 23
 PUSSY RIOT, PUTIN PISSED HIS PANTS (2012)

PUSSY POWER
The famous balaclava-clad
feminist-punk-art collective
Pussy Riot are bringing their Big Primping
unique form of artistic protest ETIKET has long been the beauty destination of choice for

PHOTOGRAPHY, DENIS SINYAKOV (PUTIN PISSED HIS PANTS, 2012), © PUSSY RIOT & COURTESY OF ETIKET, THE POLYESTER PODCAST & ELISABETTA CLAUDIO (M. ERICKSON)
to the Montreal Museum of Montrealers in the know. This January, it’ll be bringing its
best-in-class spa treatments and top-tier product selection
Contemporary Art with VELVET to even more Canadians when it opens its very first outpost.
TERRORISM: PUSSY RIOT’S RUSSIA, a Located in the Well development, in downtown Toronto, the
timely exhibition that surveys soothing travertine-clad space will sprawl across a whopping
their novel form of political 600 square metres—and every last bit of it will be dedicated
protest in Russia. Pussy Riot to bringing consumers the best of the best in beauty. There will
be six treatment rooms, including ones by Dr. Barbara Sturm
formed in Moscow in 2011 in (the very first in Canada) and Tata Harper (the second in the
a blaze of punk-rock spirit, country, the first being in Etiket’s original Montreal location), and
using joy and humour as their services from HydraFacial, SkinCeuticals, Pai and more. On the
weapon against oppression in product front, expect to find a covetable assortment of natural
a delicate dance with Russian brands, cool niche labels, luxury staples and made-in-Canada
favourites. A beauty lover’s dream! ETIKET.CA
authorities. Many of these public
performances have become iconic,
and there have been some real
consequences to their actions,
such as a famous show trial in
2012 that led to member Maria
Alyokhina’s imprisonment. Get
politically inspired by more
than 10 years of videos and
photographs of riotous DIY
action for a better world until
March 10, 2024. MACM.ORG

LISTEN
UP
The spawn
of a self-
published and
queer-centred
magazine
based in
London,
England, THE
POLYESTER PODCAST explores intersectional
feminism within arts and culture from
both an online and offline perspective.
Hosted by the magazine’s editor-in-chief,
Ione Gamble, the podcast’s motto is “Have
faith in your own bad taste!” With a
focus on the intellectual value in young
girls, Polyester puts forward femme trends
that go viral—but are often dismissed
for their “frivolity”—and refreshingly
upends them through a deeply analytic
lens (looking at sad-girl fall memes in
relation to the perception of female mental
health, for example). Subscribe and tune
in to episodes about the Kardashian
simulacrum (how a family was made real
through unreality), mean girls on TikTok
and reclaiming girlhood. POLYESTERZINE.COM/PODCAST
MEREDITH ERICKSON
FRONT ROW
High Altitude
Milan-based acclaimed Canadian author
Meredith Erickson—known for co-writing the
Joe Beef cookbooks as well as for her personal
tome, Alpine Cooking —has now ventured into
the world of spirits. DOLADIRA, an aperitivo
inspired by a rhubarb elixir in Alpine Cooking , is
bottled in Burgundy and sold in select countries
worldwide. “It is very refreshing, has almost
no sugar and a little salinity and is fresh, fresh,
fresh,” says Erickson. “I love it with soda. I love it
in a Negroni. I love it on the rocks with nothing
else. It’s the drink I always wanted but could
never find.” We spoke with Erickson about this
massive undertaking and when Canadians will
get a taste.
How long did it take you to develop Doladira?
“About three years, from ideation to being on
the shelf—and that’s relatively fast for the spirit
world. Richard Betts and Joe Marchese—my
two partners—and I collaborated on close
to 40 iterations of the recipe. We launched in
eight U.S. states in September and the U.K. in
October, [and we’re launching in] France, Italy
and Switzerland in December and hopefully
the rest of the U.S. and Canada in early 2024.”
How did your background in the food world
help you? “It’s all part of who I am. Opening Joe
Beef with that team in 2005 and then [working
on] the book that followed in 2011 and all my
subsequent experience with other books and
my Alpine project—it all stems from hospitality.
In a way, everything I’ve done has led to the
creation of Doladira.”
Where did you get the design inspiration?
“From the mountains! I worked with my close
friend and fellow Montrealer Willo Perron and
his studio, Perron-Roettinger, on the design. It’s
a custom bottle inspired by the blown glass
of Murano and the Venetian lagoon. So it’s
very alta Italia—which is the name of my next
book, by the way, and means ‘high Italy’ or
‘northern Italy.’ The ridges around the side are
meant to evoke pistes going up and around
the mountain. Our tag line is ‘The Elevated
Aperitivo,’ so everything from the liquid to the
custom font has to be intentional, meaningful
and elevated.”
What’s the best way to drink it? “Three parts
Doladira and one part soda water make the
perfect spritz.” DOLADIRA.COM
ELLECANADA.COM 25
 MANE ATTRACTION
Great news: Über-popular U.S. hair-care range VEGAMOUR will
finally be available north of the border this winter. The holistic
brand is probably best known for its GRO Hair Serum, a vegan
elixir that supports a balanced follicular ecosystem to give you
thicker, fuller-looking hair. It’s so popular, one bottle sells every
15 seconds! But the entire range is worthy of accolades thanks
to sustainably sourced proprietary phytoactive ingredients
that treat not just the symptoms but also the underlying causes
of common hair concerns. Fun fact: Nicole Kidman was so
taken with the products, she decided to join the brand as a
Hair Wellness Advocate and investor. In addition to loving the
GRO Hair Serum, the actor is partial to the HYDR-8 Leave-In
Conditioner, which she uses to nourish her lengths. “This duo
truly works wonders for my hair,” she says. Watch for Vegamour
in January at Sephora, in-store and online. VEGAMOUR.COM

AMERICAN DREAMS
Ready to lean into prep this winter?
RALPH LAUREN recently opened its first
Canadian boutique in the Yorkdale Shopping

PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF RALPH LAUREN & YE RIN MOK (B. AND D. PEART)
Centre in Toronto. The 510-square-metre
store carries a selection of women’s Collection
and Polo Ralph Lauren pieces and some
men’s Purple Label styles, and it offers
alteration and repair services as well as
by-appointment personal styling and made-
to-measure tailoring. The iconic American
A-LIST BOOK CLUB fashion brand also launched a Canadian
Celeb-penned books to read this winter. e-commerce site this past fall, so you can stock
THE BITTLEMORES by Jann Arden up on polo shirts and Fair Isle sweaters at
Canadian multi-hyphenate Jann Arden has brought your leisure.RALPHLAUREN.CA

her acclaimed writing chops to the world of fiction.

Her funny, warm and heartfelt debut novel is set in
a rural farm town and follows 14-year-old Willa as
she sets off to discover what really happened to her
missing older sister.

PRETTY BOYS ARE POISONOUS by Megan Fox

Megan Fox reveals a deeper, more intimate side of
herself in this collection of 70-plus poems, which she
describes as “an attempt to excise the illness that had
taken root in [her] because of [her] silence” after years
of keeping secrets for men.

THE WOMAN IN ME by Britney Spears

In her long-awaited memoir, Britney Spears finally
tells her story—from rising pop superstar to mother to
resilient woman fighting for her independence—in
her own words and on her own terms. Bonus: The
audiobook is narrated by Oscar-nominated actor
Michelle Williams.

26 ELLECANADA.COM
 FRONT ROW

GOODEE GOES WEST

Montreal-based GOODEE, a home-goods
marketplace and B Corp-certified company
launched by designers and brothers Byron
and Dexter Peart, recently launched a holiday
pop-up at Platform, an outdoor shopping centre
in Los Angeles’ Culver City neighbourhood.
“We at Goodee are proud to open our first L.A.
pop-up store to meet customers and friends of
the brand in person—not only those from L.A.
but also those visiting from around the world,”
said Dexter in a release. Open through January
2024, the cheery 50-square-metre store, which
was designed by Montreal’s Sangaré studio, is
stocked with a thoughtful selection of sustainably
minded design-forward gifts—from brands like
Ferm Living, Niwaki and Haws—for everyone on
your holiday-shopping list. GOODEEWORLD.COM

BYRON AND DEXTER PEART

R7997-24
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF ARITZIA, COS & BANANA REPUBLIC

FASHION AT ITS BEST!

Wsrldwide trends and remsnte’s skilled craftsmanship create
the perfect csmbinatisn sf fashisn, style and csmfsrt!
Comfort to go – since 1876 D0B74-81

www.remonte.com

ELLECANADA.COM 27
 FRONT ROW

MOVIE NIGHT
It’s that time of year again when
Hollywood brings out the big names
in order to lure us to the cinema (or
streaming services) over the festive period.
MAY DECEMBER (November 17) is
director Todd Haynes’ 10th feature film.
Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore
star in the romantic drama, which plays
with the audience’s expectations of the
genre and features Haynes’ expert use
of campy humour. If you couldn’t nab
tickets to the live concert, RENAISSANCE:
A FILM BY BEYONCÉ (December 1) will
transport you to centre stage (and

PHOTOGRAPHY, FRANÇOIS DUHAMEL/NETFLIX (MAY DECEMBER), KEVIN MAZUR/WIREIMAGE FOR PARKWOOD (RENAISSANCE: A FILM BY BEYONCÉ ) & SEARCHLIGHT PICTURES (ALL OF US STRANGERS)
behind the scenes) to fully experience the
spectacle of Queen Bey in all her fashion
glory—at a fraction of the cost. ALL
OF US STRANGERS (December 22) stars
Andrew Scott (a.k.a. “the hot priest”
from Fleabag) as a man who falls in
love with his neighbour, played by Paul
Mescal. (Sorry, we need a moment to let
this pairing wash over us.... Okay, we’re
good.) The film is directed by British
filmmaker Andrew Haigh, who has not
yet made a bad movie.

Good Apple
NINA LE PARFUM might be the most daring addition yet to the storied
Nina by Nina Ricci range. (You know—those iconic apple-shaped
flacons.) It shouldn’t come as a surprise, considering it’s the
house’s first fragrance launched under creative director and
celebrated disrupter Harris Reed’s tenure. The British-American
designer has become famous for a romantic, theatrical
aesthetic sprinkled with a hint of subversion. (That tulle hoop
skirt Harry Styles wore in Vogue? A Harris Reed original.) Now,
he’s brought that same penchant for drama to Nina Le Parfum,
a captivating blend of apple, lemon, orange blossom, gardenia
and tuberose. It’s sensual, powerful and a wee bit mischievous.
It’s also mindful of the planet, using citrus fruits discarded by
the food industry and housed in a bottle made of 20 percent
recycled glass and a box crafted from paper certified by the Forest
Stewardship Council. NINA RICCI NINA LE PARFUM EAU DE PARFUM ($112 FOR 50 ML, THEBAY.COM)

28 ELLECANADA.COM
 style

NENSI DOJAKA
GAUCHERE

GUCCI

OVEREXPOSURE
Welcome to the visibility era, where lace, mesh and
sheer fabrics leave almost nothing to the imagination.
By CAIA HAGEL

IN MORE MODEST HOLIDAYS PAST, we might have been pulling out the tight, short, slitted,
puffed and even turtle-necked black cocktail dresses to be party-ready with looks that
show enough leg or arm to feel sexy yet provide enough cover to feel cozy. This year,
though, we have an unexpected surprise: Sheer, lace and mesh dresses are making
a comeback. It’s an invitation to bring our best body magic to the season’s parties.
What began as the “pantless” trend, in which oversized boyfriend shirts, bomber
jackets and cropped trenches with heels made the full outfit (a look spearheaded by
Kendall Jenner and Hailey Bieber), has morphed into the “no pants” trend, where
shorts as small as panties are the definition of hyper-visibility dressing. Vanessa
Hudgens, Bella Hadid and Olivia Rodrigo have all been spotted wearing their
PHOTOGRAPHY, LAUNCHMETRICS SPOTLIGHT

Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren boxer shorts as out-of-the-bedroom street style. Dua
Lipa captioned an Instagram pic of herself sporting suede Miu Miu micro-shorts
“sun bum,” presumably because they were so short they exposed half of her nicely
tanned butt cheeks. Emma Corrin made their version seem unselfconscious and
sophisticated when they bombed the Venice Film Festival in an earth-green Miu
Miu cardigan and matching minishorts. And when Saffron Vadher arrived at the
Vogue World party in gold-sequined silk-and-wool Miu Miu panties, she made all
the gorgeous dresses seem too dressy.

ELLECANADA.COM 29
SAINT LAURENT

TODAY’S BOUDOIR PIECES ARE IN A PLAYFUL
MOOD, FLIRTING AS OUTERWEAR AND ADDING AN
UNEXPECTED CASUAL TONE TO THE BOLDNESS OF
GOING OUT NEARLY NAKED.
Pantlessness emphasizes the lower body while veiling the
upper body. But why stop there? Now that this trend has been
sanctified by everyone everywhere, it’s pivoting to something
even more daring: panties under lace, mesh and sheer dresses
that leave almost nothing to the imagination. Nobody’s com-
plaining, but why are we so keen to expose ourselves?
Lace now is not like the lace of the past, when it was worn
mostly as an undergarment. Today’s boudoir pieces are in a
playful mood, flirting as outerwear and adding an unexpected
casual tone to the boldness of going out nearly naked. Paired
with running shoes, chunky boots, slippers and cardigans, lace
is saying “exposure is so stylish and chill.”
Skin reveals have always been an ally of female emancipation.
Slogans like “free the nipple” have been recycled since they were
first uttered in the early 1960s during the sexual revolution. In
1964, Rudi Gernreich launched the first monokini, a garment
that fully unleashed the breasts. Yves Saint Laurent followed it
in 1966 with the first sheer look, which he took further in 1968
with his see-through dress, a soft, completely transparent chiffon
gown belted with a cinch made of ostrich feathers. Photos of
Saint Laurent’s muse, Danielle Luquet de Saint-Germain,
wearing this dress circled the world and caused a scandal that
was as gossiped about as the one caused by the masculinity of
the Le Smoking tuxedo two seasons earlier. This time, it was
the extreme femininity of the see-through dress that was the
political weapon for equal rights.
Fast-forward to Saint Laurent’s spring/summer 2024 show:
Designer Anthony Vaccarello raided the archives to update
the Saharienne safari jacket (which was first introduced on the
runway in 1967), transforming it into explorer jumpsuits that
were, he said in a press release, inspired by “Amelia Earhart,
Adrienne Bolland and other pioneering women who infiltrated
PHOTOGRAPHY, LAUNCHMETRICS SPOTLIGHT
domains once considered exclusively male, such as aviation
and car racing.” Among the tightly belted khakis, leather
headdresses and goggles, the signature looks of this feminist
collection were the completely translucent tight gauze tops
worn braless.
We have officially entered the hyper-visibility era. We post
our intimate moments and intimate feelings online. We reveal,
and we are revealed to; we consume and are consumed by
STYLE
each other. We talk to, share with, like and befriend strangers
every day. We are increasingly aware that we are always being
watched. Whether via surveillance cams in public places or the
cameras in our desktops, laptops and phones, we know that we
are monitored, datafied and monetized. Yes, the digital world
has made us exhibitionists, and in the digital space, we all belong
to everyone. So, is exposure dressing not an act of surrender
to—even an enthusiastic embracing of—our collective public
status and making it “surveillance chic”?
Hyper-visibility was introduced softly at the fall/winter
2023/2024 shows. Especially gorgeous were Mowalola’s
skin-flashing leather dresses and the tummy-baring gowns
and fur-collar tops giving underboob at Ludovic de Saint
Sernin for Ann Demeulemeester. Exposure was all over
the spring/summer 2024 runways too. At Coach, sheer
yellow and black lace barely covered black bikinis. Gabriela
Hearst’s white mermaid-esque see-through knit gowns were
layered over white bikinis and paired with sandals. Dion
Lee’s geometric lace looks had sporty sex appeal. Diesel’s
distressed techno-rave minidresses had holes in them, as
if someone or something had taken bites of the fabric. For
his debut at Tom Ford, Peter Hawkings added risqué glam
to nipple-exposing sheer dresses with only mini thongs for
bottoms. Dolce & Gabbana’s fall/winter 2023/2024 and
spring/summer 2024 shows were all about lingerie looks as
daywear. Dior added tulle and mesh to its black see-through
pieces. Victoria Beckham’s sheer white gowns were angelic,
and Chanel’s black one was ruffle-topped. Loewe did a
transparent haute beige collar dress. Mugler’s was translu-
cent cyborgian. Sabato De Sarno’s debut collection at Gucci
included silk-lace minidresses, and even Prada—the eternally
virginal house—had them in its presentation.
Hyper-visibility is joyful, confident and empowered. It
throws suspicion on covering up, privatization, information
hoarding and Instagram’s institutionalized nipple ban. It
might also poetically imply that as extremely online humans,
sharing and baring are our most unifying activities. While
sporting this sexy trend through the holiday-season parties,
remember what Yves Saint Laurent always said: “Nothing is
more beautiful than a naked body.”
ELLECANADA.COM 31
 X LONGINES
ALL IN
THE
DETAILS
Small but mighty, the new Longines Mini
DolceVita is the embodiment of elegance.
T’S SAID THAT THE BEST THINGS come in small packages, and
I the adage couldn’t be more apt when it comes to Longines’
latest timepiece. Introducing the Mini DolceVita. It might
be diminutive, but it certainly makes a lasting impression.
With its subtle dimensions and soft yet striking lines, the
Mini DolceVita is an emblem of contemporary elegance.
It is not showy or loud, instead conferring an air of relaxed
sophistication—a whisper of opulence.
In other words, it is the epitome of what has come to be
known as “quiet luxury.” This increasingly popular approach
to fashion champions investing in high-quality minimalist
pieces that will stand the test of time rather than submitting to
the ever-churning trend cycle. It is a more mindful, effortless
approach to dressing that underlines the fact that true style
comes from within.
Because, as the Longines motto goes, “elegance is an atti-
tude.” Since its inception back in 1832, the brand has been
synonymous not just with precision and performance but
exquisite taste too. It’s an aesthetic that has endured through
centuries and allows each wearer’s uniqueness to shine through.
How fitting, then, that the face of the Mini DolceVita is
someone who has come to exemplify these very qualities:
Academy Award winner and Longines Ambassador of Elegance
Jennifer Lawrence. She is a woman who exudes a natural grace
and confidence and exhibits a sartorial penchant for all things
understated and refined.
“This is a timely and timeless watch—a mini but mighty
piece that expresses modern elegance,” declared Lawrence
at the Mini DolceVita’s launch event in New York City this
fall. “Each detail enhances its classic yet contemporary style.”
32 ELLECANADA.COM
SPONSORED CONTENT
Indeed, every last element of the watch has been carefully
considered, from its discreet profile to its stainless-steel case, and
it is powered by a highly accurate L178 quartz movement. A
new circular dial—which features painted-on Roman numerals
and dashing blued-steel hands—can be admired through the
scratch-resistant-sapphire-crystal cover.
The watch is presented on a newly designed stainless-steel
bracelet. In a nod to art-deco architecture, its 198 links cap-
ture the light and emphasize the jewelled spirit of the piece.
Speaking of which, six of the Mini DolceVita styles include a
dazzling diamond-bordered case.
The watch is available in an array of captivating colourways:
Ivory White, Mint Green, Blossom Pink and Serene Blue. Each
strap matches the hue of the outer square of the dial, and an
inner square features a stunning guilloche effect.
But, of course, the hallmark of the piece is its rectangular
shape, a signature at Longines, which began creating rectangular
timepieces in the 1910s. It was in 1927 that the Swiss watch-
maker introduced the style that would, 70 years later, inspire
the acclaimed DolceVita collection. Now, the Mini DolceVita
ushers in the next chapter as a modern masterpiece rooted in
history—a celebration of elegance.
 SHOPPING

RAINS ($175,
CA.RAINS.COM) COS ($250, COS.COM)
SENTALER ($1,495,
SENTALER.CA)

LAURA ($198, MUJI ($50, MUJI.CA)

LAURA.CA)

NANUSHKA ($1,199,
NANUSHKA.COM) MACKAGE ($690,
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BOTTEGA VENETA
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SEASON
From cascading cuts to
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to turn heads.
 STEMARGSCOT
The Toronto-based outerwear
brand is bringing colour—and
warmth—to our Canadian winters.
By ERICA NGAO

WHEN IT COMES TO DRESSING for Canada’s notoriously frigid

winters, we are met with the same predicament season after
season: Should we opt for function or style? That was the
question for designer Sasha Jardine, who ended up splurging
on a long black puffer coat to protect herself against Toronto’s
biting windchill. But it wasn’t long before she felt like something
was missing. “It dawned on me that everybody was wearing
some version of that coat,” she says. “It didn’t feel special, and,
even worse, I understood that this coat was essentially made of
fossil fuels.” Jardine, who has a background in education and
biochemistry research, realized that there was an opportunity
to fill a void in the outerwear market. CHEER UP
After a year of research and development, Jardine launched “There’s this idea that if you dress colourfully, you’re associated
SteMargScot (an abbreviation of “Saint Margaret of Scotland”) with things that are juvenile or you’re not serious. We want to

in early 2023 with a line of environmentally conscious coats that
pack plenty of personality—and warmth. With a gender-in-
clusive fit and nods to heritage styles, the coats are meant to be
heirlooms for generations to come. Each component—from
the raw-edge seams to the hand-carved maple toggles—is
made without plastic or metal and is thoughtfully crafted.
To help combat the winter blues, the coats are dyed in an
array of vivid rainbow hues, including a poppy chartreuse, a
royal purple and a bright fuchsia. And the brand has already
received a nod from the industry: It was nominated for The
Award for Emerging Talent, Fashion at this year’s Canadian
Arts & Fashion Awards.
But the real star is the wool, which is custom-woven at a
family-owned British mill that’s been in operation since the
1800s. The thick, dense shell is nat-
urally wind- and water-resistant,
and a removable wool-filled liner
ensures ultimate insulation, even
in -20˚C weather. In the future,
Jardine hopes to source wool closer
to home; she’s a member of the
Canadian Wool Council’s policy
SASHA JARDINE
committee, which is working to
revive the industry here.
PHOTOGRAPHY, ANGELA LIN AND STYLIST, MEI YONEKURA (CAMPAIGN); PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF STEMARGSCOT (S. JARDINE)
encourage people to play and give themselves permission to
wear the colours they love—especially in those dark times when
we need positivity and any kind of little dopamine hit we can get.
We try to maintain a joyful aesthetic while still being luxury.”
NATURAL RESOURCES
“When you think about fashion and materials, you rarely think
about agriculture. Our clothes used to be grown. Fabrics like linen
and hemp are made of sunshine and water. Our clothes were bio-
degradable, so when we were finished with them, those nutrients
could be returned to the earth. That was truly and simply circular. I
would love to see that revisited by bringing back materials that are
far from fossil-fuel-derived fabrics like polyester and nylon and that
are also circular in their disposal process.”
WONDER WOOL
“Nowadays, when a lot of people think about a winter coat, they
forget that wool kept us warm and dry for centuries before syn-
thetics were invented—and it can continue to keep us warm.
It’s something that’s been forgotten because we only envision a
winter coat in a certain way now. Customers are inundated with
synthetic coats—they have closets full of them. We want to give
them the option of something different. Our focus on craftsman-
ship lets the wearer know that their coat is unique—there aren’t
thousands of them elsewhere in the world.”

34 ELLECANADA.COM
 SHOPPING

NECKLACE, ZARA
($36, ZARA.COM) EAR CUFF, MEJURI
($48, MEJURI.COM)

EARRINGS, PRISTINE
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RINGS, ALDO ($25 FOR A SET

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RING, STEFF ELEOFF

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CUFF, TIFFANY & CO. ($2,000,
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NECKLACE, MADEMOISELLE JULES

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EARRINGS, MAJE
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Invite these statement EARRINGS, SIMONS
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RING, SWAROVSKI ($258,
SWAROVSKI.COM) next party.

ELLECANADA.COM 35
 FASHION FICTIONCanadian author CLAUDIA DEY shares her thoughts on style,
beauty and the faces of femininity.
By CAIA HAGEL

IF THE UNCONSCIOUS FEELINGS of every moment are expressed
through trending styles and the clothes we wear, fashion has a
special kind of intuitiveness that literature has forever understood.
Clothing has always been a source of symbolism in books, and
books have endlessly inspired clothing designers. Sometimes this
relationship is obvious, like when Peter Do collaborated with
Ocean Vong, author of On Earth We Are Briefly Gorgeous, for his
recent debut at Helmut Lang and the poetry soundtrack made
people cry. Or when Virgil Abloh used James Baldwin’s essay
“Stranger in the Village” as the blueprint for his sublime Louis
Vuitton men’s fall/winter 2020/2021 show. Or when Juergen
Teller photographed Joan Didion for the Celine spring/summer
On the heels of a runway season that unveiled a new layer
of femininity via lace-draped girls in smart Miu Miu reading
glasses, Daughter, the latest novel from Claudia Dey—playwright,
author and co-founder of Toronto-based fashion label Horses
Atelier—landed in our hands.
The tale is told by bohemian ingenue Mona, and it explores
an ancient and familiar predicament for women: how to exist
alongside the gargantuan male ego and find personal power
beyond it. Mona’s father is a famous novelist whose narcissism
destroys aspects of all the women in his life and pits them against
one another. When Mona transforms into a mesmerizing con-
temporary heroine while in the fire of her heartbreaks, it feels like
PHOTOGRAPHY, DOVE DEY-KERR

2015 campaign and her face became as iconic as her prose. But
who can forget Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, whose titular protagonist
is so compelling they’ve spawned a million fashion dreams? Or
Mrs. Dalloway, another Woolf character, whose green dress—a
gown so close to being sentient that it is a character in itself—still
haunts our literary dreams?
the medicine we need right now. Daughter uses fashion metaphors
to express its characters’ psychological states and captures the
mood of a new-found underworld feminine feeling shining
from beneath our sheer dresses. We sat down with Dey to chat
about fashion, literature, the faces of femininity and her critically
acclaimed new novel, which is already a national bestseller.

36 ELLECANADA.COM

READING DAUGHTER, I WAS STRUCK BY HOW WELL YOU
CAPTURE THE CURRENT FEMININE MOOD. CAN YOU TELL ME
ABOUT THIS? “I write for contact and for closeness—closeness to
life, closeness to my reader and closeness to myself. I [created]
Mona to achieve this closeness. She is the centre of Daughter; she
is the one who possesses this new femininity, this transparency. She
does not seek to be made legible through the lens of another; she
has agency, and she has come into her power. She is inscrutable in
some ways, and she has nerve and is self-possessed. These qual-
ities are expressed in the fashion of this moment—gauze is clinical
yet sultry [and allows for] a kind of exposure that is for self-construc-
tion. Fashion, like all art—and like Mona’s arc in Daughter—is the
construction of personhood. The question is: Why would I hide?”
I WONDER HOW CONSCIOUS WE ARE THAT WHEN WE
DRESS OURSELVES EACH DAY, WE ARE CONSTRUCTING
OUR PERSONHOOD. WHAT WOULD MONA SAY? “I love this
question. I think we understand that fashion is a form of auto-
biography—an expression of mood, of state, of obsessions and of
play. Only a few of Mona’s pieces are described: a dress with a
pocket for a cellphone [that she wears] as she anxiously awaits
her narcissistic god of a father’s phone calls, a surplus jacket
that gives her shelter and anonymity during a grief spiral and a
backless dress that she wears when she has a meeting with her
spiteful stepmother. She wears the dress as a totem of strength;
it’s a tactical and sly move, signalling that she is very much intact.”
BECAUSE IT EXPOSES HER SPINE? “Yes, exactly.”
MONA ALSO WEARS HEAVY FUR IN ONE OF THE LAST
POWERFUL SCENES IN THE NOVEL. “Yes! During her emotional
winter, a period of grieving, she wears all her partner’s clothes—
his wool pants, his button-down and his overcoat. He is lanky,
shaped like a spire, and she knows that she looks ‘like a clown.’
But that’s what fashion can do—it can take you toward and
away from yourself, and Mona needs distance from her wounds.
Fashion can shift your identity and make you
obliterate and lose sight of yourself; it can be
something to hide behind.”
THIS IS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL IDEA. IN THAT
SENSE, FASHION ALSO DECONSTRUCTS
PERSONHOOD AT WILL. “Exactly. What we do
when we dress is what we do when we make
art—we disassemble and reassemble our-
selves, and we try on different faces.”
MONA MADE ME THINK A LOT ABOUT THE
METHODS WE USE AS GIRLS AND WOMEN
TO ACHIEVE POWER—THE YSL LE SMOKING
STYLE OF LEANING IN VERSUS THE YSL
STYLE
SEE-THROUGH-DRESS STYLE. ONE IS IN A TUX, AND ONE IS
IN LACE, MESH, GAUZE AND TULLE. ONE COVERS CURVES,
AND THE OTHER EXPOSES THEM. ONE MIMICS MASCULIN-
ITY, WHILE THE OTHER EXAGGERATES AND COMPLEXIFIES
FEMININITY. MONA HAS CHOSEN OPTION TWO. “I love this
framework and YSL, so I wish I could have worn the original ver-
sions of both. Yes, Mona exposes her spine in a pivotal scene—and
it is, in fact, her stepmother who describes the backless dress to
the reader. [With] a kind of voyeurism, the novel transits between
points of view, so we get the detail that the top band of Mona’s
underwear is exposed, and it is lace. I move behind the other char-
acters’ eyes because we can never quite escape that question of
‘How do those in my orbit see me? How do I appear to them?’”
IT SEEMS THAT CHERRY, THE WICKED STEPMOTHER OF THE
STORY, IS EVIL IN PART BECAUSE SHE CAN’T FATHOM THE
SEE-THROUGH-DRESS FORM OF FEMININITY. SHE ENVIES IT
AND DEMONIZES IT AT THE SAME TIME—WHICH COULD BE
SEEN AS A SOCIAL COMMENTARY ON CULTURE AT LARGE
AND THE LE SMOKING VEIN OF FEMINISM GENERALLY. THIS
LENS HAS BEEN SO CRUEL TO SOFTNESS, VULNERABILITY
AND SEXINESS, YET MONA SUBVERTS IT, AND SO DOES
HER MOTHER. “You are seeing it all. Mona’s mother, Natasha,
is described as Marilyn Monroe if Marilyn Monroe had driven
a station wagon and worked at a radio station. The qualities
you describe in Mona and Natasha—the softness, the eros, the
vulnerability and the furious, precise subversion—are also the
sources of their artistic power, a force Cherry is threatened by
and wants to quash. She does not make art but acquires it. She
is an heiress. Cherry’s dress is described as plain and pressed
like a sheet of paper; it’s a very specific and polished expression
of wealth. She speaks about style as something that should be
invisible—[she believes that] when style is visible, it is desperate.
She is not a villain, but she is oppositional in this orbit of women.
She, too, was very seductive to write.”
WE LEAVE THIS GORGEOUS NOVEL WORLD
FEELING EMPATHY FOR EACH AND EVERY
CHARACTER. WE SEE WHERE WOMEN ARE
VIS-À-VIS MEN; IT ISN’T RIGHT OR WRONG,
BUT IT DOES GIVE US PERMISSION TO BE
LESS AFRAID OF HYPERFEMININITY. MAYBE
IT’S TIME TO EXPLORE OTHER TACTICS,
WHICH IS SOMETHING WE CAN LEARN A
LOT ABOUT FROM MONA. “What is to come
for women? Where will we go next? I keep
thinking about the patriarchal [canon] ver-
sus the matriarchal canon. We were raised
[to see] male writers as mentally central, as
important and as masters . I love to see how
we, daughters, are redescribing life.”
ELLECANADA.COM 37
 STYLE

A STYLISH
LEGACYHow hip hop has transformed and dominated
the fashion industry.
By SADAF AHSAN Illustration GUILLAUME BRIÈRE

“WHEN DIANA ROSS TOUCHED MY BOOB…THAT WAS EVERYTHING.” So said the

incomparable Lil’ Kim after the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards, where she sported
a lilac wig and a single-sleeved jumpsuit that was made out of a sheer Indian bridal
fabric adorned with purple and silver seashells and left one of her breasts entirely
bare. The showstopper? The matching nipple pastie that Ross did indeed give a
loving jiggle to.
Before and since, there were and have been innumerable fashion moments gifted
to us by hip hop’s best that smashed through style boundaries and truly embodied
what it means to express yourself. Consider Run-DMC’s laceless Adidas shell toes,
MC Hammer’s drop-crotch harem pants, Missy Elliott’s garbage-bag-esque PVC
blow-up suit, Diddy’s track suits, Cardi B’s Mugler “Venus” gown, Queen Latifah’s
colourful kufi and Salt-N-Pepa’s oversized everything. Today, the fashion scene is
dominated by hip-hop artists—from Rihanna to Pharrell—who exemplify just how
powerful and resilient early artists of the genre were in breaking into a historically
exclusionary industry and redefining it.
It all started in the early 1970s, when block parties in the Bronx were filled with
one sound: hip hop, a brand-new genre that was spun into a culture by the neigh-
bourhood’s Black and brown youth. Style is a language—one that communicates
class, history and power—and during this time, many would show up at these parties
dressed to impress, rocking oversized silhouettes, bright colours and huge logos. As the
late André Leon Talley, editor-at-large of Vogue, said in the 2015 documentary Fresh
Dressed, “Urban young people are always attracted to or addicted to fashion because
it’s an expression of aspiration. A lot of people who are in hip hop have aspirations.”
In her new book, Fashion Killa: How Hip-Hop Revolutionized High Fashion, author
Sowmya Krishnamurthy digs deep into those fashionable aspirations and who,
historically, has been allowed to chase after them. The most surprising thing she
explored? Sumptuary laws, which date back to Ancient Greece and Rome and
regulated access to luxury goods to prevent extravagance—or, to put it in a more
modern context, dictated what class of people got to wear what. It’s a sentiment
that still exists today; in 2013, for example, a New Jersey resort infamously banned
sagging pants. It was a move the city’s mayor supported because he saw the style as
a “thug” look that could intimidate visitors.
Those early laws were just the start of the clothing regulations Black Americans
were subjected to based on their race, before and after the country’s independence.
What they wore—the colour, the fabric, the stitching—signified whether they were
enslaved or free. If anyone dressed above their station, it was thought they’d likely
stolen the clothing—an early example of racial profiling. As Krishnamurthy writes,
“This is important in understanding hip hop’s penchant for luxury as a complex
social and cultural phenomenon. Modern materialism could be viewed as a response
to historical lack of ownership.”

38 ELLECANADA.COM
 STYLE

ELLECANADA.COM 39
 STYLE
So how have hip-hop artists managed to have such an impact
on what we wear, even today? Well, as the genre grew more
popular, some unlikely allies in the fashion industry began to
take notice and, of course, saw dollar signs ahead. It helped,
too, that when artists wore something they loved, they shouted
it out. Think Mary J. Blige’s “What’s the 411?”, on which
Grand Puba raps: “Well, I be Puba on this here, the n— from
last year. Girbauds hangin’ baggy, Tommy Hilfiger top gear.”
Hilfiger’s bright and oversized aesthetic fit well with the
genre’s vibe, and the shout-out led to new customers. The
designer began working with hip hop’s best: Diddy, TLC,
Destiny’s Child, Wu-Tang. And, of course, there was Aaliyah
in an unforgettable 1997 campaign that saw the singer sporting
low-rise jeans and branded boxers, and it feels just as fresh today
as it did back then. Suddenly, Hilfiger was hot.
Ironically, another brand that oozed preppy and privileged—
Polo Ralph Lauren—was key too. In the 1980s, a Brooklyn-
based gang known as the Lo-Lifes had made Polo their main
objective when they were doing their shoplifting rounds. So
although many of them were from one of the poorest neigh-
bourhoods in Brooklyn, they were sporting Polo everywhere
they went, and soon fellow Brooklynites were doing the same.
Cut to 2004 and Kanye West was wearing a teddy-bear-embla-
zoned Polo sweater—which became a signature for him—on
the cover of his debut album, The College Dropout.
As Mark Campbell, assistant professor of music and culture
at the University of Toronto, explains: “Hip hop is an art form
that didn’t come from anywhere you could learn it. It came
from playing records and turntables in the parks and streets.
Though, of course, there was no value accorded to hip hop when
it came up. So the idea was you had to earn enough money to
be able to wear Polo or Versace or whatever. And it wasn’t just
about wearing it; it was about other people knowing you were
wearing it so they’d know you could afford it.... The whole idea
was for people to look at you and not see your impoverishment.
It had to be loud, it had to be in your face; it was a big middle
finger that said, ‘I’m in the projects, I’m under-employed, I’m
under-housed, but I can rock what you can rock, and I can
probably rock it better.’” In came a hefty dose of loud luxury.
The more logos—and the bigger they were—the better. Even
leaving the tag on was considered chic (for a time). So strong
was logomania in the ’80s that designer Dapper Dan made
a massive name for himself in the hip-hop world and beyond
just by stamping his own work, DIY-style, with high-end labels.
In fact, so much of what has always gone into the style
of hip-hop artists we know and love is branding, and that’s
a team effort. It was pioneering stylist and designer Misa
Hylton who was behind Lil’ Kim’s VMAs look, and it was
David LaChapelle who shot her in the nude (and covered her
in the Louis Vuitton logo from head to toe) for the cover of
Interview, adding to her brand of sex and luxury. Then there was
Kimora Lee Simmons, who handed Lil’ Kim her new Baby
Phat bedazzled T-shirts to wear and flaunt, which elevated
both the tees and Simmons to icon status.
40 ELLECANADA.COM
Eventually, journalists caught on to what hip hop was pulling
off in fashion and gave it an even brighter spotlight. Hip-hop-
focused magazines like Vibe and The Source were immensely
careful about who made the cover, what the cover stars wore
and what ads were included. Take, for instance, Timberland
boots, which, notes Campbell, rappers and hip-hop artists
started wearing to add to their street cred. These magazines
jumped on the trend, filling their pages with Timberland and
fellow blue-collar brands like Carhartt and The North Face.
The majority of the magazines’ ads also featured Black models.
Model Tyson Beckford was even discovered in the pages of The
Source and, incidentally, would go on to become the first Black
face of Ralph Lauren.
And, finally, there are people like Elena Romero, a New
York-based journalist and the assistant chair of marketing com-
munications at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she
recently co-curated Fresh, Fly, and Fabulous, an exhibit featuring
some of the most iconic fashion items from the past 50 years of hip
hop. Romero dug through archives, storage units, showrooms
and people’s homes to source clothes, jewellery, footwear and
accessories. The pieces she found included everything from
Chance the Rapper’s Polo sweater to a Megan Thee Stallion
gown and even Cardi B’s nails.
“Hip hop birthed so many things,” says Romero. “It wasn’t
just music and fashion but also magazines and television and
film programming, because so many artists, when they started,
were not getting access to mainstream or luxury brands and
outlets. So they made their own. That created jobs. And in
fashion, it led to a new face and body on the runway—we’re
talking different shades, body types and hairstyles.”
Over the years, hip hop’s impact has only grown. We
went from Diddy becoming the first Black designer to win
the Menswear Designer of the Year Award from the Council
of Fashion Designers of America for his label Sean John in
2004 (beating out Ralph Lauren in a full-circle moment) to
Kanye West—divisive as he may be—launching his first Yeezy
collection at New York Fashion Week in 2015.
Today, there’s no mistaking that the titans of hip hop are
also titans of fashion. Since launching her Fenty beauty and
fashion empire, Rihanna has become a certified billionaire.
Earlier this year, Pharrell stepped into the massive shoes of
Virgil Abloh when he became the new creative director of Louis
Vuitton. Krishnamurthy says it’s all about authenticity. “The
most successful ones really come from a place that’s organic,”
she says. “[For] the celebs who truly love fashion, it isn’t just
wearing clothes; it’s a way of life, and you can tell from the way
they dress, how they talk about fashion, how excited they get
about it and the amount of commitment [they have].... To have
a true stake in the game, there has to be that love.”
Hip hop has always been loud and proud. While that used
to be everything fashion wasn’t—or, at least, claimed not to
be—things have changed. Hip hop has taught us that indi-
vidual style matters and has power—and anyone can have it
and wield it.
 SPONSORED CONTENT X ON

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workouts, and the Winter Run Collection, which uses eco-friendly
insulation to keep your splits on track no matter the weather.
Read on as we name our top pieces from the collections—work-
out essentials that let you perform at your best all season long.

1. CHALLENGER JACKET
Even on your wintriest runs, this minimalist puffer’s heat-locking
technology—thanks to 100 percent recycled plastic bottle insu-
lation and cutting-edge woven chambers—keeps you warmer
for longer. Lean on the three-point drawstring hood as an extra
shield from the elements.

2. WEATHER VEST
Your running routine doesn’t stop for less-than-ideal conditions.
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The benefits are endless: Expect a featherweight feel and max
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essentials safe.
3. MOVEMENT BRA
Finally, a sports bra you’ll actually want to wear all day. Designed
with buttery-soft moisture-wicking material that moves with you,
the lightly padded Movement Bra is made for feeling good during
all your low-impact workouts.
PHOTOGRAPHY, NELSON HUANG; STYLIST, SANTANAE LUZIGE; HAIRSTYLIST AND MAKEUP ARTIST, VERONICA CHU
7. HOODIE
A good hoodie perfectly balances both comfort and function,
which is exactly what this ultra-soft staple aims to do. Whether
you’re warming up or cooling down, its zippered patch pocket
and drawstring lace guard (genius!) allow you to stay focused on
your practice.
8. SWEAT PANTS
Light, stretchy and breathable are the name of the game for
these sleek sweatpants. With a stylish slim fit and a bevy of con-

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4. PERFORMANCE WINTER TIGHTS and brunch alike.
Based on the brand’s bestselling performance tights, this newly
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1. 2. 3. 4.
including a pocket roomy enough for the biggest phone—mean
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5.
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8.
1. CHALLENGER JACKET ($580). 2. WEATHER VEST ($250). 3. MOVEMENT BRA ($80). 4. PERFORMANCE
WINTER TIGHTS (170 $). 5. CLOUDSTRATUS 3 ($230). 6. CLOUDMONSTER ($210). 7. HOODIE ($190). 8. SWEAT
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ELLECANADA.COM 41
 STYLE

Timeless Beauty
JENNIFER LAWRENCE embraces the power of restraint.
By KATHERINE LALANCETTE

T
HE WORLD FELL IN LOVE with her as a zany 22-year-old
who tripped on her dress on her way to scoop up her
Oscar. More than a decade later, Jennifer Lawrence
is still as disarmingly charming as ever, but look closer and
you’ll notice something a bit different about the actor: a certain
poise, a palpable sense of peace.
In 2019, the star put her movie career on hold to focus on her
life off-screen. She wed art gallerist Cooke Maroney, and the
couple welcomed their first child, a son named Cy, in February
2022. “I just think everybody had gotten sick of me. I’d gotten
sick of me,” she told Vanity Fair of her sabbatical from stardom.
“It had just gotten to a point where I couldn’t do anything
right. If I walked a red carpet, it was, ‘Why didn’t she run?’...
I think that I was people-pleasing for the majority of my life.”
She emerged from the hiatus with a revived spark and a
much-raved-about new look. She’s since been hailed as a fixture
in fashion’s stealth-wealth movement, right up there with Sofia
Richie, the cast of Succession and Gwyneth’s courtroom couture.
Think immaculate tailoring, plush textures and tasteful tones
of black, white, grey and camel. The look is an apt reflection of
the 33-year-old’s relaxed confidence these days. “I normally lean
toward a more understated elegance and quiet luxury,” she admits.
On this fall day, she sits on a couch in a New York City hotel
suite, embodying the sartorial ethos to a T in a black A-line
midiskirt, a fitted short-sleeved sweater and nude patent pumps.
A black Tiffany & Co. Elsa Peretti Bone Cuff wraps one wrist,
a Longines Mini DolceVita adorns the other.
The launch of the latter is the reason for our meeting:
Lawrence was recently appointed “Ambassador of Elegance”
for the storied watchmaker. (You may have seen paparazzi shots
of her filming a commercial for the brand back in June—you
know, those photos of her wrangling a bunch of dogs?—when
the internet went wild for her outfit: a navy sweater casually
knotted over a long trench coat, trousers, ballet flats and a dainty
silver timepiece.) Here, the actor opens up about her
approach to style, prioritizing family time and the
restorative benefits of a good Housewives episode.
WHAT IS YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH WATCHES? DO
YOU REMEMBER THE FIRST ONE YOU EVER WORE?
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF LONGINES
really meaningful to me, obviously. That’s when I started to
notice watches, which led me to Longines.”
AS AN AMBASSADOR OF ELEGANCE FOR THE BRAND, WHEN
DO YOU FEEL MOST ELEGANT? “What I like about the Mini
DolceVita is it’s the perfect staple for going from daytime casual
to black tie and formal. I always think it’s elegant to change
really quickly and not take too long. You know in Eyes Wide
Shut, when Nicole Kidman has her hair up and glasses on
and then she just takes her hair down and her glasses off? It’s
that effortless beauty where you don’t need to do too much.”
HOW DOES A WATCH FIT YOUR LIFESTYLE? “For me, it’s more of
a fashion accessory. I just think that it’s more expressive than
a normal piece of jewellery. It says something more profound
about you; it’s more professional. There’s something more
serious about it that I like. I don’t think there’s any outfit you
can put on that this watch isn’t going to elevate.”
HOW DO YOU MANAGE YOUR TIME? “I try to be organized
because being on time is important to me. My job involves so
many people—hundreds of people—that to be late would be very
disrespectful. And, of course, once you have a family, there are
these added factors of just trying to keep your time organized so
you can be more in control of your day and your week and so you
can look back and [be glad about] the way you spent your time.”
WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE TIME OF DAY? “My favourite time
of day now is morning because that’s when my husband and
son and I can be together and have our coffee. I mean, [my
husband] and I have coffee [laughs] and just watch [our son]
and laugh before the day gets started.”
HOW DO YOU MAKE TIME FOR YOURSELF? “The time that feeds
my soul is watching Housewives. Also, ever since I
had a child, people always say the same thing: ‘It
goes by so fast.’ I hate hearing that because I don’t
want it to go by fast, but it actually makes me really
appreciate every moment. Even if I’m tired, I try to
take it in and enjoy it and know that this moment

“The first watch I ever wore was a digital watch
that had kind of a [Magic] 8-Ball question-answer
situation. You could say ‘Does so-and-so have a crush
on me?’ [And it’d be] like, ‘No way!’ Then I started
caring about watches about four or five years ago.
My husband and I were engaged, and my brother-
in-law gifted me a watch from his father. It was just
is going to pass and I’m never going to get it back.”
IF YOU WERE ABLE TO STOP TIME FOR ONE MOMENT,
WHAT MOMENT WOULD IT BE? “I’m actually lucky—I
have a few moments that I would want to elon-
STAINLESS-STEEL AND
DIAMOND MINI DOLCEVITA, gate. Maybe walking down the aisle and seeing
LONGINES ($4,800,
LONGINES.CA) my husband.”

ELLECANADA.COM 43
BRILLIANT CLOTHING
IN NOVA SCOTIA

PRE-LOVED
Second-hand stores across
Canada are serving up first-rate
shopping, from vintage fashion
to sustainable chic luxury.
By EVE THOMAS
BRITISH COLUMBIA
MINE & YOURS
This luxury consignment chain’s Vancouver boutiques (as well
as one that opened in Toronto’s Yorkville neighbourhood last
summer) are so sleekly designed, you’d think you were shopping
for new (with deep discounts). Around 250 items are added
every week—in-store and online—and they’re included in a
shoppable digital lookbook called The Report. Spy everything
from trendy Acne sweaters and Ganni dresses to ultra-luxe
Delvaux leather purses and Philip Treacy wool hats.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ The brand’s Influencer Program is open
to anyone who loves second-hand clothing (not just fashion
bloggers and big names), and members can earn store credit
through referrals. “Rather than focusing on the number
of followers, we wanted to work with people who share our
values,” says owner Courtney Watkins. “Clients who engage
with [Influencer Program members] feel as though they are
getting shopping advice from a close friend or family member,
which is on-brand for us.”
TURNABOUT VINTAGE
In business since 1978, this designer-second-hand empire
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF BRILLIANT CLOTHING
has seven Vancouver locations (and one in Victoria), all with
generous men’s sections and a veritable who’s who of history’s
hottest handbags, with regular appearances by icons like the
Christian Dior Saddle Bag, the Hermès Birkin and the Gucci
Hobo (to name a few).
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ Founder Joy Mauro routinely works with
charities like Dress for Success and Big Sisters, and she even has
a dedicated concept shop (Turnabout Community) on Fraser
Street that donates all its profits to charity.
STYLE
ALBERTA
VESPUCCI
Back in 1986, long before online shopping was a thing, Dianne
Rawlinson opened a second-hand shop in a strip mall near
her house, and it’s now Calgary’s largest bricks-and-mortar
luxury-consignment store. Head there for big names and
heirloom-worthy accessories, like Chanel sunglasses and Louis
Vuitton “pochettes.”
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ Sustainable shopping is a family affair!
Rawlinson’s daughter Britt opened her own store, VSP
Consignment, in Toronto in 2013.
SASKATCHEWAN
LOOM & MAGPIE
This Regina-based luxury-consignment shop has been doing
double duty since 2017. Founded on “the belief that fashion and
sustainability can coexist,” it sells designer clothes and acces-
sories and helps keep them looking new longer by servicing and
repairing luxury timepieces, fine jewellery and leather goods.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ This boutique does not do dupes! The
team’s exhaustive analysis of second-hand goods includes
examination with a loupe, an X-ray fluorescence analyzer
and the skills of an in-house jewellery expert who’s a member
of the Canadian Gemmological Association. It also offers
authentication services and certificates for goods by select
designer labels (for a fee).
MANITOBA
NUAGE VINTAGE
Spot this second-hand store roaming around Manitoba. Located
inside “Pearl,” a 1968 Boler RV that was made in Winnipeg, it
can be found at select markets and festivals across the province
(as well as online) and offers a curation of second-hand pieces
inspired by the Prairies and French fashion. Think tan trench
coats, floral blouses and leather jackets. Owner Natasha Rey
says she founded the company to “encourage Canadians to
shop vintage in an effort to help heal the planet.”
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ A line of one-of-a-kind upcycled jeans is
available in Nuage’s online store.
ELLECANADA.COM 45
 MINE & YOURS IN VANCOUVER

ONTARIO
COMMON SORT
Toronto cool girls regularly hit this consignment shop
to both sell last season’s outfits and choose new ones
from its broad mix of styles, brands and price ranges
(shoppers come more for the up-to-the-minute trends
than the labels)—not to mention comb through the
generous sales rack. There are three locations in the
city as well as a new spot in Montreal’s Plateau-Mont-
Royal neighbourhood.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ Hour-long complimentary person-
al-shopping sessions are on offer, which are so helpful
whether you want an outfit for a special occasion or a
total wardrobe refresh.

NOUVEAU RICHE
This “true vintage” spot in Toronto’s Junction Triangle
bills itself as “gender- and size-inclusive”—it even has an
online section dedicated to larger pieces (which can be
impossible to find at many second-hand stores)—and
has a by-appointment studio. Not everything it carries
is designer, but the luxury items it does have—pieces
like ’70s Courrèges knitwear and ’80s Saint Laurent
power suits—are arranged by decade and are sure to
catch any fashion historian’s eye.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ It also has a housewares section
where you can unearth standouts like Murano-glass
bowls and mid-century-modern picnic blankets.

THE RECOLLECTIVE
One of the best consignment shops in Canada’s capital is
owned by sisters Carla and Kelly Bourada, both of whom
have years of experience in traditional fashion retail.
The daily drops on their Instagram Stories showcase
trendy faves (think Tiffany pendants, Babaton coats and
Smash + Tess rompers), which are viewable both on
a hanger and on a model or mannequin. It’s the next
best thing to browsing the racks if you like the thrill
of the hunt that only second-hand shopping can offer.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ Sign up for the store’s newsletter
and automatically get 10 percent off select items.

46 ELLECANADA.COM

QUEBEC
CITIZEN VINTAGE
“When we opened in 2011, vintage was definitely more niche,”
says co-owner Lara Kaluza, who notes that good-quality used
clothing has gotten harder to find as fast fashion has flooded
the market. So, her team got creative. “We now also have
our own line of clothing, Studio Citizen, that we make in our
Mile-Ex studio using deadstock [unused vintage] fabric. And
we have a small collection of upcycled pieces that we make in
the back of our Plateau shop.”
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ The two stores on Saint-Laurent Boulevard
always have Insta-worthy window displays featuring rotating
artist collabs as well as matching limited-edition art prints
and tees in-store.
RUSE
This hyper-cool consignment shop is for those who want
Ssense-approved luxury brands for less. (Think Off-White
bucket hats, Jacquemus blazers and Paloma Wool sweaters.)
Online drops come with FOMO-inducing countdowns and
cheeky white-glove videos, and Quebec celebs and stylists love
stopping by the boutique for show-stopping pieces.
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ The shop is located on a strip in Mile
End alongside some of Montreal’s best indie stores, including
Jennifer Glasgow and Unicorn (for local fashion) and Jamais
Assez (for chic housewares).
RUSE IN MONTREAL
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF MINE & YOURS & JEAN-BAPTISTE BELLEBNA (RUSE)
STYLE
NOVA SCOTIA
BRILLIANT CLOTHING
High-end clothing like Smythe blazers and Stuart Weitzman
boots have a home in Halifax thanks to this consignment bou-
tique. While owner Stacey Thompson says designer bags and
trench coats always sell out within minutes, she’s also noticing
a recent shift in customers’ tastes. “While we still have a ton
of logo and label lovers, we are seeing a trend toward well-
tailored timeless pieces, especially blazers and coats,” she says.
“People are embracing the ‘quiet luxury’ trend—where more
isn’t always better—and working on their capsule wardrobes.”
WHAT WE LOVE ♥ This shop’s a great example of how the
resale market, both offline and online, can put even small-town
fashionistas on the map.
THRIFTY TIPS
Second-hand shopping is definitely having a moment,
but sorting through everything on offer can be
overwhelming. Here are a few tips for getting the best
out of it.
+ Know your store. There are luxury consignment shops,
thrift stores, charity stores, vintage shops and rental
services. Figure out what you want—say, an iconic
designer bag, a one-season-old skirt or an affordable
swinging-’60s dress—and shop accordingly.
+ Inspect every inch. Look closely at the seams, zippers
and underarms, especially in cheaper second-
hand stores. And if the tag says “as is,” find the flaw
(sometimes it’s just a missing button) and factor in the
cost of repairs.
+ Size things up. Between vintage pieces and
international labels, sizing can be all over the place.
Make sure you try things on or, if you’re shopping
online, get exact measurements and check labels for
materials like Lycra to gauge stretchiness.
+ Adjust your expectations. Sometimes getting a rare
vintage piece or designer clothing at 90 percent off
means it comes with something like a loose thread or
a small stain (and a no-returns policy). Accept a little
risk for a lot of potential reward! Plus, if you buy from a
charity shop, anything you don’t wear can basically be
written off as a charitable donation, right?
+ Make a trade. If you’ve got clothing to consign, many
shops will offer more in credit than they’ll pay out in
cash, which is perfect if you’re also looking to buy.
+ Know your neighbourhood. When it comes to boutique
consignment or charity shops, trying the ones in select
neighbourhoods—including those with high-end first-
hand boutiques—can definitely help with your hunt.
+ Ask about inventory. Some stores have a regular
schedule for new items and will even keep an eye out
for designers or styles you like and alert you when they
come in.
+ Stay in touch. Most shops that do e-commerce offer a
discount code for your first purchase when you sign up
for their newsletter.
+ Trust but verify. If you’re looking for an investment piece
in pristine condition, find out how a shop authenticates.
(Some designers even have their own certification
programs.) If you find designer vintage in a bargain bin,
it may be a fake or damaged...or your lucky day!
ELLECANADA.COM 47
Healing
Through
Words
ALOK VAID-MENON , acclaimed
American poet and LGBTQIA2S+
icon, is manifesting a world
beyond the gender binary.
By AMAN DOSANJ

AMERICAN POET AND HUMAN-RIGHTS ACTIVIST Alok Vaid-
Menon uses fashion to communicate the many facets of who
they are. For arguably one of the most recognized non-binary
trans-feminine artists of our generation—they are the author
of three acclaimed books and the star of a two-year-long com-
edy world tour and have amassed 1.3 million loyal Instagram
followers—that could mean a flowy knee-length floral dress,
rainbow-coloured hair and dangly bell-shaped jhumka earrings
one day and a chest-hair-exposing vintage skirtsuit the next.
That said, the 32-year-old New Yorker explains that the days
when they feel their best are also the days when they are the
most afraid. “I feel most beautiful when I’m wearing what I
want [and not worrying about] what other people think,” says
Vaid-Menon, who is known as ALOK. “But when I do that, I
experience the most street harassment. It’s heartbreaking that
we live in a society that tells people to be themselves and then
doesn’t defend them when they [do just that]. Authenticity should
be something we all help one another realize.”
It’s a prominent theme in both Vaid-Menon’s work and
their day-to-day life. And at a time when legal discrimination
against LGBTQIA2S+ people in the United States is at a
record-breaking high, having the courage to pursue the most
authentic version of themself is no small feat. According to
the Movement Advancement Project (a non-profit devoted
to providing research, insight and analysis that help promote
equality and opportunity for all), U.S. government branches,
from local to federal, proposed well over 725 anti-LGBTQIA2S+
bills. These include restricting health- and gender-affirming
care for transgender youth and adults, banning drag shows in
public spaces, rolling back protections for same-sex marriages
and censoring books by queer writers—the list goes on. But
these human-rights violations aren’t just happening stateside.
A visible campaign of hate—including the recent “1 Million
March 4 Children” rally led by right-wing conspiracy theorists
protesting sexual-orientation and gender-identity studies in the
Canadian school system—is accelerating at an alarming rate in
“liberal” Canada. “Sometimes it feels like every day is a potential
doomsday scenario,” says Vaid-Menon. “But my art continually
returns me to love and continually grounds me in my truth and
the beauty of the world. Art continues to give me hope.”
Born to Malaysian and Indian immigrant parents, Vaid-
Menon grew up in College Station, a conservative small town in
Texas. “At every level, I was told that people like me—non-white,
non-Christian, non-hetero, non-cis—were dirty, unwelcome
[and] fundamentally wrong,” they say. After years of being
reduced to merely their appearance, the often bearded—and
unapologetically hairy—poet started writing Femme in Public
(released in 2017), a collection of raw, heart-achingly honest
letters to those who harassed them on the street. “I expected to
find bitterness on the other side of my pen, but instead I found
a bountiful love,” they share, having realized that those who
lash out are also hurting from the straitjacket of the gender
binary (a colonial by-product that separates complex souls into
PHOTOGRAPHY, LAURA SHEPHERD
two categories: male and female). “Poetry taught me how to be
soft with the people and hard with the problem. To this day,
poetry is responsible for my compassion practice.”
Across their work, the artist has continually tried to uplift
the message that trans rights are not a minority issue; they
are about everyone. For them, a world beyond the gender
PROFILE
binary would not only allow all people to determine what
gender means to them but also foster an appreciation for
complexity over prescribed conformity. Much of that desire
for something better stems from their experiences growing
up in a South Asian household. “It’s sad because even though
non-binary and gender-nonconforming people have existed
in South Asia for thousands of years—with different names
and cultural roles—no one told me that,” says Vaid-Menon.
“So many of our rituals, our ways of coming together, were
structured by binary gender norms. No one asked me who I
was; there was an assumption of who I was supposed to be.
That was very painful. It took me spending time in India on
my own and connecting with Indian queer communities to
help me heal that wound.”
If that sounds similar to the storyline of the hit CBC Gem
series Sort Of, that’s because it is. At the end of season two, the
main character, Sabi, is dealing with the sudden passing of their
Muslim father and is uncomfortably thrust into performing
duties traditionally carried out by the son. For the third and
final season (streaming now), Vaid-Menon will feature along-
side Bilal Baig, the series’ star and co-creator, who was also
the first trans-feminine Muslim lead actor on a prime-time
series in Canada.
When asked about how we can deconstruct the gender
binary, Vaid-Menon says that it starts with challenging mis-
information that’s presented as truth. “There are no ‘men’s
clothes’ or ‘women’s clothes’; there are pants, skirts, dresses,
shirts—articles of clothing that can be worn by anybody who
wants to wear them!” they say. Perhaps more importantly, this
long-overdue visibility will teach us that gender is not necessarily
about what we look like but who we are.
ALOK’S RECOMMENDED READS
DECOLONIZE DRAG
BY KAREEM KHUBCHANDANI
“A powerful celebration of drag artistry across
the world.”
SIPPING DOM PÉRIGNON THROUGH A STRAW:
REIMAGINING SUCCESS AS A DISABLED ACHIEVER
BY EDDIE NDOPU
“A riveting story of grit and glamour by a Black queer
disabled individual.”
MISS MAJOR SPEAKS: CONVERSATIONS WITH
A BLACK TRANS REVOLUTIONARY
BY TOSHIO MERONEK & MISS MAJOR GRIFFIN-GRACY
“A powerful oral history by a trans elder who was
at the [1969] Stonewall riots.”
YOU CAN’T BE SERIOUS
BY KAL PENN
“A first-hand account of navigating South Asian
representation in Hollywood.”
ELLECANADA.COM 49
 ON REPEAT
Can’t find anything good on TV—or streaming platforms?
It’s time to give in to the joys of rewatching.
By PATRICIA KAROUNOS
A STRANGE THING HAPPENED this past summer. Anyone who
had some kind of passing interest in TV seemed to be talking
about the show Suits. I watched the legal dramedy—starring
a pre-royal Meghan Markle as an ambitious paralegal and
Canadian Patrick J. Adams as an unlicensed lawyer with a
photographic memory—when it first aired, from 2011 to 2019,
hence my confusion about its relevance in 2023. But, sure
enough, the show had recently been added to Netflix in the
U.S., and it spread far and fast. As of early October, it had spent
a record-setting 12 weeks on the top of the Nielsen Streaming
chart—the longest a show has ever claimed the number one spot.
Suits’ rise to streaming domination is partly due to people
discovering the show for the first time, but I know, anecdotally,
that a fair share of its new-found popularity is because having
it back in the conversation has prompted past viewers to revisit
the series. Then it clicked: There are few things I find more
comforting than rewatching some of my favourite shows. Am
I overwhelmed and stressed? Let’s reunite with my friends in
the New Girl loft. Feeling sad? Time to return to cozy Stars
Hollow and the perpetually autumnal vibes of Gilmore Girls.
Need a healthy dose of escapism? California, here we come,
thanks to The O.C.
“[Rewatching TV] is very reassuring,” agrees Alan Sepinwall,
chief TV critic at Rolling Stone and the author of a new book about
the aforementioned series, Welcome to The O.C.: The Oral History.
“It’s not just about feeling comforted by a thing you like. A lot
of the time, it takes you back to an earlier moment. It’s nice and
innocent.” Look at, say, Friends, which had a resurgence among
millennials a few years ago. Part of its appeal, says Sepinwall,
50 ELLECANADA.COM
is that cellphones, modern technology and the doomscrolling
of a 24-7 news cycle did not factor in at all, which is helpful
when you’re spending multiple hours and days with a familiar
tale. And in a world where streaming has completely changed
our relationship with TV and offered up, frankly, too many
options (according to John Landgraf, chair of the FX network,
599 English-language scripted shows were available in the U.S.
in 2022—7 percent more than the year before), rewatching
something you know you’re going to love is the easier choice.
What actually makes a show rewatchable, then? “It has
to be good—but sometimes people rewatch crap, so maybe
that’s not the thing,” says Sepinwall, only half joking. “It has to
take place in an interesting world. Whether that’s the fabulous
McMansions of Orange County or just a loft apartment in
downtown Los Angeles, it has to feel like you’re being taken
somewhere that either you’ve never been to or that you haven’t
been to in a while. And it has to have distinctive characters you
want to spend time with, because that, more than anything else,
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF THE CW TELEVISION NETWORK
is what series television is about.” And it has to feel like classic
TV, because while you might have enjoyed that atmospheric
prestige streaming miniseries you watched three years ago,
you’re not likely to return to it as you wouldn’t have formed
the kind of connection you made with an episodic story you
spent every week watching at one point in your life.
So, the next time you find yourself mindlessly scrolling through
rows and rows of “content” in search of the next great thing that
never seems to come, seek solace in an old favourite—it could
just be the salve you didn’t know you needed. After all, there’s
nothing wrong with a bit of comfort food every now and then.

CANADIAN
CREATIVES
ON THEIR
FAVOURITE
REWATCHABLE
SHOWS.
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF RAKHEE MORZARIA, HEATHER SAITZ (A. BUCSIS), KRIS COLLINS & MAY TRUONG (S. LEIGH HENRY)
ANASTASIA BUCSIS
Olympian and CBC Sports host
“ Buffy the Vampire Slayer was the first
show that made me feel like I had
a place in this world because of its
representation of queer characters
and its ability to tackle coming-of-age
stories through monster metaphors. It’s
perfectly balanced and just plain fun.
Even though it has been off the air for
20 years, it’s still some of the freshest,
most thoughtful storytelling I’ve ever
come across. Sarah Michelle Gellar is
also a force, and her performance is
sinfully underrated.”
EPISODES TO (RE)WATCH “‘Hush,’
‘Once More, With Feeling’ and ‘The
Body’ are some of the greatest pieces
of television ever created.”
TELEVISION
RAKHEE MORZARIA
Actor, CBC’s Run the Burbs
“My go-to show to rewatch is
The Good Wife. I love Kalinda
Sharma—icon—played by
Archie Panjabi. And it’s a really
well-written and topical show.
But mostly I just like to drink wine
in my fanciest glass and pretend
that I’m a lawyer.”
EPISODES TO (RE)WATCH “I love
any that have a good will-they-
won’t-they moment between
Alicia and Will.”
KRIS COLLINS
TikTok content creator (a.k.a. @kallmekris)
“I love rewatching Game of Thrones
because it’s so beautifully written
and has so much incredibly detailed
lore—I always find that there are
small details I missed in previous
viewings. This makes rewatching
it enjoyable and fun. Plus, the
character development and plot
lines are the best in any series,
hands down. Let’s just not talk about
season eight.”
EPISODE TO (RE)WATCH “My
favourite has to be ‘The Dragon
SASHA LEIGH HENRY
and the Wolf.’ So much comes to
Creator of Bria Mack Gets a Life on Crave
light. Even knowing what’s going to
happen, I still feel satisfied every time.” “I love ’90s and 2000s sitcoms,
and I go through phases where I’ll
pick one and exhaust it for months,
watching it on repeat every night. It’s
really like picking a favourite child—I
love Martin , Living Single, Seinfeld ,
The Office, Broad City and, recently,
Abbott Elementary. I love to laugh, and
it’s comforting to watch something
I know is going to deliver on that—
especially when I’ve had a hard day
or the world is feeling a bit bleak.
Comedy is my salve.”
EPISODES TO (RE)WATCH
Seinfeld’s “The Opposite”
and Broad City ’s “In Heat”
ELLECANADA.COM 51
PIERLUC DALLAIRE (FRONT) DANCING AT STUD COUNTRY IN L.A.

GET IN LINE A new queer line-dancing movement in Los Angeles

is heel tapping its way into Canadian nightlife.
By JOANNA FOX
PHOTOGRAPHY, CLAIRE PRESTON

IT’S 8 P.M. ON A MONDAY NIGHT at the end of August—one of
those perfect warm late-summer Montreal evenings when the
moon is plump and low-hanging and everyone seems to be out,
eating and drinking on terraces and spilling out onto the streets.
The last thing anyone would want to do is be in an upstairs
enclosed space. But I make my way up the time-worn wooden
staircase that leads to Champs, a queer-friendly sports bar on
Saint Laurent Boulevard, and find that the room is packed with
people ready for Spurs, the bar’s new line-dancing night. Some
patrons are sporting cowboy boots and denim vests, some are in
tasselled shirts, but most, like me, are simply in jeans and a tank
top. It’s already hot in here, and we haven’t even begun dancing yet.

52 ELLECANADA.COM

Our host for the evening,
filmmaker Pat Kiely, stands on
a platform at the front of the
room holding a microphone and
wearing worn-in black leather
boots, white jeans and a short-
sleeved collared shirt that has a
whisper of Western vibes. He
announces that he’s going to
be leading us solo because his
teaching partner, Canadian
actor Kathleen Munroe, has a
new gig in Toronto (everyone
cheers in support), and then he
reminds the crowd of the golden
rule: “No drinks on the dance
f loor!” Shania Twain’s “Any
Man of Mine” starts playing,
Kiely calls out the moves and
everyone breaks into a routine
that’s “relatively simple,” accord-
ing to the regulars, who are
stepping, kicking, heel tapping
and clapping to my left and
right. After all, we’re just getting
warmed up.
This is not the first time I’ve
been invited to line dance over
the past few months. When I
was visiting Los Angeles, former Montrealer (and an old col-
league of mine) Pierluc Dallaire wanted me to experience Stud
Country, a queer line-dancing night at Club Bahia in the city’s
Echo Park borough. It was founded by Sean Monaghan and
Bailey Salisbury in 2021 after Oil Can Harry’s—the oldest
gay club in L.A.—sadly closed after 52 years of business. It
was well known for its Friday line-dancing night and was a
key safe space for the LGBTQIA2S+ community. Monaghan
and Salisbury had been dancing there since 2017, so when it
shuttered, they decided to find a new home for the night they
cherished so much.
Dallaire, who is the director of operations at Botanica, a
restaurant in the L.A. neighbourhood of Silver Lake, had been
taking recreational dance classes pre-pandemic and felt very
isolated during the lockdown months. “Everything was still
closed, and we were doing a [dance] class in the park, and it
kind of sucked,” recalls Dallaire. “One of my friends was like,
‘Hey, you should go see Bailey and Sean; they’re doing this
night called “Stud Country.”’ We were only about 20 people in
this weird space with our masks on in the middle of summer,
and it was really hot, but it was so much fun. Then it just kind
CULTURE
of became a community with a really cool, inclusive space to
hang out, have fun and meet friends—and just line dance.”
Kiely and Munroe, who are from Montreal and Toronto
respectively, also became regulars at Stud Country while living
in L.A. and fell in love with not only the dancing but also how it
made them feel like they were part of something special. Kiely
was dancing at well-known choreographer Ryan Heffington’s
former studio, The Sweat Spot, when he heard about Club
Bahia. “I don’t drink, so it’s sort of challenging to find social
activities that are stimulating and also get your endorphins
going,” explains Kiely. “The line-dancing community is just
wonderful—it’s not competitive, and you’re building something
together. It can be almost spiritual, where you get a high just
from dance.” For Munroe, who lives between L.A. and Toronto
with her wife, taking part was unlike any other experience
she’d had. “It’s pretty intersectional in terms of not just being
a lesbian event, not just being a gay-guy event, not just being
even a queer event—it’s really open to supportive allies [like
Kiely] and open to [any] age,” she says.
Although communal line dancing has a long history—the
first known instructions were recorded in a book of dance
sheets dating back to the 1650s in England—its current form
started to become popular in the U.S. during the late 1950s,
and it has had a slow but steady ascent since then. What made
Oil Can Harry’s, in particular, unique was that it was a safe,
non-judgmental place for same-sex couples to line dance
together and just be themselves. It wasn’t so much about the
line dancing (which in itself was popular); rather, it was about
the environment and how it transformed into more than just
a bar for its patrons. That’s why Monaghan and Salisbury
created Stud Country and why this event has been catching
on with a new, younger generation who are seeking both a
good time and an open-minded community.
Dallaire was so taken with the weekly dance events that he
began searching for others and discovered the L.A. Wranglers,
a non-profit queer line-dancing troupe that was started 22
years ago. He auditioned, got in and now travels around the
U.S. and performs at various events, including the Stagecoach
Festival, L.A. Pride and San Francisco’s Sundance Stompede.
It’s a volunteer association that partners with other groups
nationally and internationally—it’s even part of the same close-
knit network as Club Bolo in Montreal, a line-dancing troupe
in the Village neighbourhood that’s been around for 20 years.
Although the Wranglers’ skill level is new to Dallaire, line
dancing was very much a part of his upbringing in Quebec’s
Montérégie region. “When I was 10, my aunts would come
pick me up every Monday and drive me to the town next to
ours for line dancing,” he says. “It’s so funny that now I’m into
it again but also that it’s the same routines from some of these
old songs I learned 30 years ago.”
ELLECANADA.COM 53
 CULTURE

PAT KIELY AND KATHLEEN MUNROE

“You don’t need

to be great to do it.
The fact that
we can teach without
being professional
dancers speaks to the
accessibility of it.”
– KATHLEEN MUNROE

At the line-dancing evenings, there are

usually two routines that are taught each night;
then the floor opens up to let people do routines
they’ve learned in the past. All the dances
are designed to be paired with specific songs.
“Most of the big dances that everyone loves
come from [just a few] choreographers,” says
Dallaire. “There are websites where you can
find all the spec sheets—you can look up the
name of the song, and then you’ll find a sheet
that [outlines] the dance.” Kiely also finds it
helpful to look up YouTube videos in which
the dances are performed step by step; it’s how he and Munroe Munroe are not professional dancers; they just want to share
learn a lot of the choreography they teach. To prepare, they the thrill, good vibes and open-minded atmosphere that these
spend hours rehearsing and memorizing the moves for each nights give to them.
song. The choice of song and dance speed really depends on There is, without a doubt, admiration in the crowd for those
the club and the predominant age of the dancers. For example, who nail the routines, but there are many people, like me,
the new generation of line-dancing nights, like Stud Country who just want to try it out—to move and have fun. “You don’t
and Spurs, include more contemporary songs and are not need to be great to do it,” reiterates Munroe. “The fact that
limited to country music—there’s just as much Britney Spears we can teach without being professional dancers speaks to the
as there is Brooks & Dunn—and the choreography is often accessibility of it. It’s not competitive; it’s also not performative.
faster. That’s why Dallaire, who now teaches at Stud Country It’s communal—so much of it is about moving together.” Kiely
once in a while, has started a new, slower-paced class. “I’m agrees. “We forget how physical we are as human beings,” he
teaching a group of 70- to 80-year-old ladies in Beverly Hills says. “We forget what beautiful vessels we’re in and that we’re
at the Four Seasons Hotel,” he says with a laugh. “They love capable of so much.”
PHOTOGRAPHY, BRITTANY CARMICHAEL

it. And so do I.”
When Kiely moved back home to Montreal this past summer,
he reached out to Munroe, who was spending time in Toronto,
to see if she would be interested in starting a line-dancing night
at Champs with him. It was so successful that the pair tested
it out in Toronto, and it has now found a home at the city’s
Owls Club. It should be noted that, like Dallaire, Kiely and
After my evening at Spurs—which I went into with abso-
lutely no dance experience and no expectations—I completely
understand why so many people get hooked on line dancing
and why there’s such a strong desire to honour these spaces
and spread the joy they bring. “I felt very moved by it almost
immediately,” says Munroe. “Often at Bahia, I would be crying
a little on the dance floor, just in awe of it all.”

54 ELLECANADA.COM
 DEBUT

SACHA
The Canadian artist is ready to take
over country music.
By PATRICIA KAROUNOS

SINGER-SONGWRITER SACHA WAS BORN IN MONTREAL but

moved to the small town of Warkworth, Ont., with her family
when she was just a toddler. She didn’t know then that the
quaint rural setting would be a major influence behind her
pursuit of country music years later. It was about 10 years ago
that the musician decided to chase her dream career, and she
knew there was a long road ahead. “I look back and I don’t
know how I did it,” she says from Nashville, Tenn., where
she now lives part-time. (When back in Canada, she lives in
Oshawa, Ont.) “I remember looking up studios, finding the
head contacts and just messaging them.” She discovered that
Canadian musician advocacy group SOCAN has a house in
the country-music mecca where you can stay for free if you’re a
songwriter, so down south she went. “I remember walking up
and down Music Row and handing out my CD,” she recalls.
She self-released her debut EP, The Best Thing, in July 2020
and has since released hit tracks with Canadian heavy hitters
like The Reklaws and, more recently, Tyler Shaw. But the tide
really shifted in 2021 when she was named one of Country
Music Television’s Next Women of Country, a program that point when I was working for this company that ended up fold-
supports up-and-coming women artists and earned her much ing, and I was like: ‘To heck with this, man. I’m going to do music.’
more industry attention. And after a decade of hustling, the I picked up a guitar and started writing. Taylor Swift was just on
artist’s biggest break yet came this year: her first record deal the scene, and I was so encouraged by her. I hit the open mikes,
with a major label, Sony Music Entertainment Canada. Now started putting myself out there—terrified—and the rest is history.”
that she has a full-length LP in the works, 2024 looks like it’s set
to be the year of SACHA. “It feels like a full-circle moment,” FOR THE ART “[Songwriting] is a really tough road. It’s devastating
she says. “It’s been a long time coming. I’ve been working at times. The only reason I’m here is because I have a strong con-
toward this dream forever.” viction. It’s like do or die. There’s this haunting thing inside me that
keeps reminding me that this is what I’m here to do.”
SMALL-TOWN LIVING “My parents are musical—they had a
band—so we had every instrument in the house. They’d have TRUE SOUL “I can do anything, really, because I’ve had every
rehearsals—we’d have backyard bonfires and everyone would musical influence, which has prepared me to play all sorts of
play around the fire. Music was playing 24-7, [so it’s] been a way genres. But for me, country music is a natural thing. I grew up on
of life for me since [I was] young. There were a lot of good times milk farms in a small town, playing Garth Brooks, Shania Twain
and bad times living in a small town—there was zero diversity— and Faith Hill with friends. It’s just authentic to me and takes me
but we still felt at home. It was all we ever knew. We grew lots of our back to my roots, and I love the fact that I get to tell my story
food in our backyard, and we’d have sleepovers with friends who through country music.”
lived on farms. It was the country-music, country-living lifestyle.”
PHOTOGRAPHY, AUSTIN CHAFFE

GROWING PAINS “I always had this dream to [pursue a career
in] music—I’d do talent shows and write songs. But then life hap-
pens and you have nowhere to go; you have to work full-time and
pay your own rent. I was in survival mode, so the dream took a bit
of a back seat. But I always knew it had to happen. There was a
NEW SOUND “I have evolved. The stuff that I started out doing
was more, like, backwoods bluegrass folk-Americana. Now, I’m
more into the pop-country world. But you’re hearing every influ-
ence in country right now, whether it’s hip hop, soul, gospel or
rock—it’s all meshing together. I’m working on my album right
now and pulling from all the stuff that I love.”

ELLECANADA.COM 55
 THE
AI
BIAS
Artificial intelligence, with its
scaremongering headlines around
its future and ours, doesn’t get
good press. But there are a number
of women in the field working to
detoxify AI, and they say now is the
time to pay attention and get involved.
By ROSAMUND DEAN
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT when you think of artificial intel-
ligence? Perhaps the Terminator movies, where the machines
rise up and destroy us. Or perhaps you don’t think AI is worth
worrying about until Siri is capable of playing the song you
actually asked for. Many people fall into one of two camps: Either
they have a fear of some future robot apocalypse or they feel
that AI is tech-bro baloney that’s irrelevant to normal people.
The trouble is neither camp is engaging with it, so they’re not
seeing all the ways AI is affecting our lives right now.
Tech experts agree that AI will be as transformative for
the world as the internet has been. But the story of AI—from
Alan Turing’s work in the past century to “Godfather of AI”
Geoffrey Hinton’s multi-layered neural networks—has so far
been written by men. “It’s true that the field is shaped dispropor-
tionately by white dudes, and this is the case in both academic
and commercial spaces,” says Brittany Smith, associate fellow
at Cambridge University’s Leverhulme Centre for the Future
of Intelligence. “This means that biases can be encoded into
AI systems in lots of ways.”
Since OpenAI launched the widely used ChatGPT at the
end of last year, tech giants such as Microsoft and Google have
been in a race to introduce similar products. The ensuing
frenzy has caused panic that we’re moving too fast. A group
of prominent computer scientists signed an open letter insisting
that AI development be paused because “human-competitive
intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity,”
from spreading misinformation and automating jobs to more
catastrophic future risks that we can’t yet imagine. Even Hinton
56 ELLECANADA.COM
has warned that in the wrong hands, this technology could be
devastating. Meanwhile, Christopher Nolan says that his film
Oppenheimer, about the development of the atomic bomb, contains
“very strong parallels” with AI, and the whole of Hollywood
was recently on strike for fear of what AI might mean for their
jobs. It’s scary to think that the genie might be out of the bottle
and little wonder that so many of us take a head-in-the-sand
approach. But there is a bright spot in this story: the women
working to create positive change and make AI a force for good.
One of the areas where AI most affects our day-to-day is the
workplace, particularly when it comes to recruitment. “It’s one
of the civil-rights issues of our time,” says Hilke Schellmann, an
Emmy-award-winning investigative reporter and author of the
upcoming book The Algorithm: How AI Decides Who Gets Hired,
Monitored, Promoted and Fired and Why We Need to Fight Back Now.
“We are automating all of the inequities we already have, and
it goes unnoticed.” If an AI system designed to scan CVs has
been programmed using those of previous successful candidates,
then it might adopt historical prejudices. For example, if people
who were successful in a particular role before tended to be
middle-class white men, then the algorithm will favour certain
words, schools or even particular hobbies. So a woman might
be perfect for the job but her CV would be rejected because
it doesn’t meet the nebulous criteria based on who has done
PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY
that role in the past.
Then there are issues with facial-recognition technology,
which is being used for recruitment, with AI analyzing a
person’s words, intonation and facial expressions. But what if
 TECHNOLOGY

these are misread? What if you’re prone to “resting bitch face,” about the future. “It’s a field where there has been a lot of good
where your neutral expression is perceived as irritated? This work,” she says. Some of that work has been around finding ways
afflicts many of us but is almost always attributed to women. to regulate these systems. Lila Ibrahim is COO of DeepMind, the
“A computer might assume that because you’re smiling, you’re AI-focused arm of Google. She started her career as an engineer
a happy person, but that’s not scientifically rigorous,” says on Intel’s Pentium processor in 1993, so she has seen extraordinary
Schellmann. “And what happens if we’re being compared change over the past 30 years. “The responsibility to ensure that
with successful candidates who are white men? Do they have this technology is representative, inclusive and equitable falls on
expressions that perhaps women, or women of colour, don’t?” us all across tech, government and civil society,” she says. “Like
It’s no coincidence that the earliest critics of AI have been any transformative technology, AI demands exceptional care.
women of colour who quickly realized that their experience That’s why we prioritize diverse perspectives and bring outside
of being marginalized in life was showing up in AI tools. In voices in—to hold us accountable.”
2018, Joy Buolamwini published a study called Gender Shades, She uses the example of DeepMind’s AlphaFold database,
about how facial-recognition systems are inaccurate when used a system that predicts a protein’s 3-D structure based on its
with darker skin. “That form of inaccuracy can lead to people amino-acid sequence, accelerating biological research. “Before
being falsely accused of crimes, which has a direct effect on releasing it, we sought input from more than 30 experts across
their life,” says Smith. “If you’re in jail for the weekend while biology research, security and ethics to help us understand how
you wait to see a judge on Monday morning, you might lose to best share the technology with the world.” She says that
your job or not see your kids.” AI has the potential to help solve some of humanity’s biggest
Worrying about a sci-fi-style apocalypse is something of challenges. “But it must be built responsibly, with diversity,
a distraction from the very real issues that are affecting us equity and inclusion as a priority, not a bolt-on,” she insists.
right now. “So much of the public imagination around AI is “There’s no silver bullet, so we must work to make sure these
focused on speculative existential harms,” says Smith. “Will AI voices have a seat at the table.”
systems become more intelligent than The absence of that silver bul-
us and decide to harm us? Maybe. But let means we’re lucky that there are
your life is already being affected by WORRYING ABOUT smart, focused and ethical individuals
AI systems in ways that we can solve. A SCI-FI-STYLE working in this field, one of whom is
Our ability to intervene successfully APOCALYPSE IS Verity Harding, a globally recognized
today is directly connected to bigger, expert in AI, technology and public
more complex interventions we might SOMETHING OF A policy. Formerly of DeepMind, she is
need in the future. Ignoring what’s right DISTRACTION FROM the founder of tech-consultancy firm
in front of us would be bizarre.” The THE VERY REAL ISSUES Formation Advisory and an affiliated
answer, adds Smith, is in public aware- researcher at Cambridge University’s
ness and participation. “We need more THAT ARE AFFECTING US Bennett Institute for Public Policy. She
public engagement and deliberative RIGHT NOW. rejects the narrative (as referenced by
democracy,” she insists. “Some AI Nolan) that likens AI’s advent to that of
companies have launched efforts to gauge what people think the atomic bomb. “In a democracy, we can all have a say,” she
are appropriate uses of AI. This is great, but we shouldn’t be says. “I’d encourage anyone who’s concerned or excited about
solely dependent on the goodwill of companies to do the right the potential uses of AI to get involved in trying to shape it,
thing for our democracy. This is why it’s so promising that whether by writing to their MP with their views, demanding
governments are paying much closer attention now and why that schools and workplaces have clear AI policies or simply
it’s important that we all think about how to maximize benefits reading more about the subject to understand the clear links
while minimizing risks.” between politics and technology.”
Tech is also a space where women are having some influence Harding’s debut book, AI Needs You: How We Can Change
on the future of AI. Partnership on AI is a non-profit global AI’s Future and Save Our Own (out in March 2024), points to an
alliance of more than 100 organizations, including Meta, Apple, achievable future in which AI serves purpose rather than profit
Google and IBM. “Our goal is to advance the development of and is firmly rooted in societal trust. “The good news is that
AI so that it benefits people and society,” says CEO Rebecca what we call ‘AI’ is actually just people,” she says. “It’s people
Finlay. “We were founded in 2016 when people were starting building new technology and making decisions about what it
to see that although AI has the potential to be extraordinarily should look like and how it should be used.”
positive, it can also be biased and harmful.” And if you think Finlay, Ibrahim, Harding and other women are helping
that you can somehow go through life without engaging with create a more diverse AI workforce, which will expand AI’s
it, Finlay has news for you. “If you’re on TikTok, you’re using creative output. It seems that now is the time to start influencing
AI. If you use Google Maps, you’re using AI. I’d encourage the narrative around AI and how this technology will affect
people to acknowledge that and take a look at those systems and our lives. Humans are still the ones in control here, and we’re
think: How is this working to help me? And how, potentially, already seeing great advances in science and medicine. Forget
could it be hindering me? Because you can’t just disengage. the idea of a robot apocalypse (for now, anyway). Because if we
The reality is that we’re all engaging with it every single day.” were to overlook the benefits of AI out of fear or complacency,
And while Finlay acknowledges the issues, she is optimistic that would be the more imminent catastrophe.

ELLECANADA.COM 57
 GUESSING GAME Canadian novelist NITA PROSE is
entering a new chapter—and wants
to take you with her.
By PATRICIA KAROUNOS

“SOMEBODY GOT THE MATH WRONG.” That’s what Canadian writer-editor Nita Prose
first thought when she heard that her debut novel, The Maid, had sold over one mil-
lion copies in North America (and even more in the 40-plus countries it’s available in
around the world). But there was no mistake. The 2022 whodunit, about fast-thinking,
straightforward hotel maid Molly, who is accused of murder after she finds a wealthy
guest dead in his room, remains a literary phenomenon. It was an instant bestseller
in Canada, spent weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list, was a Good Morning
America Book Club pick and has been honoured with a flurry of awards, including a
win at Australia’s prestigious Ned Kelly Awards for Best International Crime Fiction.
PHOTOGRAPHY, DAHLIA KATZ PHOTOGRAPHY (N. PROSE)

It’s even in development to be adapted into a film, which is slated to star Florence Pugh.
And with all the fervour, it became clear—from both a business point of view and the
many enthusiastic readers Prose has interacted with—that people wanted more of
Molly the maid and her cozy mysteries.
Prose, however, wasn’t immediately convinced. “The tricky part was how to
deliver more without delivering less,” she says. “The challenge was whether I could
unveil a new story that would do Molly justice rather than diminish a character that
so many readers hold close to their hearts. I said to myself and my editors: ‘I’m only
going to commit to this once I feel I have something that is as good or better than
The Maid. You will never see it if I don’t think I’ve succeeded.’”

58 ELLECANADA.COM

“I WRITE FOR READERS. MY GOAL IS NOT TO
COMPLETE THE PICTURE BUT TO LEAVE
ENOUGH SPACE FOR THEM TO EMBELLISH,
SEE AND CREATE IN THEIR OWN MINDS.”
Then came what the writer calls “a lightning bolt” of an
idea. Prose had been toying with setting a story in an old house
filled with history and secrets when she was travelling in the
U.K. to promote The Maid. While there, she visited a museum
in a castle and came across two unusual items: a mummified
rat carcass and an old silver spoon. As it turned out, this was a
commemorative display for a maid who’d worked in the castle
long ago and been fired for stealing silverware—though she
claimed she didn’t do it. Years after her firing, when restoration
work was being done on the building, the walls were opened up
and the missing silverware was found in a rat’s nest. Suddenly,
Prose couldn’t get her mind to stop whirring.
That parable is how she starts The Mystery Guest, a stand-
alone sequel to The Maid that hits shelves on November 28
(and is published by Viking Canada). Molly is back, but now
she’s the head maid at the Regency Grand Hotel and much
more self-assured and secure with where she’s at in life. But
when a famed reclusive author—whom Molly’s kind-hearted
late gran worked for decades earlier—drops dead during an
event at the hotel, Molly finds herself back in the middle of a
criminal investigation, and it’s being led by the same detective
who tried to pin the last murder on her. Whereas The Maid
was, in part, about exploring how human connection and care
should be enough to set aside differences, The Mystery Guest
homes in on how finding a sense of belonging can change how
you operate in the world. “It’s really about growth and coming
into yourself,” says Prose, who is also the vice-president and
editor-in-chief at Simon & Schuster Canada in Toronto under
her full name, Nita Pronovost. (She adopted “Prose” as a pen
name to distinguish between her dual roles in the publishing
world.) “And with that growth comes a real curiosity about
who other people are too—when you grow into yourself, you
have more room to consider others.”
Molly isn’t the only one who has gone on
a journey of self in between the two books.
As a writer, Prose has evolved too and now
feels a greater sense of confidence and trust in
herself as she works. This has also led to her
finding more enjoyment in the act of writing,
something most writers will tell you is hard to
do. It’s a long way from the rural route outside
of Toronto that Prose grew up on—but, then
again, not quite.
She’s always been a fanatical “omnivore”
reader, eagerly tearing through books of any
and every genre. “I loved the sense of escape
reading gave me—the feeling of being trans-
BOOKS
ported to different worlds and understanding different people
through characters,” says Prose. “I was often reading things
that were supposedly for ‘older,’ more ‘mature’ kids, and I’m
sure I didn’t understand everything I was reading at the time,
but I loved the feeling of curiosity and [hoped] that maybe
one day I would come to understand these things more fully.”
But writing wasn’t a career she chased. She spent time as a
special-education teacher, sharing her love of reading with
her students, before going to school for publishing, which is
how she ended up working at Simon & Schuster Canada.
As an editor, Prose has overseen titles by Ruth Ware, Kate
Morton, Iain Reid and Rupi Kaur. She’s even ghostwritten
books and published reviews. And although reading, teaching
and editing have all occupied a similar space in her brain,
writing professionally—crafting her own stories actually
intended for other people to read—still wasn’t something
she ever considered.
Until a lightning bolt—different from the one that sparked
The Mystery Guest—struck, that is. In 2019, Prose was on a
business trip when she walked into her hotel room and startled
a maid who was tidying up. She has often talked about how
that interaction made her realize that being a maid is both
an invisible and an incredibly intimate job, and on the plane
home, she started writing what would become The Maid and
couldn’t stop. “The lightning bolt is just one glorious gift—then
there’s the hard part,” she says. “When I got that idea, there
was something about it that made me really want to try to get
through the tough stuff. I wanted to see, just for myself, if I
could make it to the end of that story.”
Now Prose knows that there’s an actual audience for her
writing, so she did feel some pressure as she worked on her
second novel, especially after the beyond-expectations success
of her debut. But she wouldn’t change a thing.
In her mind, the relationship between writer
and reader is symbiotic and invaluable. Books
are the product not just of their authors but of
their readers too. “My feeling has always been
that the book isn’t mine when it’s done—there’s
a feeling of relief that comes over me because
this thing I’ve held close to my heart is no
longer mine and I can give it away, and it can
mean something, hopefully, to someone else,”
she says. “I write for readers. My goal is not to
complete the picture but to leave enough space
for them to embellish, see and create in their
own minds. It makes writing easier because
then I don’t feel completely alone.”
ELLECANADA.COM 59
SHIM-SHIMMER
Frosted lids à la Y2K were
huge on the runways. Pretend
you’re counting down the PLAY
T
last seconds of 1999 with
a medley of silver shadows
(Diorshow 5 Couleurs in 043
Night Walk, $84) going all the
way from your lashes to your
brows. Sometimes, more
really is more.
JACKET AND TURTLENECK (BALENCIAGA),
HAT (HEIRLOOM HATS) AND NECKLACE
(CAROLE TANENBAUM)
FRINGE FEST
Pile on the mascara—the
one and only Diorshow ($40),
of course—to your heart’s
content and channel your
beauty
inner ’60s mod girl. Consider
adding in a few individual
falsies for even more drama.
A simple swipe of gloss (Dior
Addict Lip Maximizer in 050
Holographic Silver, $54)
completes the picture.
COAT (MARNI) AND EARRINGS (BIKO)

TIME
We took Dior Beauty’s holiday collection out for a spin.
Here’s to making the most of the season with bold hues,
twinkling finishes and a hearty dose of fun.
Photographer LIAN BENOIT Creative direction OLIVIA LEBLANC
Text & beauty direction KATHERINE LALANCETTE Makeup CAROLE THE ARTIST
Hair MADDIE ALPER Styling NADIA PIZZIMENTI
SLICK MOVES
BEAUTY
Who says gloss should only
go on your lips? Double the
shine by layering Dior Addict
Lip Maximizer (shown here in
049 Pure Copper, $54) over
gilded shadow (Diorshow 5
Couleurs in 543 Promenade
Dorée, $84). Lips are glazed
with Dior Addict Lip Glow in
058 Opal Pearl ($54).
JACKET (CHRISTIAN DIOR), TURTLENECK
(STYLIST’S OWN) AND EARRINGS
(CAROLE TANENBAUM)

PHOTOGRAPHY,

62 ELLECANADA.COM
I’LL HAVE THE RED
Adopt an all-crimson-
everything motto (after all,
it’s the colour of the season)
with tone-on-tone makeup.
Cheeks get a generous serving
of blush (Rouge Blush in 621
Splendid Rose, $63), while lips
are painted in the iconic 999
(Rouge Dior Forever Liquid,
$58), a red that somehow
looks incredible on everyone.
DRESS (ESTER MANAS AT ABSOLUTELY FABRICS)
 BEAUTY

LOUD MOUTH
It doesn’t get more festive than
glittering lips! Meet the new
sequin-finish version of Rouge
Dior Forever Liquid ($58); it’s
available in four fabulous
shades, including this deep
purple, 993 Magical. The
perfect plus-one for any party.
BLAZER, SHIRT AND BOW TIE (CHRISTIAN DIOR)
PHOTOGRAPHY,

AND EARRING (CAROLE TANENBAUM)

FOR DETAILS, SEE SHOPPING GUIDE.

MODELS, NYADORA JANY (ANITA NORRIS
MODELS), KRISTINE KRAVCHENKO (ANOTHER
SPECIES) AND TIAN GAO (ELITE MODELS
TORONTO); EDITORIAL PRODUCER, PÉNÉLOPE
LEMAY; PHOTOGRAPHER’S ASSISTANTS,
ALJOSA ALIJAGIC AND EMILY GILBERT;
64
STYLIST’S
E LASSISTANT, A . C O MBLAIS
L E C A N A DAUDREY
BLURRED VISION BEAUTY
A blotted Bordeaux lipstain
suggests you’ve just enjoyed a
few champagne sips or maybe
a midnight kiss. Try topping
Rouge Dior in 720 Icône Velvet
(available for the holidays in a
stunning four-lipstick makeup
clutch, $370) with a dab of
Satin Blueberry shadow from
the Dior Backstage Silver
Essentials Eye Palette ($70). Yup,
shadow on the lips—because
the rule is: There are no rules.
DRESS (NICKLAS SKOVGAARD AT SSENSE)
AND EARRINGS (MICHELLE ROSS)
PHOTOGRAPHY,

FROM LEFT: GUERLAIN MÉTÉORITES LIGHT REVEALING PEARLS OF POWDER ($80),

GUCCI ROUGES À LÈVRES VOILE LIPSTICK IN 505 JANET RUST ($61), SHISEIDO
EUDERMINE REVITALIZING ESSENCE 150TH ANNIVERSARY LIMITED EDITION ($78)
AND GUERLAIN SHALIMAR EAU DE PARFUM SPRAY ($102 FOR 30 ML)
RING AND NECKLACES (STYLIST’S OWN) ELLECANADA.COM 65
 BEAUTY
SMARTY-
PANTS
What if we could train our skin
to be more...intelligent?
By THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU
W
E JETTED OFF TO TOKYO, beauty capital of the
world, where it seems cosmetics shops stand on
every corner and the plethora of products on
offer—a mix of cutting-edge innovation and time-honoured
classics—are enough to make even the most seasoned beauty
writer dizzy.
It’s no coincidence that luxury brand Clé de Peau Beauté,
part of the Shiseido group, was born here more than 40 years
ago; pushing the limits of science to better understand skin is
in its DNA. And its latest discovery might be its most exciting
yet. Studies conducted by Shinobu Nakanishi, molecular
biologist and research scientist at Clé de Peau Beauté, and his
team have revealed that our skin cells have receptors that are
tied to the five senses. They allow our epidermis to monitor its
environment and adapt itself to it in a manner that’s completely
independent from our brain.
“We’ve successfully visualized the network in the skin
that is separated from the brain’s neuron network,” explains
Nakanishi. “This discovery represents a significant advancement
in understanding skin behaviour and opens up new possibilities
for further research and development.”
So how do these receptors work exactly? “It’s fascinating
to see that the cells are reacting as if they were thinking for
themselves,” says Nakanishi. “They can even communicate
with each other.” Pretty cool, right? The genes in these cells
form a sort of “community” and react together to different
stimuli—be they positive (such as a pleasant scent, a nourishing
ingredient, a luscious texture) or negative (pollution, stress, UV
rays)—and determine our skin’s key attributes.
The great news is that by upping our skin’s intelligence,
we can actually improve the way our cells interact with each
other, which can directly impact our complexion, affecting
everything from texture to radiance. “Skin with high intelli-
gence is more resilient and adaptive and better equipped to
protect itself from external aggressors such as dryness and UV
damage and internal aggressors such as stress,” says Nakanishi.
66 ELLECANADA.COM
We know we can foster our intellect by reading up on topics
and remaining curious about the world around us, but how
can we go about honing our skin’s intelligence? It’s as simple as
doing something nice for our skin. “By receiving good stimuli,
the intelligence of cells increases and the skin becomes more
and more beautiful,” explains the expert. “Giving your skin
something it enjoys is a very good thing!”
That means smoothing on cocooning products, taking the
time to massage our face and incorporating effective ingredients,
like Clé de Peau Beauté’s new Skin-Empowering Illuminator
complex, which is formulated with platinum gold silk essence,
Japanese pearl-shell extract and theanine as well as perilla and
angelica extracts. (The brand’s glow-enhancing solutions are
now all powered by the special brew.)
It’s a philosophy we could all stand to benefit from—and not
just from a skincare standpoint. It comes down to peppering
our days with little pleasures: petting a purring cat, listening
to a feel-good tune, breathing in a fabulous fragrance... After
all, if positive stimuli are good news for our complexion, why
not let our whole being in on the action?
A+ STUDENT
PHOTOGRAPHY, MARTIN SWEERS/TRUNK ARCHIVE (MAIN IMAGE)
Earn extra credit
with these
skin-intelligence-
boosting formulas.
1.
2.
3.
1. CLÉ DE PEAU BEAUTÉ INTENSIVE FORTIFYING CREAM ($235). 2. CLÉ DE PEAU BEAUTÉ
HYDRO-SOFTENING LOTION ($150). 3. CLÉ DE PEAU BEAUTÉ THE SERUM ($395).
CLEDEPEAUBEAUTE.CA
 SHOPPING

Any hairstylist will tell you that sleeping

on a silk pillowcase is a game-changer
when it comes to preventing breakage
and frizz. Bonus: This one comes with
super-cute scrunchies. SLIP QUEEN GIFT SET
IN CHELSEA ($126, SLIPSILKPILLOWCASE.CA)

Trust Jo Malone to craft one of the

chicest holiday candles ever. Its
comforting scent evokes just-baked
gingerbread yet feels timeless enough
to burn all year round. JO MALONE GINGER
BISCUIT HOME CANDLE ($107, JOMALONE.CA)

With its star-emblazoned tube,

cranberry hue and 3-D glowing
pigments (genius for faking a more

Special
pillowy pout), this lipstick has party
written all over it. CHARLOTTE TILBURY
ROCK LIPS IN READY FOR LUST ($48,
If there’s one skincare brand that
CHARLOTTETILBURY.COM)
will make any beauty fan squeal, it’s
Augustinus Bader. This set—designed
to maintain skin’s radiance through

Delivery
the colder months—combines
the line’s cult-classic moisturizer
with a creamy cleansing gel and
eye-awakening patches. AUGUSTINUS
BADER THE WINTER RADIANCE SYSTEM
($290, AUGUSTINUSBADER.COM)

It’s the most wonderful time

for beauty lovers: when
limited-edition treats and
big-value sets make their way
Calling all sufferers of chapped
onto shelves. This season’s crop lips (which in Canada is all of us):
is seriously good—so good you This jelly-like mask flies to the
rescue, soothing and smoothing
just might be tempted to keep while imparting a sheer berry tint.
TATCHA THE KISSU LIP MASK IN DEEP
it all for yourself. WISTERIA ($39, SEPHORA.CA)

By KATHERINE LALANCETTE
This luscious body polish smells like
a cup of hot cocoa and leaves you
velvety from head to toe—even in
the depths of winter. HERBIVORE HOT
COCO COCONUT OIL BODY SCRUB
($33, HERBIVOREBOTANICALS.COM)

Clé de Peau’s sumptuous

cleansing oil (it gets rid of
every last trace of makeup,
even the waterproof kind)
gets dressed up in whimsical
packaging created by Yes, gifting someone a fragrance
North Vancouver artist is usually a gamble, but there’s
Katie Rodgers. CLÉ DE PEAU truly no going wrong with Chanel’s
BEAUTÉ CLEANSING OIL ($85, iconic Coco Mademoiselle, an
HOLTRENFREW.COM) ambery yet fresh mélange of
orange, jasmine and patchouli. This
beautiful set includes both the eau
de parfum and the body oil. CHANEL
COCO MADEMOISELLE GIFT SET ($253,
CHANEL.COM)

ELLECANADA.COM 67
 EYE
CANDY
After falling by the wayside, bold shadow
is primed for a comeback. Presenting the
fresh, modern way to dress up your lids.
By KATHERINE LALANCETTE

W
HEN MAKEUP BRAND MERIT held a company brain-
storm to discuss making a foray into the eye-colour
category, the first question posed to the team was
“Who here wears eyeshadow?” The response? “Nobody in the
room raised their hand,” recalls chief marketing officer Aila
Morin. “It just wasn’t a relevant everyday product.”
Merit staffers weren’t the only ones who felt that way. After
growing steadily in the 2010s, eyeshadow sales saw a steep decline.
By 2020, they were down by 42 percent, according to a Nielsen
report. While it’d be easy to blame the pandemic, the slump
began well before we all baked our first loaf of sourdough. A
year earlier, The Business of Fashion had published a piece called
“The Great Makeup Crash of 2019,” while Vogue Business had
announced that “The US Cosmetics Boom [Was] Over.”
Analysts cited the growing popularity of skincare as the
main reason why beauty spending habits were changing. The
contoured faces and flat matte lips of the vlogger era were being
replaced by a more natural aesthetic—one that would eventu-
ally come to be known as the “clean girl” look. Elaborate eye
makeup suddenly seemed out of place in the new paradigm.
The way people adorn their eyes actually reveals a lot about

COLLAGE, ANNE-SOPHIE PERREAULT; PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY (CELEBRITIES) & STEVEN PAN (VIOLETTE_FR)
a particular period, says makeup historian Sara Long. “When
we look back through history, it’s very interesting [to see] how
we evoke different emotions with the types of trends, shapes
and colours we use—in particular around the eyes because
the eyes are how we communicate.”
In times of peace and prosperity, for instance, eye makeup
tends to be softer and rounder, whereas it becomes more
angular during moments of political or economic distress. Take
the ’80s, for example—the height of the Cold War, when it
was all about harsh, straight lines. “It was highly reflective of
the anxiety of the time, like, ‘Oh, my gosh, is there going to be
nuclear warfare?’ Makeup mirrors a lot of what’s going on in
the world,” says Long.
So where are we at now, nearly four years since COVID
began? It seems we might be ready to welcome shadow back
into our lives. A survey conducted by Merit showed that while
shadow was the product consumers used least, it was actually the
one they most yearned to see the brand create. The question
was: What would it take to bring eyeshadow back to people’s
 BEAUTY

daily routines? “There was a little trepidation in taking on a
category that everyone wanted but no one was using,” says Morin.
The segment was certainly ripe for a rebrand. Twenty-
shade palettes requiring multiple brushes to apply now felt
overwhelming, not to mention completely at odds with the
current effortless ideal. Consumers wanted simplicity and to
appear as though they hadn’t tried too hard.
Known for its minimalist ethos, Merit sought to capture the
mood with Solo Shadow, a cream-to-powder formula launched
this fall in eight shades: four neutrals and four “statements.” The
finger-friendly texture was specially devised to go on with zero fuss
or fallout and stay put without settling into lines. Most importantly,
its effect is casual enough to sport with a T-shirt and jeans.
That’s precisely the look that’s become French makeup
artist Violette Serrat’s signature. (You might know her better
as Violette_FR, her highly popular social-media handle.)
Somehow, in her Paris-bred expert hands, even sparkly magenta
lids manage to read as the height of insouciance.
Serrat tends to favour applications comprising one or two
colours maximum, usually blended sans brush either just
along the lashes or from lash line to crease. She doesn’t worry
about making it pristine from the outset and simply cleans up
any mess afterwards with a cotton swab dipped in makeup
remover. Easy-peasy.
“It’s a balance—you have to think in a 360-degree way
and not just look at one zone,” she says of how to make vibrant
shadow feel laid-back and not overdone. “So if you do a green
smoky eye, for example, your hair needs to look clean but not
overly styled. Maybe you skip foundation, or use very little,
and you go neutral on the lips.” The outfit is also part of the
equation. Serrat’s favourite ensemble to pair with a bold eye is
a sweatshirt (usually borrowed from her husband), blue jeans
and shoes that “are elegant but not high heels.”
Interestingly, throughout her career, marketing experts have
often warned the pro that there’s little demand for colourful
shadows. “I’d be consulting for companies and people would
tell me, for example, ‘Forget blue—it doesn’t sell,’ and I’d say:
‘But blue is fantastic! It’s just that a really good one hasn’t been
made.’” She’s gone on to design a succession of bestselling
brightly hued eye products for brands like Dior, Estée Lauder,
her own eponymous range and, most recently, Guerlain, where
she serves as creative director of makeup. Her newest collec-
tion for the beauty house includes an opulent holiday palette
featuring flashes of emerald, gold and amethyst.
“I’ve realized people actually do like colour; it’s just a matter
of how it’s developed,” she says. “My biggest joy is creating
strong colours but making them super chic, and so far, it’s
worked really well.”
Merit experienced similar results. Not only did Solo Shadow
prove to be a smashing success, rapidly selling out, but sales
of the “statement” hues—a rich navy, a forest green, a soft
mauve and a charcoal grey—far surpassed projections. “It’s
really interesting because I think as much as we all love an
everyday neutral, there’s almost an appetite for having a little
fun with our makeup again,” says Morin.
Long isn’t surprised. During a time when we were all afraid
of getting sick, it made sense for a fresh, healthy aesthetic—
flushed cheeks, glowing skin—to be all the rage. She views
the return of eyeshadow “as a kind of rebellion in response to
the pandemic, when everything was so restricted.” Now, we’re
ready to let loose, paint our lids with a quick, imperfect swipe
of a finger and enjoy living again.
Because at the end of the day, opting for vivid eyeshadow
shouldn’t be about subscribing to a trend, says Serrat. “You
should go toward colour because you crave it, you have a need
for it and it just makes you feel really good.”

PUT A LID ON IT
A look at the latest and greatest eye adornments.

Hermès recently entered
the eye-makeup space
with a collection of shadows,
mascaras and application
tools. Let’s have a moment of
appreciation for this exquisite
palette-cum-objet d’art.
HERMÈS LE REGARD EYESHADOW
PALETTE IN OMBRES MARINES
($140, HERMES.COM)
Done the Violette way,
twinkling purple feels just as
right at a holiday party as it
does on a regular Tuesday
morning. Also, the liquid
formula is a dream to apply;
simply swipe it on and go.
VIOLETTE_FR YEUX PAINT IN
VIOLETTE SAUVAGE
($42, VIOLETTEFR.COM)
The glittery zebra-striped
packaging alone is enough
to make us covet this limited-
edition palette, but what’s
inside is even better.
GUERLAIN OMBRES G EYESHADOW
QUAD IN 879 GLITTERY TIGER
($105, GUERLAIN.COM)
This is the ideal soft grey for If you think you suck at
creating a smoky eye that’s applying eyeshadow, you
sexy but not severe. We love haven’t tried these sticks.
how the matte finish gives it a With their buttery texture
cool ’90s feel. and easy-to-grip format,
MERIT SOLO SHADOW IN NELSON
they make embellishing lids
($31, MERITBEAUTY.COM) virtually foolproof.
FENTY BEAUTY BY RIHANNA
SHADOWSTIX IN CANDY RAPPER
($34, SEPHORA.CA)

ELLECANADA.COM 69
 LIKE A ONCE SLEEPY NEIGHBOURHOOD
being declared the hip new area, the bar-
rier has become skin’s hottest real estate
of late. Stroll through the beauty aisles
and you’ll find shelves full of launches
solely dedicated to safeguarding this
outermost layer of skin.
Sure, you could discount this as just a
new way to market moisturizer, but there
seems to be more at play here. The trend
signals a significant shift away from the
skincare philosophy that prevailed in
years past—namely that we should buff
and sting our way to a glassy countenance
or reach for the bottles boasting the
highest concentrations of actives.
These days, the focus seems to be on a
gentler, simpler approach. Instead of trying
to obliterate a specific perceived flaw—a
wrinkle here, a dark spot there—the idea
is to treat skin more kindly and holistically.
“Before, we were focusing on exfoliat-
ing and using harsh chemicals, but what
can end up happening is we overindulge
in all the things we think are good for us,”
says Dr. Neha Goyal, co-medical director
at MD Beauty Clinic in Toronto. Not
that retinols or peels are inherently bad,
says the pro. Quite the contrary: They
can be incredibly beneficial. But potent
actives call for caution. Let’s put it this
way: If you’re not seeing the results you
want from your skincare, chances are
you’ve gone too far. “When you strip
away all the oils, the skin starts to act up
because you’re actually working against
your goal,” says Goyal.
Once your barrier is compromised,
you might start to experience things
like redness, itching or sensitivity. “That
inflammation can lead to the develop-
ment of acne and eczema flare-ups,”
says Dr. Monica Li, a Vancouver-based

GOOD
dermatologist, who adds that barrier
damage may be due to your skincare
routine, hot showers or the environment.
“Cold, dry weather is an external factor
that can damage the skin barrier,”
PHOTOGRAPHY, LAUNCHMETRICS SPOTLIGHT (MODEL)

DEFENCE
“Barrier” is beauty’s latest buzzword. Turns out
setting boundaries isn’t just good for your mental
health—it’s essential for your skin too.
By MELISSA FEJTEK
she says. (Canadian winters, anyone?)
When left untreated, this kind of chronic
inflammation can speed up skin aging.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, a
strong barrier translates to a clear, plump
and glowing complexion and skin that
feels soft and smooth to the touch. Who
wouldn’t want that, right? Here, we break
down how to get a healthy barrier and
maintain it all winter long.

70 ELLECANADA.COM

BUILDING BLOCKS
The first thing to understand is how
the barrier functions. Derms often use
the analogy of a brick wall. “You’ve got
your cells, which are the bricks,” says
Goyal. “And then you need something
to seal the bricks so they don’t let any-
thing in.” This “sealant” is made up
of lipids, a combination of ceramides,
cholesterol and fatty acids. They act as
the mortar, holding the bricks together
and creating a defence system for your
skin. This wall prevents microbes
and irritants from entering your skin,
“but at the same time, [the barrier]
is semi-permeable, allowing oxygen,
topical medications and products to
[penetrate it],” says Li.
EASY DOES IT
If you find yourself encountering symp-
toms such as burning, peeling, flaking or
itching, it’s most likely a sign that your
barrier is unhappy at the moment. In
that case, you’ll want to reassess your
routine. “Either what you’re using is too
strong for you or you’re using it too often
and it’s time to step back,” says Goyal.
When this happens, it’s best to steer
clear of anything that could aggravate
the situation, such as harder-to-tolerate
ingredients like retinol and alpha-hy-
droxy acids (glycolic, lactic and mandelic
are some of the most common ones) and
other potential irritants, like fragrance,
alcohol, essential oils and sulphates.
LESS IS MORE
While elaborate routines involving
10-plus steps used to be all the rage, the
pendulum seems to be swinging in the
other direction these days—a trend that’s
come to be known as “skinimalism.” For
dermatologists, who often see patients
come in with rashes, redness or pimples as
a result of overdoing it with their regimen,
the change couldn’t be more welcome.
“When it comes to skincare, more is often
not better,” Li reminds us. That’s why
experts recommend streamlining your
routine if you’re noticing signs of damage.
Think of it as a sort of elimination diet
for your face. It will give your barrier
time to heal, and then, once things calm
down, you can slowly reintroduce and
experiment with targeted products based
on your specific needs and monitor how
your skin reacts.
BEAUTY
BACK TO BASICS
So what should a skincare “makeunder”
look like? “Stick with non-negotiables: a
cleanser, a gentle pH-adjusted moisturizer
and an SPF,” recommends Li. Use only
the bare minimum—at least until your
barrier is back up and running. SHINING ARMOUR
CLEANSE: Choose a cleanser that leaves Serve and protect your barrier
your skin supple rather than dry, espe- with these coddling picks.
cially during the colder months, when
there’s less moisture in the air. “Cleanse
with the goal of removing dirt and
environmental pollutants rather than
excess oils and sweat,” says Li. Look for
a rich oil or cream texture and a formula While some cleansers strip
that includes ingredients like ceramides, skin of moisture, this one
is formulated to fortify the
hyaluronic acid and niacinamide, all of barrier with a blend of lipids
and humectants.
which hydrate and soothe.
SKINFIX BARRIER+ FOAMING OIL
MOISTURIZE: You don’t necessarily have HYDRATING CLEANSER
($40.50, SEPHORA.CA)
to select a moisturizer with the word
“barrier” on the label for it to be effective.
“Most moisturizers are formulated to help This balmy cream calms skin
either protect, restore or repair the barrier on contact, quickly reducing
redness and discomfort
to some degree,” says Li. You do, however, thanks to a special ceramide-
building complex.
want to choose a product containing
DERMALOGICA STABILIZING
ingredients that are clinically proven REPAIR CREAM
($89, DERMALOGICA.CA)
to hydrate the skin, such as glycerine,
colloidal oatmeal and urea. Apply your
cream of choice while your skin is still
damp to get the most out of the product. Formulated with 100 percent
natural-origin ingredients,
“The moisturizer spreads better and also this featherlight oil has
been clinically shown to
traps water at the skin surface,” says Li. strengthen the skin barrier
within seven days.
That said, humectants alone often
REN CLEAN SKINCARE EVERCALM
aren’t enough. Goyal likens it to baking a BARRIER SUPPORT FACE OIL
($81, SEPHORA.CA)
muffin. “If your muffin comes out dry, the
next time you make it, you don’t just add
more water. You have to add something While you’re getting your
rich in fat.” Hence the need for those beauty sleep, this overnight
treatment goes to work,
aforementioned lipids: ceramides, fatty optimizing the barrier
function to reveal a fresher,
acids and cholesterol. more-radiant-looking
complexion. No wonder it
PROTECT: Don’t forget the importance of keeps selling out.
a daily SPF, even in the winter. “You can U BEAUTY THE BARRIER
BIOACTIVE TREATMENT
get a bad sunburn from UV light reflect- ($260, SSENSE.COM)
ing off snow, and any damage from the
sun can also damage the skin barrier,”
says Li. And if you regularly exfoliate, Did you know mineral
sunscreen is less likely to
cut back to once or twice a week during cause irritation than its
the winter months or forgo it altogether if chemical counterpart?
This one goes on clear
you’re on the sensitive side. “People often on all skin tones and feels
totally weightless.
believe that they need to use an exfoliant,
SUMMER FRIDAYS SHADEDROPS
but the skin naturally sheds cells to make BROAD SPECTRUM SPF 30
MINERAL MILK SUNSCREEN
room for new ones underneath,” says ($48.50, SEPHORA.CA)
Li. “Humans are pretty resilient, and
so is the skin barrier, as long as you’re
not adding to the damage or irritation.
Simplify your routine so that you’re
keeping the essentials and giving the
skin time to repair itself.”
ELLECANADA.COM 71
 BEAUTY

A BEAUTY STAR
IS BORN
LADY GAGA is no stranger to pushing boundaries, whether in music,
fashion or movies. Now, she’s ready to shake up the makeup world.
By HEATHER TAYLOR-SINGH

IN THE TRADITION OF POP ICONS like David Bowie and Madonna before her, Lady
Gaga is a master of reinvention. With every album launch comes a new, fully realized
persona—from an electropop princess for The Fame to a guitar-strumming, pink-
cowboy-hat-donning Americana darling for Joanne.
Then there are the red-carpet appearances, which are often more akin to
performance art. Remember the meat dress? (The woman wore an actual flank
steak on her head.) Or the time she turned up at the Grammys in an egg hoisted
by latex-clad models?
But make no mistake about it: With Lady Gaga, it’s never a mere gimmick or
an attention grab. There is an earnestness to every look and every decision—a true
devotion to artistry.
“When people would say ‘persona’ to me, I used to feel almost offended because
my persona is still an extension of my personality,” she says. “I think the implication
is that it’s not real or that it’s fake, but it’s always real.”
The same goes for her makeup. Whether she’s rocking a full face or barely a
stitch, she is completely herself—or, rather, one of her selves. That’s part of the ethos
behind Haus Labs, her makeup line, which she relaunched last year. For her, it’s
not so much about how the products make you look (although, spoiler: They make
you look really good, especially the new concealer, but more on that later) but how
they make you feel: strong, confident and never like you’re hiding or striving to be
someone else. Here, the multi-hyphenate opens up about self-care, feeling beautiful
and doing things her way.

WHAT HAS WORKING ON HAUS LABS TAUGHT YOU ABOUT MAKEUP? “I didn’t realize
how much people didn’t believe in innovation—or that it was even possible—in the
makeup space. It was much more about how you look wearing a makeup product
than about feeling your best and makeup being good for your skin. It kind of didn’t
matter if makeup was good or bad for your skin as long as you looked good—and I
PHOTOGRAPHY, DOMEN & VAN DE VELDE

really hated that. I thought: ‘This is exactly what I don’t want. So how can we make
this better?’ Considering all the amazing innovations you see all over the world when
it comes to different kinds of products that are not makeup, I thought, ‘Well, we
can definitely make a brand that’s clean, vegan and cruelty-free and not sacrifice
performance but optimize performance.’ Makeup should be extremely functional.
The thing I’m so proud of with this company is that it has the heart and soul of the
things I love about self-care and beauty.”

ELLECANADA.COM 73
 BEAUTY
SELF-CARE SEEMS TO BE A KEY ELEMENT IN HAUS LABS’ MESSA-
GING. WHY IS THAT IMPORTANT TO YOU? “I know first-hand
that makeup can really help transform your spirit, build
your confidence and strengthen your sense of self. Some
people feel like that shouldn’t be the case—that when you
have no makeup on, you should just feel 100 percent con-
fident in yourself. And if that’s how someone feels, that’s
wonderful, but that’s just not true for everybody. For some
people, makeup is a way to feel better about who they are
and express who they are. I’m a big believer in makeup as
self-care. I wanted to frame it that way within the company
so we could say ‘This is not just about how you look; this is
about how you feel.’”
BEING INNOVATIVE IS SOMETHING YOU’RE KNOWN FOR AS A
MUSICIAN. HOW DID YOU PUSH FOR INNOVATION WITH HAUS
LABS? “When I started this brand, I think people wanted
me to innovate in the space of creativity because that’s how
they know me. And I did—I just did it differently. I did it
by applying skin science to our formulas. It was more of an
exercise in innovation and formulation. With the concealer,
for example, everybody wants a concealer that brightens, blurs
and conceals in the most beautiful way—and this [one] does.
It has an extremely creamy, beautiful texture and amazing
ingredients. But the additional thing it does—which is kind of
the hallmark of what I’ve been doing with this company—is
expand knowledge of beauty. We’ve done a lot of testing using
a biotech caffeine that’s [based on] Ayurvedic medicine, so it
looks beautiful. This concealer gives you long-lasting beauty
effects: It de-puffs under the eyes and decreases redness all
over the skin. It allows you to feel like you’re taking care of
yourself all day long.”
WHERE DID YOUR LOVE OF SKIN SCIENCE COME FROM? “As a
kid, I always watched my mom take care of herself, and she
was vigilant about her morning skincare routine, a beautiful
makeup routine and makeup as self-care. When I started this
brand, I knew I wanted it to be inclusive. That was the number
one thing. Then I thought about what else I wanted it to be. [I
noticed] there was this huge problem in makeup: When you
wear it all the time, it wrecks your skin. I wear a lot of makeup
because I’m a performer, so I wanted to push myself in this
space. What got me so into skin science was my love of taking
care of my own skin. I started reading a lot of articles and
books [and] educating myself. Then I started sharing my own
homeopathic remedies with the company and working with
the labs as well. That’s how we develop our products—they’re
really a reflection of my philosophy on skin.”
74 ELLECANADA.COM
HOW HAS YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH BEAUTY EVOLVED OVER TIME?
“When I was a teenager, I was really self-conscious and I loved
makeup and the way it helped give me some type of superhero
cape. When I was in high school, I did a full-face high-cover-
age foundation. When I got out of high school, I discovered
eyeliner—I found that it really gave me a [way to] express the
edge of my personality. I went to a school where it wasn’t really
okay to express [yourself] with your physical appearance. So
I really started screaming [about who I was] when I got out of
school. Then I got deeper and deeper into music and started to
create these various personas for myself with makeup, and they
all felt natural. For me, makeup was a way to be whomever I
wanted to be at any given moment and say the things on the
outside that I was feeling on the inside—but not with words.
Instead of telling people who you are, you’re showing them.”
WHAT MUST-HAVE PRODUCTS DO YOU ALWAYS HAVE ON YOU?
“I’m not just saying this, but I do actually always have our
concealer in my pocketbook. It’s the first thing I put on after
my moisturizer in the morning, even if I’m not doing a full
face of makeup. Then I’ll put on some lip oil, and sometimes
I’ll take the lip oil from my lips and dab it on my cheeks. If
I’m really feeling like I want to have a little something extra,
I’ll add a blush into the mix—our Color Fuse blush. And I’m
done! I would say that’s my everyday look.”
WHAT’S BEEN THE MOST REWARDING PART OF LAUNCHING
YOUR OWN BRAND? “We love our fans so much, and we just
want to make everyone happy by delivering high-quality
products that really enhance the artistry experience and the
beauty experience. So, for me, there’s always that warmth in
my heart when I see the makeup make somebody’s day.”
1. 2. 3.
1. HAUS LABS BY LADY GAGA PHD HYBRID LIP OIL ($32.50, SEPHORA.CA). 2. HAUS
LABS BY LADY GAGA TRICLONE SKIN TECH HYDRATING CONCEALER WITH FERMENTED
ARNICA ($43.50, SEPHORA.CA). 3. HAUS LABS BY LADY GAGA COLOR FUSE TALC-FREE
POWDER BLUSH WITH FERMENTED ARNICA ($51.50, SEPHORA.CA).
Helping women & teens FACING CANCE R

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*Up to a maximum donation of $60,000.

OUR PARTNERS
 A BEAUTIFUL
LEGACY
You might not know his name, but French pharmacist Pierre Fabre
single-handedly transformed the worlds of hair care and dermatology.
By THÉO DUPUIS-CARBONNEAU

SOME RITUALS ARE SO EMBEDDED in our day-to-day that it’s he made significant contributions to the pharmaceutical
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF THE PIERRE FABRE GROUP

hard to imagine a time when they didn’t exist. Take dry
shampoo, for example—a much appreciated time saver on
many a hurried morning, allowing you to quickly refresh
your roots without wetting your hair. The genius behind
this invention? Pierre Fabre, who, in 1967, dreamed up the
product for his bedridden maman. Klorane Dry Shampoo
went on to collect numerous awards, and today, one bottle
is sold worldwide every 11 seconds.
But Fabre’s achievements stretch far beyond the hair-care
aisle. Through his tireless commitment to medical research,
sector—helping develop cancer drugs, for instance—as well
as to skincare and wellness. We have him to thank for brands
like Avène, Klorane and Ducray, which, although deeply
rooted in the south of France, have found great success on the
international scene, including right here in Canada.
Hoping to learn more about the illustrious founder, we
paid a visit to his native Occitania. As we hopped around
from Toulouse to Avène to Soual, it became clear just how
deeply the pharmacist’s vision had influenced our daily lives
and continues to do so to this day.

76 ELLECANADA.COM
 FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: THE
PIERRE FABRE BOTANICAL
CONSERVATORY; BOTANY,
BEAUTY
A PILLAR OF THE PIERRE
FABRE PHILOSOPHY; THE
AVÈNE HYDROTHERAPY
CENTRE, AT THE FOOT OF
THE CÉVENNES MOUNTAINS

IN THE HEART OF THE PINK CITY

First stop: the Pierre Fabre Lab, inaugurated in 2019 in Toulouse. Bathed in
natural light, the cozy boutique—think brick walls and lots of greenery—
allows development teams to better understand consumer demand. “Last
year, we conducted over 400 interviews with members of the community
to help our brands come up with the best products to respond to people’s
needs,” says Marie Chenal, retail and consumer-experience manager. The
lab’s mission also includes dreaming up the pharmacy of the future, with
innovative activations, such as treatment rooms and learning sessions, that
transcend traditional retail. “Here, we have the space and the time to try
things out,” adds Chenal. “When something is successful, we implement the
concept in nearby drugstores to test it on a larger scale.” On-site, pharmacists
and dermo-cosmetic experts are present to welcome shoppers, share advice
and guide them in their product selection. “On average, clients spend 30 to
45 minutes in the store because they just feel so at home here.”

AVÈNE: A MIRACLE FOR SKIN

FRENCH TOUCH
Two of our favourites from
Avène and Klorane.
The secret behind this firming solution, which is
chock full of niacinamide and hyaluronic acid?
More than six years of research to find the best way
to target tired skin cells.
EAU THERMALE AVÈNE HYALURON ACTIV B3 RENEWAL
FIRMING CREAM ($65, SHOPPERSDRUGMART.CA)
Thanks to a combination of quinine and caffeine, this
serum stimulates keratin production at the roots to
strengthen hair and promote its growth.
KLORANE HAIR STRENGTHENING SERUM
WITH QUININE & ORGANIC EDELWEISS
($50, SHOPPERSDRUGMART.CA)
Next on the itinerary is the village of Avène. Home to the Avène Hydrotherapy
Centre, it’s nestled at the foot of the Cévennes mountain range, a stone’s throw
from the precious thermal water source that was discovered in 1736. Every
year, more than 3,000 people suffering from dermatological conditions like
eczema or psoriasis or whose skin has been affected by cancer treatments
come to the centre to receive care by way of hydrotherapy (including baths,
showers and underwater massages). The thermal water helps relieve itching,
reduce inflammation and repair the moisture barrier. “That same water,
which has a unique physical, mineral and biological makeup, is at the heart
of all of Avène’s formulas,” says Laurence Lautier, doctor of pharmacy and
quality and scientific projects manager at the Avène Hydrotherapy Centre.
Since 2020, the centre has also boasted a spa, the SensiCure space, for
visitors who are looking to unwind and enjoy the benefits of the thermal
source but don’t have any particular skin issues. On the menu: relaxing
surroundings, hot tubs, thermal-water showers and body treatments.
KLORANE: BOTANICAL WISDOM
We finish our journey in Soual at the Pierre Fabre Botanical Conservatory,
where more than 225 plant species are housed. It’s a place that perfectly
encapsulates the philosophy of hair-care brand Klorane as well as the
mission behind the Klorane Botanical foundation. By fighting to prevent
the extinction of plant species, helping protect ecosystems throughout the
world and fostering our connection with nature, the organization seeks
to preserve the biodiversity that makes our planet so extraordinary. You
feel it immediately when you start down the paths of the conservatory’s
garden, where peonies and poppies bloom brightly and fresh herbs fill the
air with their aroma.
Although Fabre passed away in 2013, his legacy lives on through his
company and foundation, which continue to promote what he valued
most—health, personal care and medical research—on the world stage.
And we, in turn, get to benefit from his knowledge and commitment in our
beauty routines every day.

ELLECANADA.COM 77
 LOOKING
AHEAD
From sci-fi hair and makeup tools to
AI-generated skin advances, the future
of beauty is looking mighty bright.
By SOPHIE BANFORD AND KATHERINE LALANCETTE
FORTUNE TELLERS HAVE CRYSTAL BALLS; industry insiders have
VivaTech. The buzzy conference, held yearly in Paris, is often
where the latest and greatest innovations in pretty much every
field imaginable (health, energy, telecom—you name it) are
unveiled. That applies to beauty too. So we headed to the City
of Light, slipped on our passes and got a sneak peek at what’s
next in skincare, makeup and more. Put it this way: We might
not have flying cars yet, but our beauty routines are about to
get seriously high-tech.
BEAUTY FOR ALL
Meet Hapta by Lancôme, the world’s first hand-held computer-
ized makeup applicator. It was devised for those experiencing
hand-motion challenges due to things like arthritis, tremors,
Huntington’s disease or stroke-related issues. The device uses
stabilizing technology to assist anyone with limited grip strength
or wrist mobility as well as those who have trouble raising their
arms. How great is that? Here’s how it works: Advanced sensors
keep the tool level, constantly adjusting to the user’s position
and counteracting any unintentional movement, while the
ergonomic design—think a super-easy-to-hold handle—was
created with people who have arm-, hand- or wrist-related
78 ELLECANADA.COM
conditions in mind. It makes putting on lipstick and mascara
easier than ever. Just plug in your preferred product and enjoy
a flawless application.
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER
Are your cheeks feeling dry because they’re lacking water or oil?
Are your strands rough to the touch because they need protein
or emollients? Cutting-edge devices will soon give you all the
PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY (MAIN IMAGE), COURTESY OF L’ORÉAL(OTHER IMAGES)
answers, providing an in-depth look at your skin and hair and
taking the guesswork out of picking products. Giorgio Armani’s
Meta Profiler, comprising a real-time hydration sensor and an
algorithm built on over 100,000 skin captures, measures 13
markers, including wrinkles, dark spots and redness. It features
18 analytical LEDs and even a 3-D mode for assessing smooth-
ness and texture. All it takes is a few minutes at an Armani
counter and you’ll find out everything that’s going on with
your skin. Then there’s Kérastase’s K-Scan, a smartcamera
that provides hairstylists with a deeper understanding of their
clients’ hair and scalp. The tool takes microscopic pictures
of both, and then the images are evaluated via AI-powered
analysis so your pro knows exactly which products and in-salon
treatments are best for you.
 L’ORÉAL PARIS
COLORSONIC BEAUTY

MAYBELLINE
BEAUTY APP

HAPTA BY LANCÔME

VIRTUAL ASSISTANCE
Picture the scene: You’re working from home in your pyjamas,
hair unbrushed and dark circles down to your cheekbones,
when a calendar alert pops up on your screen, reminding you
of a video call you’d completely forgotten about. Oh, and it
starts in five minutes! Been there before? Same. Not to worry,
though; the Maybelline Beauty App for Microsoft Teams has
got your back. Consider it your own personal makeup artist.
It allows you to choose between 12 virtual looks, from subtle
and natural to bold and playful. They were developed in col-
laboration with the Geena Davis Institute, which examines
intersectional onscreen representation, to ensure they would
suit a broad range of users. All you have to do is launch Teams,
go to Video Effects, click the Maybelline tab and start trying
on looks. Select your favourite and join the meeting. It’s that
simple and still gives you ample time to run a comb through
your hair and change your shirt.

DIY PRO
In the near future, next-gen gadgets will allow you to benefit
from expert assistance from the comfort of your own bathroom.
Take, for example, the L’Oréal Paris Colorsonic, a first-of-its-
kind device that’s about to make colouring your hair at home
totally foolproof. Nine years in the making, the revolutionary
tool perfectly mixes your colour and then practically applies
it for you. The brush moves 300 times per minute to evenly
distribute the dye, saturating every strand and getting right
into the roots, even in those hard-to-reach areas, like the back
of your head. The smart bristles adjust their speed to deposit
exactly the right amount needed for your hair type. Even bet-
ter, the formula is packed with hydrating and shine-boosting
ingredients and contains zero ammonia, silicones, parabens and
phthalates. Just pick your shade, pop in the cartridge and start
brushing your hair. The Colorsonic will take care of the rest.
GREEN LIGHT
When we consider the future, it’s essential to take into account
ways to reduce our impact on the environment. That’s where
the L’Oréal Professionnel Water Saver comes in. It’s a shower
head that divides the flow of water to create 10-times-smaller
droplets, which are then delivered at an accelerated speed
for faster and more effective rinsing. This cuts down water
use by a whopping 60 percent. It gets even better: Thanks to
a patented approach called “Cloud Cleansing,” micronized
hair-care formulas specifically made for the Water Saver
are infused directly into the water stream for better product
distribution and absorption. The technology is already rolling
out globally and is expected to be in 10,000 salons worldwide
in the next few years. And great news: An at-home version is
currently in the works.

ELLECANADA.COM 79
 LOREM IPSUM

ON THE MOVE
Out-of-office doesn’t have to mean out of sync with your feel-good
fitness habits. Here’s how to keep active while travelling.
By CAITLIN KENNY

PHOTOGRAPHY,

80 ELLECANADA.COM
 HEALTH

HERE’S NO FEELING LIKE VACAY MODE —swapping DURING THE TRIP

T Zoom screens for ocean views and dinner prep for

happy hour. And while there’s a unique bliss in letting
our inboxes fester, there are some parts of normal life that
we’d rather not abandon completely—namely, our workout
habits. It’s not about a strict #nodaysoff attitude but, rather,
how exercise makes us feel physically and mentally.
Take it from Peloton instructor and frequent flyer Tunde
Oyeneyin. Travelling for both work and pleasure, the New
York-based athlete has recently been to destinations including
Australia, France, England, Nicaragua, the Maldives and
the U.S. Through it all, she always makes “me time” for
movement. “I love to stay active while travelling not only
because it keeps me connected to the work I do but also for
my mental state—so I still feel connected to myself,” she says.
“I’m a Sagittarius, and I love being spontaneous, but in terms
of what I’m eating or the way I move, I love knowing what
to expect.” Fortunately, there are tons of smart, easy ways
to add exercise to your itinerary.
ON FLIGHT DAYS
Maybe it’s the frenzy of security lineups or the recycled air on
the plane, but long travel days tend to leave us feeling about
as fresh as that cardboardy muffin they serve on board. And
though an intense workout is the last thing anyone needs on
an already hectic day, small hits of movement can help you
feel a little less sluggish.
“Never discount the walk,” says Oyeneyin. At the airport,
she skips the moving walkways and picks stairs over escalators
when her carry-on isn’t too heavy. “I look at the struggle as
an opportunity to spark my heart rate and get in a little dose
of a workout,” she says.
Another “opportunity” Oyeneyin is keen to make the most
of is shopping at the gate. “I call it my ‘walk-spend workout,’
and as far as I’m concerned, shopping gets your heart rate
up,” she jokes. “Anything to get me up and moving so I’m not
sedentary for a full day.”
For a more formal workout, airports are answering the
wellness trend’s call with free yoga rooms at Chicago O’Hare,
Dallas Fort Worth, San Francisco International and others;
a GoodLife gym in Terminal 1 at Toronto Pearson; and a
drop-in health club (with a pool!) at the Fairmont hotel inside
Vancouver’s airport. If you’re staying at YVR overnight, you
can book Fairmont’s Fit on the Fly Suite, which comes complete
with a Peloton bike, a bench with weights, a yoga mat, a balance
ball, workout gear (something Fairmont offers guests at all of its
locations) and even in-room hydrotherapy, which consists of a
hot shower with essential-oil steam followed by a cold plunge.
After takeoff, Oyeneyin switches her focus to meditation and
adds some light stretching to help with circulation. “You can
do body rolls from side to side in your seat to open up the hips
and get the blood moving,” she says. For an energy reset at her
destination, Oyeneyin swears by the Peloton app, “even if it’s a
PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY
If your goal is to stick to your workout routine while you’re
away, make it part of your plans, says Oyeneyin. “Log your
workout into your schedule and respect it just like everything
else you respect in your calendar that day.” She also recom-
mends inviting your travel mates to join in so you can lean
on each other for accountability throughout the trip.
It can be as simple as hitting the fitness centre at your hotel
or resort—and should you ever bump into Oyeneyin, be ready
to join an impromptu class. “People tend to get nervous when
they see me in a gym—I think they think I’m critiquing them,
but once I invite them in, it changes the energy entirely and is
really fun,” she says. Perhaps the next best thing to a chance
Oyeneyin encounter are Peloton Gym workouts, which launched
earlier this year (and are available in the free version of the
app). Instead of doing the usual instructor-led video classes,
you can move at your own pace following a written-out plan
(with help from onscreen timers and demo videos) designed
by your fave instructor.
There’s a lot you can do without leaving your room too. “I
like to take resistance bands with me when I’m on the road,”
says Oyeneyin. “They’re light, easy and affordable.” Many
hotels supply yoga mats—just ring up the front desk and ask
to have one brought up. You can also hold on to a desk or the
back of a chair for a good barre workout.
Low on time? Look for ways to make the workout part of
your itinerary, whether that’s by touring buzzy boutique studios
or—Oyeneyin’s latest obsession—hitting the pavement. “I was
just in London with my teammate Jeff [McEachern], and I
said, ‘Hey, I only have two hours of free time—let’s go for a
half-marathon and see all the sites.’”
Ultimately, it’s about doing something that feels good to
you. “If you have 10 minutes to get in a dance-cardio class
where you just dance around the room, take that—don’t make
it something that’s a pain point,” says Oyeneyin. “Life is short;
enjoy the vacation.”
PACKING LIST
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bicep curls and more workout or pump-up space with stylish
with extra resistance playlist and control sneakers that can go
from these carry-on- playback without from gym to run to
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phone. (The improved

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someone in your ear guiding you.” Bonus: Heading out into APPLE AIRPODS PRO
2ND GENERATION
the sunshine can help your body adjust to a new time zone. ($329, APPLE.COM)

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PHOTOGRAPHY, RONAN MCKENZIE; COAT AND SKIRT (SELASI), GLOVES (HANDSOME STOCKHOLM), BOOTS (Y/PROJECT) AND EARRINGS (ALEXANDER MCQUEEN)

HEAT THIS WINTER.

OF COLOUR ADD
PIECES AND POPS
HIGH-DRAMA
DECEMBER/
FEBRUARY
JANUARY/
fashion
NEXT ACT
WINNIE’S

ENVY (2008-2013) BY BARRY X BALL; SCULPTURE, PAKISTANI “BELLA FI” ONYX AND STAINLESS STEEL; PEDESTAL (58 X 44 X 24 CM), MACEDONIAN MARBLE, STAINLESS STEEL, WOOD, ACRYLIC LACQUER, STEEL, NYLON AND PLASTIC
As she
celebrates
a decade at
the top of
her industry,
Canadian
supermodel,
entrepreneur
and aspiring
actor Winnie
Harlow steps
into a new era.
By SUMIKO WILSON
Photographers CARLOS + ALYSE
Creative director OLIVIA LEBLANC
Stylist JACLYN BONAVOTA
 DRESS (KIM SHUI AT SSENSE),
BRA (MAISON MARGIELA AT
SSENSE), GLOVES (ISA BOULDER
AT SSENSE) AND NECKLACE
(TIFFANY & CO.)
 W
INNIE HARLOW DOESN’T SET NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS. It’s a
practice she has intentionally abstained from. At the end of
each year, she’d always notice that her aspirations paled in
comparison to what she actually achieved. “It was almost as
if some of the things I got I couldn’t even have dreamt of,”
she says.
Since making her debut as the world’s first model with the
skin condition vitiligo 10 years ago, she has made a habit of
exceeding expectations. In fact, she didn’t initially plan on
being a model at all. But it’s not by happenstance—when she
struts into Bistrot Leo in New York’s SoHo neighbourhood on a
balmy October afternoon, it’s impossible to see her as anything
else. Arriving sans entourage and without a shred of makeup,
she wields an unspoken power that commands attention. Her
arrival brings forth an inaudible whoosh as diners’ heads swivel
to clock her presence as she settles onto a banquette.
“I don’t know if the idea of being a model actually
appealed to me prior to [becoming one],” she says.
“I wanted to be a journalist.” Before Chantelle Brown-
Young, the Mississauga, Ont., native who worked in retail,
became Winnie Harlow, the barrier-breaking icon, the
industry didn’t consider her a contender. Over the years, she
has often told the story of how a modelling agent dismissed
her by saying that if she wanted to be part of the fashion
world, she should instead try to be a makeup artist.
Harlow’s moniker—a combination of homages to
Winnie the Pooh and Jean Harlow, the emblematic 1930s
leading lady—originated as a username on Facebook when
she was a teen. And since it was her social-media handle,
she has technically gone by “Winnie” since the end of
high school. Personally, I can recall when her alias began
appearing on my own Facebook timeline long before she
was making headlines. Having grown up attending the
same church as Harlow and being just a few years younger
than her, I can vividly remember seeing her as a tween and
then as a teenager. When we meet again for this interview in
New York City all these years later, she doesn’t fully register
the connection. Then, in an instant, she does. “You were so
cute,” she recalls. “You always had cute cheeks.”
Decades ago, we were part of the same small Pentecostal
congregation in Malton, Ont. Sunday after Sunday, I’d see
her in a pew with her younger sister and her mom. When
the preachers were long-winded, as they often were, I’d
BLAZER, PANTS AND BELT
(LOUIS VUITTON), SHOES
notice her retreating to the church’s carpeted staircase with
(GIUSEPPE ZANOTTI),
EARRINGS (ELSA PERETTI AT
TIFFANY & CO.) AND RINGS
(TIFFANY & CO.) ELLECANADA.COM 87
 CELEBRITY
friends, giggling and taking photos. Even when I was in
elementary school and she was a preteen, it was evident that
she exuded an indelible sense of self-assurance. The last time
I saw her, more than 12 years ago, my mother and I were on
an eastbound subway and caught her as she was leaving the
Toronto Eaton Centre excitedly toting an Aritzia bag. On
the train, she shared that she had purchased a winter jacket.
Just a few years later, she was on an ad at that same station.
When we were children, in the era of the homogeniz-
ing “Prada effect” and “Nothing tastes as good as skinny
feels,” my own imagination couldn’t conceive of a modelling
industry that held up the girl I knew from church as one of
its most recognizable faces. As years passed, I admired her
ascent from afar: She grew an Instagram following, was cast
on America’s Next Top Model and then courted the attention
of famed photographer Nick Knight, who shot her for a
Diesel campaign that altered her trajectory. Since then,
whether she’s gracing runways for Christian Cowan or red
carpets for Vogue World, designing athleisure collections
for Puma, posing with Kim Jones and Naomi Campbell at
Fashion Week or taking part in what was once considered
“Fashion’s Sexiest Night,” the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show
(most recently, she returned to the brand’s runway in the
globe-trotting showcase dubbed “The Tour”), Harlow’s very
presence has been viewed as a harbinger of a more inclusive
industry. And her impact is unequivocal. As part of a class
of models believed to be the “super” resurgence (with peers
like Kendall Jenner and the Hadid sisters), her celebrity is
imbued with a distinct weight that sets her apart from some
of her contemporaries. It means something. It says something.
It creates opportunities and dismantles the exclusionary
systems that have existed for longer than she’s been alive.
After years of working with Harlow, designer Jeremy
Scott believes that her position in the industry will encourage
people to expand their notion of beauty. “Nothing is more
beautiful than diversity,” he says. Once Scott saw Knight’s
first photos of Harlow, he knew that he wanted to work with
her. When they finally met in February 2018 at a New York
Fashion Week afterparty for one of his shows, they instantly
clicked. “She was wearing a look from my collection and was
so radiantly beautiful, and she oozed warmth and kindness
to boot,” the former Moschino creative director recalls. Since
then, Harlow has walked in Moschino shows, and she starred
in a lookbook for the brand’s 2021 pre-fall collection. “I’ve
championed unique beauties since the start of my career—
with Devon Aoki, then Sophie Dahl—and Winnie is part of
this lineage [of models who] can break the mould of what the
current beauty standard is and expand it for a new genera-
tion.” Together, the pair coached emerging talent when they
appeared as judges on the second season of Amazon’s fashion
competition series Making the Cut.
“Winnie’s undeniable beauty coupled with her visible
vitiligo makes her such a modern-day beauty icon,” raves
Scott. “[She has] that rare, special, unique combination
[along] with [an] out-of-this-world personality, and she
really knows how to model.” And this past August, the
United Nations Association in Canada also recognized
Harlow’s impact on the industry and announced that she
would receive the 2023 Global Citizen Award, a prize that
88 ELLECANADA.COM
honours Canadian change makers leading the way. In a
release, the UN praised Harlow for “shattering norms” in
fashion and advocating for diversity.
While Harlow is proud of what her career has come to
represent, the idea of being a role model was initially a lot to
manage. “I’m not here to raise anyone’s kids—I’m here as
a child who turned into a teenager and then turned into an
adult in front of people,” she tells me. “That doesn’t mean
that I’m not supposed to make mistakes.” As is often true for
those who shoulder the labels of “first” or “only” in a space,
small missteps have overwhelming ramifications. Instead
of actions reflecting on an individual, they tend to represent
a group at large. Harlow made it a point to “release” this
pressure during the early stages of her career. “I started just
being like: ‘You know what? I’m gonna fuck up. It is what it
is.’” Now, as she approaches a new decade (she’ll celebrate
her 30th birthday in July), her stance is shifting. “I’m older
now and it’s okay to take on more—that’s fine. But in the
growing stages, I kind of released the responsibility.” The
priority, she says, was showing herself grace.
Without it, being positioned as a symbol of self-esteem
can prove deeply dehumanizing. First, such platforms tend
to have insidious, insulting undertones. When self-love is
framed as an accomplishment for specific groups of people
or a feat of bravery, it subtly implies that qualities that deviate
from certain beauty norms aren’t inherently worthy of love.
SLEEPING HERMAPHRODITE (2008-2017) BY BARRY X BALL; SCULPTURE, TRANSLUCENT PINK IRANIAN ONYX; BASE (47 X 173 X 91 CM), GREEK THASSOS MARBLE AND STAINLESS STEEL
In short, being told “If you can love yourself, anyone can love
themselves” isn’t quite complimentary. Plus, being framed
in such a lens leaves little room for faltering. Last year, on a
Revolt panel hosted by Michelle Obama, Harlow said: “My
least favourite question when people interview me is ‘How are
you so confident?’ Like, what? For being myself? For living in
my own skin, I’m brave? Are you telling me I shouldn’t be?”
While she understands the fascination with her skin, her
story is multi-faceted, and she refuses to be boxed in. “When it
comes to my career, I feel like a lot of people want to talk about
my skin, but there are so many other things in life that you
deal with other than the one thing that you were bullied for in
high school,” says Harlow. Her journey with her skin has been
a source of strength—it also sparked the idea for her suncare
line, Cay Skin. When she launched the brand in 2022 with just
a few core SPF-forward products, including a face lotion, a lip
balm and a body oil, she shared that a serious sunburn inspired
her to venture into the suncare sphere. While on a shoot in
the Caribbean in 2018, she was wary of reapplying sunscreen
because she feared that its undesirable white cast would show
up in the photos. Ultimately, the burn permanently altered the
look of her vitiligo. Promising sheer sun coverage and a head-
to-toe glow, Cay Skin’s selection has since expanded to include
sun-safe and vegan essentials for the face, the lips and the body,
all of which are enriched with ingredients inspired by Harlow’s
Jamaican roots, from sea moss to aloe vera.
The line launched in an era when celebrities were creating
skincare brands at breakneck speed. But Harlow’s experience
gives Cay Skin a unique sense of purpose. Still, she’s aware
of the critique. “I’ve seen people [say], ‘Oh, yeah, it’s a cash
grab—she’s just trying to do something to make money,’” she
says. “But I actually have a story when it comes to skin and
SPF specifically. When I created Cay Skin, I wanted it to be
 CELEBRITY

DRESS (GUCCI), CUFF BRACELET

(ELSA PERETTI AT TIFFANY & CO.)
E L L EAND
CANRINGS
A D A(TIFFANY 89
. C O M & CO.)
 CELEBRITY
DRESS AND SHOES (ALEXANDER
MCQUEEN) AND CUFF BRACELETS
(ELSA PERETTI AT TIFFANY & CO.)

90 ELLECANADA.COM
COAT, TEXTURED BRA AND JEANS (NENSI DOJAKA), BRA (ARAKS) AND BRACELETS AND EARRINGS (TIFFANY & CO.)
 CELEBRITY
something that was true to me.” When news of the line became
public, Harlow was praised for joining a short list of women
of colour who’d received over US$1 million of venture-capital
funding. In total, she raised US$4.1 million to launch the
brand. Before embarking on this journey, she admits, she didn’t
even know what “VC” stands for. Today, Cay Skin is available
at Sephora locations across the U.S. and Canada.
As Harlow mulls over my questions, her posture remains
arrow-straight and her sheer white turtleneck stands out
against the restaurant’s leafy green wallpaper, drawing
attention upward to her hair. Though she has gone between
sleek waist-length bussdowns, bronde waves, faux locs and
occasional pops of colour over the years, she recently cut it
into a pixie. It’s not her first big chop (she debuted a shorter
’do in 2016), but the introspection and intention behind her
latest look are indicative of a major shift: Despite taking
beauty standards to task over the course of her career, she
has subconsciously upheld one for herself. “Getting older,
I realized how much pride I had in my hair,” she reflects.
When she revealed the style in August, it was curly and
coiffed. Today, her cropped cut is sleek and straight with tiny
curls flitting throughout to add dimension; it’s giving early-
aughts, Die Another Day-era Halle Berry. “I wanted a fresh
start. I’ve been short before but with wigs. I did like it, but
I’ve always had a [desire] for long hair,” she explains. She tells
me a story from her childhood, when she wrapped a towel
around her head and pretended that it was her own hair,
playfully making it flow in the wind. “Long hair has always
been something that I held [up] as beauty.”
It appears that part of accepting the responsibility of her
mantle is viewing her relationship to beauty through a micro-
scopic lens—and questioning her own perception of beauty.
For Black women, in particular, this can have a more serious
tenor. Historically, Black women have been inundated with
messaging that suggests that they’re incapable of growing
long hair or invalidates their curls if they grow outward
in intricate coils versus cascading down their backs. Long
hair can be an ideal that beckons to a more conventional,
Eurocentric beauty standard. It’s not just hair.
For this reason, her cut was significant. “If I’m supposed
to be this person who, like you said, is a beacon of confi-
dence and I rely so heavily on something that I feel is part
of the epitome of beauty, I need to be able to release that
to truly feel beautiful. I don’t need long hair, even though
from a young age it was something I loved.” Though she’s
not opposed to occasionally switching it up with wigs (it was
even her idea to sport a long style for our cover shoot), she
realizes that hair can be something that’s interchangeable
and can be switched up to enhance different looks. “When
I’m wearing a certain outfit, I might want long black hair, or
if I’m in Miami, I might want to be beachy, blond and curly
or something. It’s a beautiful accessory, but it’s not necessary
for beauty.”
As our conversation wraps, I learn that after our meeting,
Harlow is off to get ready for an event with SKYY Vodka.
As an ambassador for the brand, she’s in NYC for just 24
hours to celebrate the launch of its new espresso-infused spirit.
“You should come,” she says earnestly. I initially dismiss the
invitation as a pleasantry, but six hours later we are on the
92 ELLECANADA.COM
top floor of the Moxy hotel, sipping espresso martinis and
swaying to “fukumean” by Gunna. Harlow has shed her off-
duty-model style and is now in a hand-beaded PatBO denim
ensemble. Glints of shimmering blue jewels on her bralette
dance in the light as she poses for photo ops in front of the DJ
booth and behind the bar, shaking cocktails.
“We should FaceTime my family,” she says. She calls
her younger sister, Christina, then her mother, Lisa. As we
regale them both with the tale of our meeting earlier that
day, almost yelling over the music blaring from the Highlight
Room, I hear someone on the line call her name: Chantelle.
Her mother, says Harlow, alternates between “Winnie”
and her given name. She now mostly goes by “Winnie”
in her personal and professional life. “If I talk to someone
close to me [frequently] enough, they call me Winnie,” she
explains, “but if I haven’t spoken to someone in a long time,
they call me Chantelle.” She answers to both but is more
likely to answer to “Winnie” in a public setting. There are
SICKMAN AT THE HOSPITAL (2013-2023, WORK IN PROGRESS) BY BARRY X BALL; SCULPTURE (274 X 132 X 132 CM), TRANSLUCENT “WOUNDED” MEXICAN ONYX, 24-KARAT-GOLD-PLATED STEEL AND ALUMINUM AND STAINLESS STEEL
still distinctions between the two. “I feel like maybe my
insecurities come from Chantelle and Winnie doesn’t have
any.” She stipulates that they’re very much in sync and
Winnie is not a persona but a nickname. “I’ve grown up
and grown into Winnie—that is really who I am,” she says.
“There’s a name for what I’ve done and [who I’ve] become.”
As we part ways, she tells me that she’s heading back
home to Los Angeles, where she moved mid-pandemic. Since
relocating from New York to California, she’s been taking
acting lessons in preparation for the next step she wants to take
in her career. (She recently made a cameo in Netflix film The
Perfect Find starring Gabrielle Union.) Back in 2020, she read
for a role in a British zombie horror-comedy called The Loneliest
Boy in the World and ultimately passed on it but has conflicting
thoughts about how it went down. At the time, strict lockdown
regulations would have required her to quarantine in the U.K.
for two months. However, she had just begun a relationship
with NBA star Kyle Kuzma and didn’t feel comfortable being
away for such a long time. “I don’t know if I’m disappointed
that I didn’t take it because I’m happy I didn’t at the time,” she
tells me. The film was released in 2022, but she’s apprehensive
about seeing it. “I’m going to watch it and think ‘I would have
killed that,’” she says with a sigh.
I don’t get the impression that she spends too much time
looking back, though. She has her sights set on the movie
industry and is channelling her energy into what’s to come.
While she no longer makes resolutions, she understands the
power of setting intentions. Two years in a row, she wrote
that she wanted to work with Beyoncé and then appeared
in the music video for “Freedom” in 2016. “Even though
it wasn’t something that I pursued—[Beyoncé] pursued
me—it was still a manifestation and a prayer that I had
put out into the world and to God.” For the year ahead,
she’s focusing on Cay Skin and her new love: acting. “I am
manifesting more growth and success with Cay Skin, and
I’m manifesting working on a big film,” she tells me. But
modelling will never be far behind. “I’ll make time for cov-
ers,” she says with a laugh. “Seeing myself on a cover always
reminds me that there’s going to be a little girl who feels like
I did and will look at that and feel seen. I wish I’d had that
when I was younger.”
 CELEBRITY
TOP (PH5), SHORTS (JACQUEMUS),
SOCKS (STYLIST’S OWN), SHOES
(JACQUEMUS) AND BRACELETS
(TIFFANY & CO.)

ELLECANADA.COM 93
TOP, SHORTS, BELT AND BRIEFS
(MIU MIU) AND CHAIN-MAIL BRA
(ELSA PERETTI AT TIFFANY & CO.)

OPPOSITE PAGE:
DRESS (BINYA AT SSENSE), CORSET
(KNWLS AT SSENSE) AND NECKLACE
(TIFFANY & CO.)

FOR DETAILS, SEE SHOPPING GUIDE.

MAKEUP ARTIST, BILLIE GENE (OPUS
BEAUTY); HAIRSTYLIST, DHAIRIUS
THOMAS (FACTORY DOWNTOWN);
EDITORIAL PRODUCER, PÉNÉLOPE
LEMAY; SET PRODUCER, AMAYA
FARIA; PHOTOGRAPHER’S
ASSISTANTS, BRANDON JONES
AND JEREMIAH CUMBERBATCH;
STYLIST’S ASSISTANT,
AMER MACARAMBON

THANK YOU TO BARRY X BALL FOR

GIVING US ACCESS TO HIS STUDIO
AND ARTWORK.
 SAINT BARTHOLOMEW FLAYED – ASCENSION (2011-2021) BY BARRY X BALL; SCULPTURE, FRENCH ROUGE DU ROI MARBLE AND STAINLESS STEEL; PEDESTAL, ALUMINUM, STEEL AND ACRYLIC LACQUER; PLATFORM (201 X 90 X 92 CM), ALUMINUM, STAINLESS STEEL, ACRYLIC LACQUER AND ABS PLASTIC

ELLECANADA.COM
95
CELEBRITY
 LIGHT
AND
SHADE
WITH ITS COLOURFUL, DRAMATIC
AND TONAL ELEGANCE, THIS SEASON
CELEBRATES THE TWO POLES OF GLAMOUR.
PHOTOGRAPHER RONAN MCKENZIE
STYLIST TESS HERBERT

DRESS (STANDING GROUND) AND

EARRINGS (ALEXANDER MCQUEEN)
CAFTAN AND BOOTS (Y/PROJECT), HOOP
EARRINGS (BY PARIAH), STUD EARRINGS
(FERRAGAMO), EAR CUFF (ALEXANDER
MCQUEEN) AND RINGS, FROM LEFT (LIV
LUTTRELL AND ALEXANDER MCQUEEN)
COAT, BODYSUIT, SHORTS AND
BELT (MICHAEL KORS COLLECTION),
BOOTS (DURAN LANTINK), EARRINGS
(ALEXANDER MCQUEEN)
JACKET, SKIRT, SHOES AND RING
(GILLIAN
AND BAGHORSUP)
(REJINA PYO)
COAT AND EARRINGS
(FERRAGAMO)
BODYSUIT AND SKIRT (COURRÈGES),
BOOTS (RUSSELL & BROMLEY) AND
RINGS, FROM LEFT
COAT, BLAZER AND(GILLIAN HORSUP,
ALIGHIERI
TROUSERSAND LIV LUTTRELL)
(CHLOÉ)
 BODYSUIT (MARNI) AND
EARRINGS, BRACELET ON
HAND
JACKET,
ANDTOP,
NECKLACE
TROUSERS
ON
AND SHOES
ARM (FERRAGAMO)
(MAX MARA)
DRESS, UNDERWEAR AND HEELS
(DOLCE & GABBANA) AND RINGS,
FROM LEFT (JOE SPURGEON AND
GILLIAN HORSUP)

JACKET, SKIRT, SHOES

AND BAG (REJINA PYO)
JACKET (PRADA)

FOR DETAILS, SEE SHOPPING GUIDE.

MODEL, MAYOWA NICHOLAS (MILK
MANAGEMENT); HAIRSTYLIST,
BATISEOL GOMIS (SAINT LUKE
ARTISTS/EUGENZE/DYSON/AMIKA);
MAKEUP ARTIST, JOEY CHOY
(PREMIER HAIR AND MAKE-UP/LA
PRAIRIE); MANICURIST, MICHELLE
CLASS (LMC WORLDWIDE/SALLY
HANSEN); STYLIST’S ASSISTANTS,
GAL KLEIN AND STEPHANIE
AELBRECHT; PHOTOGRAPHER’S
ASSISTANTS, IBRAHIM AZAB AND
MYLES BAILEY; SET DESIGN,
AMY FRIEND (LALALAND); SET
ASSISTANT, HANNAH KNOWLES;
FLOWERS, HARRIET PARRY
DIAMONDS FOR ALL
 lifestyle

HOLIDAY
GIFT GUIDE
This season, we wanted to try to be more
thoughtful with our gifting choices. With a
less-is-more attitude and a focus on items that
are personal and timeless and, above all, bring
a little bit of joy, here are some festive ideas
for those we hold near and dear and, most
importantly, those we are lucky enough to
be celebrating with this year.
By MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN
 PERSONALIZED
LUGGAGE TAG,
PARAVEL ($82,
TOURPARAVEL.COM)

BY FAR DAYDREAM OF A SPLASH

EAU DE PARFUM ($300 FOR
100 ML AND A PERSONALIZED
BOTTLE, BYFAR.COM)

NOTEBOOK & NOTECARD

PERSONALIZED SET, PAPIER
($93, PAPIER.COM)

LETTER BRACELET, MEJURI

($375, MEJURI.COM)

SMART BIRD FEEDER,

BIRDBUDDY ($336,
MYBIRDBUDDY.COM)

PERSONALIZED BACKPACK,
FJÄLLRÄVEN ($170, FJALLRAVEN.COM) PERSONAL
TOUCH
MONOGRAMMED
PAJAMA SET, KIP ($240,
SLEEPINKIP.COM)

PROSE CUSTOM SKINCARE SET

($200, PROSE.COM)

Unique ideas that can be tailor-made.

KIDS LETTER BASEBALL

HAT, PROVINCE OF
CANADA ($54,
PROVINCEOFCANADA.COM)

FELT-TIP PEN CREATION KIT,

BALTIC CLUB ($59,
THEBALTICCLUB.COM)

CONVERTIBLE TENNIS TOTE, TORY BURCH

($537, TORYBURCH.COM)

106 ELLECANADA.COM
 GIFT GUIDE
HEART KEYCHAIN,
COREY MORANIS ($105,
COREYMORANIS.COM)

BAG, ALDO ($75, ALDOSHOES.COM)

NORDIC SPRUCE SEED SPROUTING

KIT, MODERN SPROUT ($25,
MODERNSPROUT.COM)

BFFS
WINE CLUB: A MONTHLY GUIDE TO
SWIRLING, SIPPING, AND PAIRING WITH
FRIENDS BY MAUREEN PETROSKY
($42, AMAZON.CA)

Thoughtful gifts to give to—and

share with—friends. SLIPPERS, SLEEPER
($476, THE-SLEEPER.COM)

TUMBLER, KINTO
($54, KINTO-CANADA.CA)

WORKOUT BANGLES, BALA ($75

FOR TWO ONE-POUND BANGLES,
SHOPBALA.COM)

CHLOE CHARDONNAY, CHLOE WINES

(FROM $19.60, CHLOEWINECOLLECTION.COM)

DANCING IN PARADISE PUZZLE, ARTY

GUAVA ($40, JIGGYPUZZLES.COM)

SPLITTABLE HEART
DANGLE CHARM,
PANDORA ($80,
CA.PANDORA.NET)

ORIBE GOLD LUST

COLLECTION HAIR SET
($144, ORIBE.COM)
BRACELETS, ROXANNE ASSOULIN ($75
FOR A SET OF THREE, HOLTRENFREW.COM)

ELLECANADA.COM 107
 BRACELET,
CHOPARD
($5,750,
CHOPARD.COM)

BAG, DIOR (PRICE UPON

DAY-DATE 36 WATCH, REQUEST, DIOR.COM)
ROLEX (PRICE UPON
REQUEST, ROLEX.COM)

LOEWE OREGANO
LIQUID SOAP ($108,
PERFUMESLOEWE.COM)

TIMELESS
LUXURY
Pieces that are sure to be treasured
and very much appreciated.

DRESS, SILK LAUNDRY

($525, SILKLAUNDRY.CA)

BALLPOINT PEN, MONTBLANC

($560, MONTBLANC.COM)

SCARF, TOTEME ($280,

TOTEME-STUDIO.COM)

SANDALS, GUCCI
($1,610, GUCCI.COM)

RING, MESSIKA
($4,340,
MAISONBIRKS.COM)

HANDMADE JEWELRY BOX, MYEL

($780, MYELDESIGN.COM)

HAT, FENDI ($920,

FENDI.COM)

VASE, LAMBERT & FILS ($280,

LAMBERTETFILS.COM)

108 ELLECANADA.COM
 GIFT GUIDE
COAT, MAX MARA
($5,190, CA.MAXMARA.COM)

CHARLOTTE TILBURY CHARLOTTE’S AWARD-WINNING

BEAUTY ICONS ($230, CHARLOTTETILBURY.COM)

GABRIEL CHRISTMAS CANDLE, CIRE

TRUDON ($220, MODAOPERANDI.COM)

MEN’S POCKET ORGANIZER, LOUIS VUITTON

($690, LOUISVUITTON.COM)

NECKLACE, MICHAEL KORS

($365, MICHAELKORS.COM)

GUERLAIN BEE
BOTTLE
(FROM $171,
HOLTRENFREW.COM)

GLOVES, HERMÈS PANTS, BEAUFILLE

($1,125, HERMES.COM) ($675, BEAUFILLE.COM)

BAG, CHANEL (PRICE UPON

REQUEST, CHANEL.COM)

CAIRO ETERNAL BY MAI ELDIB

($161, AMAZON.CA)

STREAMLINE CUFF BRACELET,

DAVID YURMAN (PRICE UPON
REQUEST, DAVIDYURMAN.COM)
EARRINGS,
TIFFANY & CO.
($5,350, TIFFANY.CA)

SUNGLASSES, SAINT LAURENT ($510, YSL.COM)

ELLECANADA.COM 109
 CANDLE, HOPSON GRACE ($88,
HOPSONGRACE.COM)

DESSERT PLATE, MALAIKA

($58, GOODEEWORLD.COM) CUSHION, FERM LIVING ($120,
FERMLIVING.US)

CANDLESTICKS, MUST
($29 FOR A SET OF TWO,
MUSTSOCIETE.COM)

INCENSE HOLDER,
LA SOUFFLERIE
($55, OBAKKI.COM)

LAMP, &TRADITION
($990, KELLI.SHOP)

LA VIE FIR MANDARINE ROOM SPRAY

($32, ATELIERLAVIEAPOTHICAIRE.CA)

FRENCH PRESS
BREWER, HAY
($105, DWR.COM)

FLOWER BOUQUET, STUDIO ROOF

MIRROR, FOUND (FROM $175, SHOP-FOUND.COM) ($85, 313DESIGNMARKET.COM)

CARAFE AND CUP SET,

FØRS STUDIO ($110,
FORSSTUDIO.COM)

LIMITED EDITION CANDLE SET, DIPTYQUE

($203, DIPTYQUEPARIS.COM)

110 ELLECANADA.COM
 GIFT GUIDE

MATCH STRIKER,
JOSH OWEN ($41,
AREAWARE.COM)

GLASSES, MISETTE
($270 FOR A SET OF TWO,
MISETTETABLE.COM)

VASE, LA DOUBLE J ($885,

LADOUBLEJ.COM)

CONNECTION 1 FRAMED ART PRINT

(50 X 70 CM), AMANDA JANE JONES
($150, SUNDAYS-COMPANY.CA)

LIMITED EDITION WINTER

SOLSTICE MASKWA, LODGE
($65, LODGESOYCANDLES.COM)

THROW, SILK & SNOW ($250, SILKANDSNOW.COM)

JOYFUL Objects and accessories

to brighten up the home.

VASE, KAS AUSTRALIA

($70, SIMONS.CA)

PERFECT POT,
OUR PLACE ($220,
FROMOURPLACE.CA)

DOMINO SET,
JONATHAN ADLER ($77,
THEMODERNSHOP.COM)

RUG, RUGGABLE (FROM $138, RUGGABLE.COM)

SERVIETTES, INDIGO ARROWS ($68 FOR A SET OF FOUR, INDIGOARROWS.CA)

ELLECANADA.COM 111
 TOILETRY BAG, AWAY
($95, AWAYTRAVEL.COM)
GLOVES, MANITOBAH
($90, MANITOBAH.CA)

PORTABLE CHARGER,
KREAFUNK ($50,
KREAFUNK.COM)

HAT, CANADA GOOSE

($250, CANADAGOOSE.COM)

SNEAKERS, ON ($180,
WELL KEPT THE DISCOVERY SET ON-RUNNING.COM)
($125, KEEPWELLKEPT.COM)

WATCH, NIXON ($375,

CA.NIXON.COM) CARDHOLDER, SMYTHSON
($286, MATCHESFASHION.COM)

BOYS
CLUB
A selection of must-haves
for the men in our lives.
SUNGLASSES, PERSOL ($378, PERSOL.COM)

INSTAX MINI EVO HYBRID INSTANT

CAMERA, FUJIFILM ($231, BESTBUY.CA)

PULLOVER, PATAGONIA ($209, PATAGONIA.CA) BACKPACK, RAINS ($160, CA.RAINS.COM)

112 ELLECANADA.COM
 GIFT GUIDE
ROSA PARKS BY LISBETH KAISER
($17, INDIGO.CA)

PLAY TENT, 3 SPROUTS

($45, 3SPROUTS.CA)

PHOTO AND VIDEO CAMERA, KIDYWOLF

($103, SMALLABLE.COM)

CHILD’S PLAY A good dose of fun for the little ones.

HAIR CLIPS, SUPER SMALLS
($41 FOR A SET OF THREE,
CHILDRENSALON.COM)

BANJO, LIEWOOD
($79, JOURES.CA)

HAT, CARIBOU ($43,

CARIBOU.STUDIO)

SKATEBOARD,
BOBBY SMALL ($232,
COMMEDESENFANTS.COM)
ELEPHANT DOLL,
PETITS GENOUX ($63,
PETITSGENOUX.COM)

PLAY KITCHEN, MIDMINI ($680, MAUDEKIDS.COM)

HAPPY PLANETS PRINT, OPPOSITE WALL

(FROM $8, OPPOSITEWALL.COM)

CHEF COAT AND HAT, CRATE&KIDS

($44, CRATEANDBARREL.CA)

ELLECANADA.COM 113
 BEAUTYCOUNTER MINI BEYOND GLOSS VAULT
($63, BEAUTYCOUNTER.COM)

FABRIC SHAVER,
STEAMERY ($91,
GOODEEWORLD.COM)

HAIR BUN ACCESSORY,

GIBOU ($25, GIBOU.CA) BLACK TRUFFLE
CHILI CRUNCH,
MOMOFUKU ($28,
TATA HARPER CANADASHOP.
CREAM BLUSH ($57, MOMOFUKU.COM)
THEDETOXMARKET.CA)

SMALL
WATCH, CHIKIBOOM
($95, CHIKIBOOM.COM)
DETAILS Compact treats that are perfect
EARRINGS, JENNY BIRD for holiday stockings.
($168, JENNY-BIRD.CA)

SOCKS, ROOTS
($16, ROOTS.COM)
U BEAUTY THE PLASMA
LIP COMPOUND IN ORCHID
($88, UBEAUTY.COM)

SELV RITUEL
LA POUSSIÈRE
NORDIQUE BATH
SALT ($30,
SELVRITUEL.COM)

AFFOGATO PUZZLE,
SLEEP MASK, OLIVIA VON HALLE AREAWARE ($23,
($125, OLIVIAVONHALLE.COM) DRAKEGENERALSTORE.CA)

114 ELLECANADA.COM
 GIFT GUIDE

WATERPROOF BLUETOOTH
SPEAKER, BANG & OLUFSEN
($359, BANG-OLUFSEN.COM)
TAROT DECK, ADAM J. KURTZ
($29, INDIGO.CA)

PHONE CASE, KASEME

($45, KASEMEDESIGN.CA)

EARRINGS, WARREN STEVEN SCOTT

($60, WARRENSTEVENSCOTT.COM)

LOLA PINOT GRIGIO,

PELEE ISLAND
($6, LCBO.COM)

MITTENS, ELLIE
MAE STUDIOS ($145,
ELLIEMAESTUDIOS.COM)

BKIND NAIL
POLISH IN
GLACIAL
($16, BKIND.CA)
HOT WATER BOTTLE,
LOVE & LORE
($35, INDIGO.CA)

ZIP WALLET,
MAGUIRE ($110,
MAGUIRESHOES.COM)

SCARF, ARITZIA
($118, ARITZIA.COM)

CHOCOLATE BON BONS,

CHOCOLAT DE KAT ($27
FOR A BOX OF NINE,
CHOCOLATDEKAT.COM)

ELLECANADA.COM 115
 X HOLT RENFREW SPONSORED CONTENT

FESTIVE The ease and comfiness of

pyjamas but made for the
nine-to-five: That’s what
you’re gifting when you wrap
up this chic and sustainable

FINERY
Sleeper set, which comes
in a muted olive colour
with faux-leather piping.
OFF DUTY SHIRT ($450) AND
PANTS ($395), SLEEPER

Holt Renfrew is where the style-

minded go for holiday gifting.
At this time of year, holiday-gift guides are a dime
a dozen. And you’ve probably noticed that not all
guides are created equal. When you’re in search of
This TikTok-approved hair-
presents that put design, sustainability and festive
dryer set comes splashed
spirit at the forefront, head to Holt Renfrew— in a limited-edition cobalt
Canada’s leading destination for elevated luxury hue just in time for the
holiday season. With its
and lifestyle gifting—for its curated picks across multiple attachments
the fashion, beauty and home domains. Beyond and heat-damage-
preventing technology,
the luxe-leaning selection of designer names
it’s guaranteed to spoil
and wares, Holt Renfrew is also home to a bevy of the beauty buff in your
thoughtful stocking stuffers and more affordable life. SPECIAL EDITION
SUPERSONICTM HAIR DRYER
gift ideas. Whether you’re perusing online or For the art collectors and frequent GIFT SET, DYSON ($580)
in-store, Holt Renfrew truly makes the shopping flyers among us, this can’t-miss
coffee-table book is the perfect
experience joyful and effortless. Here, we share a gift pick. A celebration of Miami’s
special selection of the store’s countless holiday- unmatched vibrancy, it also lends
gift options—a curated guide with something to a welcome pop of colour to any
abode. MIAMI BEACH, ASSOULINE ($140)
surprise and delight everyone on your list.

Spanning the luxury fragrance,

skincare, makeup and hair-
care categories, Holt Renfrew’s
Cut from a one-of-a-kind slab of hotly anticipated Beauty
Porto Gold marble, this Canadian- Advent Calendar is truly the gift
designed decorative footed dish— that keeps on giving. Without
ideal for holding keys or coins or spoiling the surprise, we can tell
simply to sit atop a stack of books—is you to expect minis from top-
a stunning addition to the modern- shelf brands like Armani Beauty,
leaning home. LUCAS FOOTED MARBLE Augustinus Bader, Valmont and
DISH, MONTANA LABELLE LIFESTYLE ($425) more. BEAUTY ADVENT CALENDAR
2023, HOLT RENFREW ($595)

Crafted from a
sumptuously soft wool-
cashmere blend, this
modern bolero is made
for the style chameleon
with an of-the-moment
wardrobe. RIBBED WOOL
AND CASHMERE BOLERO,
VINCE ($405)

Up his knitwear game

with one of Robert
Barakett’s classic-meets-
cozy crewnecks. With its
timeless design codes,
this Montreal-based Everyone knows a dedicated dog
menswear brand offers mom who loves her pup like it’s her
an easy way to introduce own child. Help her gear up her fur
him to a streamlined baby for winter walks with this weather-
style approach. BERTONA protective onesie, which also happens
WOOL CREWNECK SWEATER, to have major street-style appeal.
ROBERT BARAKETT ($295) THE SLUSH SUIT, CANADA POOCH (FROM $75)

116 ELLECANADA.COM
 DESIGN
WHITE & BLUE LIBERTE PLATE,
LAETITIA ROUGET ($135, SSENSE.COM)

ECO DINNER CANDLES IN STRIPED ABSTRACT

($71 FOR A BOX OF SIX, TROUVA.COM)

ORNAMENTS ($68 FOR A SET OF SIX,

313DESIGNMARKET.COM)

SCALLOP BORDER
MENU ($38 FOR 10,
PAPIER.COM)

CASCADIA FRAGRANCE
BUNDLE IN EVERGREEN
($79 FOR THE HOLDER,
THE CANDLE AND
15 INCENSE STICKS,
THEBALTICCLUB.COM)

HOLIDAY
CHEER
COTTON NAPKINS ($20 FOR
A PACK OF TWO, HM.COM)

FILL-YOUR-OWN CRACKERS IN MARBLE ($19 FOR A SET OF SIX, INDIGO.CA)

Brighten up the season with

these entertaining essentials.
CHRISTMAS
STOCKING, ZONE ($30,
ZONEMAISON.COM)

PINK TWIST COCKTAIL

GLASSES ($55 FOR A SET
OF TWO, SIMONS.CA)

PAPPERSBJÖRK GLASSES IN
MIXED COLOURS ($13 FOR A
PACK OF FOUR, IKEA.COM)
STYLING, MACA ATENCIO

SEIREENI JUTE PLACEMAT ($51,

MARIMEKKOVANCOUVER.COM)

ELLECANADA.COM 117
SANDALS DUNN’S RIVER RESORT
EXPLORING
OCHO RIOS
There is so much to discover in and around
this port town on Jamaica’s north shore.
By JOANNA FOX
TRAVEL TO THE MIDDLE OF JAMAICA’S northern coast and you’ll
find OCHO RIOS, the island’s stunning “adventure capital.”
The town is about a two-and-a-half-hour drive from both
Montego Bay and Kingston and just a 10-minute drive from
Ian Fleming International Airport—named after the creator
of the James Bond series, who fell in love with the area and
penned his famous books here. Today, Ocho Rios is one of
Jamaica’s most popular tourist destinations, drawing visitors
from all over the world to experience its many natural wonders
(including Dunn’s River and Island Gully Falls), beautiful
beaches, award-winning resorts and unparalleled local cuisine.
This past summer, I was invited to spend a few days exploring
the mountainous area with SANDALS DUNN’S RIVER RESORT and
the JAMAICA TOURIST BOARD, so I got to discover what makes
this region so special.
118 ELLECANADA.COM
RELAX, SWIM, EAT, REPEAT
From the moment I arrived at the new Sandals Dunn’s River
Resort (which opened in May) and was warmly greeted by the
staff, I knew my every need would be taken care of during my
stay. Located just outside Ocho Rios, this luxurious adults-only
all-inclusive is a little slice of paradise. The resort offers several
different room types to cater to all kinds of budgets, and I stayed
in one of the Skypool Suites, which boast a private balcony
pool overlooking the beach, butler service, a stocked bar and
all the amenities you could ask for during a worry-free vacay.
As lovely as all the suite features are, it’s the beach—with
its soft white sand and clear turquoise waters—that’s the true
showstopper. If the open sea is not for you, head to one of the
resort’s five spacious pools to cool off as the afternoon heat sets
in. And once you’ve worked up an appetite, there’s no shortage
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF SANDALS DUNN’S RIVER
of options for eating and drinking thanks to the 12 on-site res-
taurants, which are open throughout the day and night, plus a
number of bars where you can grab a thirst-quenching drink.
For adventurous types who want to paddle, snorkel, sail or
water-ski their way along the coastline, there are many friendly
qualified staff members who can offer expertise. And if a spa
day is more your speed, the resort’s chic RED LANE SPA will
melt any tension away with its exclusive massage therapies,
facials and specialty treatments designed to scrub, smooth
and tighten. SANDALS.COM/DUNNSRIVER

FALLS JUMPING
Though lounging around a resort is the per-
fect way to unwind, there is so much more to
explore beyond the property. Get your adrenalin
pumping at the absolutely gorgeous—and a bit
intimidating—ISLAND GULLY FALLS, a group of
bright-blue mineral pools, streams and rushing
waterfalls that are a 20-minute drive up into the
mountains. Clad in water shoes and a life jacket, I
was led by a skilful guide along the lush cliffs as we
jumped in and across the water pools. The whole
experience—including one very high jump and
swinging into the river on a Tarzan rope—was
exhilarating. ISLANDGULLYFALL.COM
SIP AND SAVOUR
Although the fresh mountain water makes
for the ideal morning pick-me-up, I could not
leave Jamaica without a taste of its famous Blue
Mountain coffee. Due to the peaks’ high altitude,
SUMMERHOUSE RESTAURANT
the mountainside-grown beans are denser than
usual, producing a richer coffee. We made our
way to ISLAND VILLAGE, a small shopping complex
with specialty boutiques in the heart of Ocho Rios, where the
lovely staff at JABLUM prepared a fresh cup of this smooth and
velvety brew. After my caffeine hit, I popped into the APPLETON
RUM tasting room next door and sampled three of the local
brand’s offerings, including the Appleton Estate Signature and
a more aged rum, the 12-year-old Rare Casks, which is ideal
for sipping. Last but certainly not least was PURE CHOCOLATE
JAMAICA, where the owners of the award-winning farm-to-bar
company let me sample some of their best treats (my personal
faves were a divine dark chocolate with cinnamon and the sweet
and spicy dark chocolate with jerk seasoning), which come in
packages designed by local artists. ISLANDVILLAGEJA.COM
JERK AND PATTIES
No trip to Jamaica is complete without some indulgence in
the country’s most iconic dishes. Start at SCOTCHIES JERK, a
two-minute drive from the Sandals resort. This very relaxed,
convivial outdoor restaurant offers shade from the sun with its
scattered tables under thatched-roof huts. “Jerk” refers to a style
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF SUMMERHOUSE RESTAURANT & ISLAND MAGNOLIA BOUTIQUE
of cooking in which the main ingredient—typically chicken,
pork or goat—is coated in seasoning that includes allspice and
Scotch bonnet peppers and then slow-cooked on a grill over
green pimento wood. There are also the essential sides: festival
(a sweet fried dough), roast breadfruit (a starch-rich fruit that’s
like a cross between bread and potatoes) and rice and peas. I’m
a huge fan of jerk, and there is no comparison to having it here,
where the entire meal, washed down with an ice-cold Red Stripe
beer, was smoky, spicy and out of this world. @SCOTCHIESJAMAICA
Another Jamaican favourite is the patty, a baked half-moon
suet-dough pie filled with seasoned ground meat. It’s a perfect
hand-held snack to eat on the go, and there are several famous
Jamaican brands, including Juici, Mother’s and Tastee. Everyone
seems to have their favourite, but I opted for TASTEE’s beef and
jerk-chicken versions. Packed with flavour and the perfect
amount of spicy filling and encased in a flaky and soft but
ever-so-crisp pastry, these patties were perfection. TASTEEJAMAICA.COM
TRAVEL
MICHELLE ROUSSEAU AT THE
ISLAND MAGNOLIA BOUTIQUE
CULINARY STARS
One of Jamaica’s most popular restaurants, MISS T’S KITCHEN,
is located in the centre of Ocho Rios, but I met the spot’s
award-winning chef and owner, Anna-Kay Tomlinson, at the
picturesque LAUGHING WATERS. In this stunning beach setting,
where waterfalls flow into the ocean, Tomlinson whipped up
an incredible outdoor meal. Her love of Jamaican ingredients,
food and culture shone through with every bite, whether it was
a delicately spiced fish with citrus and sliced Scotch bonnets
or her finessed jerk-chicken salad, sumptuous oxtail and—not
to be overlooked—the best rice and peas I’ve ever tasted. A
force in the Jamaican culinary scene, Tomlinson is a natural
talent and a true ambassador for women entrepreneurs and
local cuisine. @MISSTSKITCHEN
HARMONY HALL , a 15-minute drive from Ocho Rios, is where
you’ll find the Rousseau sisters, Michelle and Suzanne. This
powerful duo have combined their love of food, fashion, art
and culture under one roof—a colonial-style heritage building
surrounded by a pristine landscaped garden. Venture upstairs
and you’ll find their boutique, ISLAND MAGNOLIA, for which
they’ve curated some of the most exquisite Caribbean- and Latin
American-sourced clothing, accessories and home decor, all
with a focus on quality and slow fashion. On the main floor is
SUMMERHOUSE, a restaurant that offers contemporary reinter-
pretations of Caribbean classics with fresh seasonal and local
ingredients. Seated in the space’s covered patio, I enjoyed a meal
that included curried-ackee wontons, kale salad with quinoa,
local mango and feta, East Indian chicken skewers with green
and red curries and lobster frites. The sisters are well known in
Jamaica, both for their previous retail, hospitality and lifestyle
establishments and for their love of food and cooking—they
have two internationally bestselling cookbooks and even a
television show. Their unique perspective on Jamaican life,
culture and hospitality celebrates the diversity and artistry of
their country. SUMMERHOUSEJA.COM
ELLECANADA.COM 119
 48 Hours in
LOS ANGELES
A must-see guide to the city’s coastal west side.
By RANDI BERGMAN

ASK AN ANGELENO which of their city’s 400-plus

disparate neighbourhoods takes top honours and
they’ll likely all plump for their own with gusto.
Eastsiders will happily forsake the beach for galleries
and wine bars, but for those craving quintessential
California vibes, little can compete with the city’s
languid, semi-tropical western coast. From Malibu to
Santa Monica to Venice Beach, you’ll find surf shops,
farmers’ markets and historic spots with enough Old
Hollywood throwbacks to rival Hollywood itself, all
within view of the Pacific Ocean’s crashing waves.

STAY
THE GEORGIAN Steps from the kitschy Santa Monica
Pier stands The Georgian, a landmark art-deco hotel
that originally opened in 1933, once hosted the likes
of Marilyn Monroe and Charlie Chaplin and has
recently been restored to its 1930s glory. Its turquoise
facade is a preview of the kind of flourishes you’ll find
inside, from a golden U-shaped lobby bar flanked by
flamingo-feathered sculptures to the 84 retro-beachy
rooms and suites. With details like bellhops wearing
seafoam-green caps and a lobby phone that plays a
conversation between guests who stayed there in the
1930s, it seems the designers might have taken a page
from Wes Anderson. Summon bubbles, Prohibition-
PHOTOGRAPHY, COURTESY OF THE GEORGIAN, EAMES OFFICE, BAR COUCOU & LCD

style, in any of the 28 one-bedroom suites by hitting

the “press for champagne” button and a bellhop will
roll to you with a cart of vintages in tow.
Dinner is served on the terrace with a dreamy sunset
backdrop, and the menu is coastal-Italian-inspired,
with offerings of fresh seafood and contorni from the
nearby Santa Monica farmers’ market. Close out your
classic Hollywood fantasy with a nightcap at The
Georgian Room, a speakeasy piano bar serving up
old-fashioneds and hefty nostalgia via framed prints
of the restaurant’s original menus. Look closely and
you’ll see a train pattern woven into the carpet—a
reference to the long-gone Mile Long Pier railroad,
THE GEORGIAN
which extended into the Pacific on a long wharf in
the late 19th and early 20th centuries. THEGEORGIAN.COM

120 ELLECANADA.COM

EAMES HOUSE
BAR COUCOU
EAT
BAR MONETTE Down the block from The Georgian, you’ll find
this buzzy wine haunt, which was opened by Toronto-born chef
Sean MacDonald earlier this year. The candlelit bottle-green
space boasts a short but mighty menu of small plates served
on antique tableware, wood-fired pizzas dotted with zucchini
blossoms or caviar and a not-to-be-skipped section of fancy
dipping sauces, including burnt romesco and jalapeno tonnato.
BARMONETTE.COM
BAR COUCOU If you just learned that Cali-French cuisine is a
thing (you’re not alone) and are curious about it, look no further
than this Venice bistro, which serves up snacks like “L’Haute
Dog,” a sausage topped with fondue cheese. Coucou’s cocktail
menu is equally cheeky, with drinks including the Bitches of the
Seizieme, a blend of brandy, bubbles and creole bitters. The
laid-back space balances vintage patina with contemporary
charm and is done up with paintings and photographs by
emerging artists—like the airy and surreal still-life snaps by
local photographer David Kitz—and mini table lamps that
bring an intimate Parisian feel to dinnertime. COUCOU.LA
TRAVEL
DO
EAMES HOUSE This mid-century landmark is hiding in plain
sight in Pacific Palisades, an affluent neighbourhood just a
short drive from Santa Monica. Designed and constructed
in 1949 by famed husband-and-wife duo Charles and Ray
Eames, the house is an homage to the geometric, gridlike de
Stijl style, with swaths of primary colours painted on its sliding
walls and windows and a now ubiquitous open-concept floor
plan. (Viewings are available by reservation only, so make sure
you book your tour ahead of time.) EAMESFOUNDATION.ORG
LOS LEONES CANYON No trip to L.A. is complete without
a hike through one of the city’s eye-popping canyons. First-
timers may prefer to visit Runyon Canyon or the trails near the
Griffith Observatory, but we love Malibu’s Los Leones Canyon
for its unparalleled views of Santa Monica Bay with the city
in the distance. When visiting outside of wildfire season (and
you should always check the conditions before you head out),
you’ll find the area incredibly lush and verdant, with plenty
of shady spots. TRAILS.LACOUNTY.GOV
SHOP
SURFING COWBOYS Strip malls in L.A. are packed with gems,
including this vintage and collectibles shop in Malibu Country
Mart, an outdoor shopping centre set against the backdrop of
the Santa Monica mountains. The shop showcases Americana
at its finest, from rare concert T-shirts (think Fleetwood Mac
and Tammy Wynette) to surfboards from the ’60s and ’70s.
There’s something here for both surfing enthusiasts and those
who’ve only watched Blue Crush once. SURFINGCOWBOYS.COM
LCD You’ll find pieces by hot emerging designers, like Luar,
Vaquera, Sandy Liang and Collina Strada, showcased alongside
hyped sneakers from brands like Salomon and Vans at this
stylish Venice outpost. The cult-favourite boutique combines
idiosyncratic fashion with colourful home decor as well as spe-
cial-edition magazines and trendy coffee-table books. SHOPLCD.CO
LCD
 Raise a Glass
’Tis the season to pop open a bottle (or three)
of our favourite Canadian sparkling wines.
By AMAN AND JASMIN DOSANJ

CANADA HAS LONG BEEN KNOWN for its icewine production and varietals like
Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Riesling. But from British Columbia to Nova Scotia,
more and more wineries have been adding a delightful surprise to their repertoires:
world-class bubbly. In fact, of the 600-plus cool-climate wineries dotted across the
country, about 200 are now producing sparkling wine—and they’re making a mark.
In a class with top producers from across the globe, Canadian makers earned 31
medals at this year’s prestigious Decanter World Wine Awards in London, England.
It’s clear, then, that there has never been a better time to stock up on local bubbles.
Besides our short growing season, which is a must for preserving that all-important
natural acidity, the eclectic microclimates and shape-shifting soils across the country
are what make each terroir-driven expression unique. Whether for Christmas parties,
family movie nights, impromptu gatherings or major celebrations, these Canadian
sparklers have you covered.

TAWSE WINERY 2020 LIMESTONE

RIESLING SPARK!
NIAGARA PENINSULA, ONT. ($24.95) BENJAMIN BRIDGE 2019 BRUT ROSÉ
GASPEREAU VALLEY, N.S. ($39.75)
Tawse, a four-time winner of the WineAlign
National Wine Awards’ Canadian Winery of A deep respect for its coastal terroir has
the Year category, clearly knows a thing or helped shape Benjamin Bridge into
two about crafting delicious Rieslings, and one of the country’s premier sparkling
this fun traditional-method offering is no houses. Presenting with an amber hue
PHOTOGRAPHY, GETTY (MAIN IMAGE)

exception. From its complex nose, which in the glass, this 2019 Pinot Meunier,
keeps luring you back to the glass, to its Chardonnay and Pinot Noir rosé has
crisp Spartan-apple flavours, lush mousse zippy East Coast-apple aromas and
(froth lining the rim of the glass) and off-dry red-berry undertones. Hints of orange
finish, everything sparks conversation. It blossom, strawberry and white flowers
oozes cool—and not just for wine nerds. on the palate lead to a lingering
TAWSEWINERY.CA saline finish. BENJAMINBRIDGE.COM

122 ELLECANADA.COM
 LIFESTYLE

LIGHTFOOT & WOLFVILLE 2021

BRUT ROSÉ
ANNAPOLIS VALLEY, N.S. ($39.13)
Growing classic vinifera varieties suited
to a cool coastal climate is what Lightfoot
& Wolfville is all about. A 70-30 blend
of Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier, this
pink bubbly was aged for 11 months on
lees for added texture and complexity.
Delicate red-berry notes follow through
to a ripe and tart fruit palate with wild
strawberry and cranberry flavours. It’s
dry and balanced with a racy acidity,
a creamy mousse and a long finish.
LIGHTFOOTANDWOLFVILLE.COM
AVERILL CREEK VINEYARD
CHARME DE L’ILE
COWICHAN VALLEY, B.C. ($28.20)
HANGOVER-FREE CHEER
Here are three ready-to-pour
zero-proof options with light
sparkle but none of the buzz.
BENJAMIN BRIDGE
PIQUETTE ZERO
(250 ML / $3.49 EACH)
Piquette Zero is an
easygoing grape-skin
infusion with aromatic
yuzu and zesty lemon-
pith flavours. While Citra
hops add texture and
complexity, a gentle lick of
terroir from Bay of Fundy sea salt lifts the
palate. Unlike many de-alcoholized wine
options on the market, this no-added-
sugar wine-style sparkler from Benjamin
Bridge is full of personality and is seriously
crushable. BENJAMINBRIDGE.COM

Crafted using the Charmat method (in

which the second fermentation takes HEARTWOOD SPARKLE:
place in a tank instead of the bottle), ORGANIC APPLE
(355 ML / $2.95 EACH)
Averill Creek’s charming young blend of
Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris and Chardonnay Ontario’s Heartwood
is wild-fermented (made without Farm crafts small-batch
the addition of enzymes, nutrients or ciders that capture the
sulphites). Lively and fresh with notes of nature of its 42-acre
green apple, stone fruit and lemon on regenerative farm and
the palate, it’s an easygoing bub for surrounding community. A mix of organic
any occasion. AVERILLCREEK.CA apples, including McIntosh, Honeycrisp
and Northern Spy, are expertly blended
to highlight the naturally sweet and
deliciously tart characteristics of the
HENRY OF PELHAM 2017 CUVÉE fruit in an off-dry cider that is made
CATHARINE ESTATE BLANC DE BLANCS without sweeteners or preservatives.
“CARTE BLANCHE” HEARTWOODFARM.CA

SHORT HILLS BENCH, ONT. ($49.95)

It’s no wonder Henry of Pelham’s stunning

NONNY PALE ALE
Blanc de Blancs received 93 points (out (355 ML / $12.99 FOR A FOUR-PACK)

of a possible 100) at the 2023 Decanter Since bursting onto the

World Wine Awards. First, a dedicated block scene in January 2022,
of only the best of the best estate-grown Nonny has changed
Chardonnay is hand-picked, and then it’s perceptions about what
partially barrel-aged for 54 months on lees. an all-natural non-
Think of Carte Blanche as Zendaya on a alcoholic craft beer can
red carpet—brimming with easy elegance. be. Tropical pineapple
With lemon, apple and mineral aromas aromas lead to a crisp, citrusy finish. With
and classic brioche notes on the palate, all the hoppy characteristics you’d expect
it shines bright next to the world’s best, from a pale ale, this is nicely carbonated
champagne included. HENRYOFPELHAM.COM and has zero grams of sugar. NONNY.BEER

ELLECANADA.COM 123
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 FOOD
FAN
Meet Margaux Verdier, a
Canadian content creator
who wants to share her love of
dairy-free plant-based dishes.
By JOANNA FOX
MONTREAL-BASED MARGAUX VERDIER has always been interested
in food and cooking. For starters, her mother, Katrine Paradis,
is known in Quebec for her food magazine, book and web series,
all under the name K pour Katrine, so Verdier literally grew up
in the kitchen. When she got older, she helped Paradis create
recipes and style food for photo shoots. “Working with my
mom has been an amazing experience, and I’m so thankful
for the relationship we have,” says Verdier. “We have always
shared a passion for food, and she has been a wonderful role
model for me.”
So it was natural for Verdier to venture into a food career
of her own with her Instagram account @margaux.food and
her new website, margauxfood.ca. She, like many Canadians,
grew up dealing with severe food allergies, so she wanted to
create a place where people could go to find the kinds of recipes
she likes to make herself—dairy-free and mostly vegetarian.
With fare like vegan zucchini pasta with garlic, lemon, walnuts
and vegan feta, white-bean puttanesca, 15-minute creamy
curry noodles or the occasional meat dish—hello, air-fryer
crispy-chicken tacos—Verdier’s enthusiasm and instincts for
perfectly pairing flavours is evident. We recently spoke with the
25-year-old about starting her cooking career, her must-have
ingredients and some of the biggest challenges she has faced
as a young entrepreneur.
How did you get into cooking? “I started cooking a lot because
of all my food allergies. I’m allergic to all dairy and fish, but when
I was younger, I had a lot of allergies, including eggs, nuts and
seafood. It really pushed me to become more independent and
self-reliant in the kitchen. But I have to say that my mom is the
reason I love cooking so much. She’s the one who passed on her
passion and taught me almost everything I know about cooking.
I’m really grateful for her.”
Do you remember the first recipe you created on your own?
“I think I made a burrito-bowl recipe for K pour Katrine. I must have
PHOTOGRAPHY, ARIEL TARR
been 16, and it was my go-to when I hosted dinners for friends.”
What are the ingredients or food items you can’t live without?
“Definitely a spicy sauce—either sambal oelek or sriracha—fresh
basil, lime and a bunch of spices. Oh, and, of course, dill pickles.
I’m obsessed with them.”
When did you know you wanted to have a career in food and
cooking? “When I did my master’s degree in digital marketing in
Barcelona in 2022, I realized that I missed cooking and creating
recipes a lot, so that was a sign for me. I’m glad I trusted my gut
and started my own business in the food industry.”
What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced so
far? “I’m a really creative person, so my biggest challenge is hav-
ing to deal with all the things that bore me—as in all the adminis-
trative stuff you have to do when you have a company.”
Do you have a favourite meal you like to make? “Definitely
salads—all kinds of salads for all seasons. I’m obsessed with them
because the possibilities are endless.”
What’s the best restaurant you’ve ever been to? “My all-time
favourite is Xavier Pellicer, a vegetable-forward restaurant in
Barcelona. I discovered it with my mom, and we were amazed
by the creativity there and the whole experience.”
What are your Canadian go-to restaurants? “In Montreal, for
a special occasion, it would be Damas for sure. I also love Foxy,
and I go to Sushi Momo for the best vegan sushi. Pichai is another
favourite of mine, but be aware: Some of its specialties are
really spicy. I’m dying to try Pai in Toronto as well as St. Lawrence
in Vancouver.”
What are your favourite food cities? “Definitely Montreal and
Barcelona. I know I’m a little biased, but I’ve travelled a lot, and I
still think they’re the best for diversity and modernity. I also love
the fact that they both have a huge selection of vegetarian and
vegan restaurants.”
Can you give us some of your best cooking tips or tricks?
“Always have fresh herbs on hand. Don’t be afraid to try new reci-
pes and new ingredient combinations. Get yourself a good knife
and a good pan—they’ll make life a lot easier. Don’t be shy with
spices. And, finally, cook with friends. It’s way more fun, and you
get free help with the dishes.”
ELLECANADA.COM 125
 ASTROLOGY

Holiday
Horoscope Special
Gift ideas for that special sign in your life.
By VANESSA DL

CHARM, MEJURI ($375,

MEJURI.COM)

SIGNET RING, BRILLIANT

EARTH ($945,
BRILLIANTEARTH.COM)

EARRINGS, MOON MAGIC

($125, MOONMAGIC.COM)

SAGITTARIUS CAPRICORN AQUARIUS

NOVEMBER 22 – DECEMBER 21
Check your bank account and your
schedule to avoid taking on any
obligations that you’re not able to meet,
DECEMBER 22 – JANUARY 19
The end of the year will give you the
opportunity to re-evaluate how you
present yourself as well as the projects
JANUARY 20 – FEBRUARY 18
You’re learning to cultivate your faith
in yourself during times of transition,
especially when the future seems
STYLING, MAROUCHKA FRANJULIEN

either financially or physically. This period
of reflection will help you create space
in your life to welcome the unexpected
more fluidly while focusing on your true
desires and priorities.
you take on. Remember that you have
the right—but also a responsibility—to
change your approach to ensure that
your actions are true to your core values.
uncertain. Don’t forget to rely on your
network during these difficult times.
Watch for chance encounters at the
beginning of the new year; you might
be surprised by what comes your way.
In the meantime, try to refocus.

126 ELLECANADA.COM
PISCES
FEBRUARY 19 – MARCH 20
There are changes for you on
the horizon—some of them quite
unpredictable. To prepare, reassess
your aspirations and how you want
to be involved in your community.
The universe is encouraging you to
reconnect with some big dreams and
pick up where you left off.
EARRINGS, RETROFÊTE ($380, REVOLVE.COM)
ARIES
MARCH 21 – APRIL 19
The next few months bring you flexibility
and the readiness to make career
changes. Take a step back to revise
your strategy as needed and update
your plan of action. Remember to adjust
your overall vision, and, most importantly,
be ready to adapt and take on new
challenges with confidence.
MEDALLION, MELANIE AULD ($55, MELANIEAULD.COM)
TAURUS
APRIL 20 – MAY 20
Think carefully before shaking things up
in your life. Instead of rushing in, why not
seek out external resources for help in
achieving your goals more realistically?
This way, you’ll start the new year with
a clearer and more grounded vision of
your future.
CHARM, PANDORA ($80, CA.PANDORA.NET)
GEMINI
MAY 21 – JUNE 20
Review the projects and relationships
in your life, keeping in mind the time,
energy and resources you’ve put into
them. If necessary, discuss them with
your partners—in life and in love—to
redefine your common vision. Your goal
should be to focus on what’s essential
and nurture constructive relationships.
EARRINGS, MAJE ($145, CA.MAJE.COM)
CANCER
JUNE 21 – JULY 22
Address any relationship issues and
resolve them before they escalate.
Deadlines can be frustrating, so
try to see them as opportunities to
review your action plan and find
compromises together. Promote regular
communication to help you maintain a
harmonious life-love balance.
BRACELET, YVONNE LÉON ($415, MATCHESFASHION.COM)
LEO
JULY 23 – AUGUST 22
You need to accept that your routine can
be turned upside down from time to time.
The universe is not trying to upset you—it’s
actually trying to stimulate your creativity.
Figure out what’s distracting you, prioritize
what truly nurtures your inner artist and
don’t be hard on yourself if you need to
go back to the drawing board.
RING, GUCCI ($590, GUCCI.COM)
VIRGO
AUGUST 23 – SEPTEMBER 22
Let your imagination run wild. It’s more
important to listen to your emotions and
needs right now than to force something
to happen prematurely. Honour this
expressive period by giving yourself the
space you need to flourish organically
and without constraints.
NECKLACE, MYEL ($890, MYELDESIGN.COM)
LIBRA
SEPTEMBER 23 – OCTOBER 22
Be acutely aware of inner conflicts that
make you question your values. Be sure
not to overload your schedule as it’s
important that you have the bandwidth
for introspection. You might need to
remind yourself that you have the
freedom to choose which responsibilities
you want to take on.
EARRING, CHLOÉ ($560, SSENSE.COM)
SCORPIO
OCTOBER 23 – NOVEMBER 21
If there have been misunderstandings
recently, it’s essential to keep an open
mind and favour curiosity and flexibility to
help you find common ground. Put value
on having meaningful conversations,
as they will show you that you already
possess the skills and ability to resolve
disagreements in a positive way.
HAIRPIN, DEUX LIONS ($160, DEUXLIONSJEWELRY.COM)
ELLECANADA.COM 127
 PROMOTION

ELLE CANADA
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P. 60
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ELLECANADA.COM 129
 FINALE

GLOWING
TRIBUTE
AFTER JEAN PAUL GAULTIER took his final bow on the runway in 2020, he began
inviting guest designers to draw up collections for his namesake label. It wasn’t long
before the shows became a highlight of Haute Couture Week, and the fall/winter
2023/2024 iteration was perhaps the most anticipated yet. In a presentation held
at Gaultier’s Parisian headquarters, a reverential Julien Dossena paid tribute to the
French master with a dazzling procession of designs that drew from the house’s ’90s
TEXT, ESTELLE GERVAIS; PHOTOGRAPHY, LAUNCHMETRICS SPOTLIGHT

archives and its ability to harness the power of femininity. The Rabanne creative
director nodded to some of the couturier’s most fabled codes—sailor stripes, rock ’n’
roll leather, grunge plaid, nipped corsets, printed mesh—while ushering each look
into a new era of modernity. A sleek leather pencil skirt was paired with a romantic
sheer-silk top with a playful feathered collar; a mohair sweater’s stripes were almost
engulfed by its texture; and the iconic cone bustier was complemented by a Rabanne-
esque chain-mail train skirt. Closing the show was French supermodel and long-time
Gaultier muse Laetitia Casta, who looked fittingly regal in a bejewelled crown and
mulberry velvet gown. It was a full-circle moment, as Casta’s first-ever catwalk was for
the brand back in 1993. The fashion world adored the homage, collectively lauding
Dossena for his respectful reinterpretation. But perhaps the most significant praise
of all came from Gaultier himself, who, while sitting front row and taking in the
pieces for the very first time, wore the best look of the show: a smile of approval.

130 ELLECANADA.COM
 Up to

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 8® CHANEL S. de R.L.
©CHANEL, Inc. CHANEL ®

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