This roundup of things we liked this week originally appeared in the May 16, 2024 edition of the Secret Strategist newsletter, a weekly email where we share the stuff our staff — plus a rotating cast of writers, design-world people, and various others with very good taste — would otherwise keep to themselves. If you want to get our picks straight to your inbox each week, sign up here.
Some luminescent pants, some handsome burl furniture on auction at Housing Works, and a $16 (???) Cynthia Rowley dress. Plus unisex summer shoes. We have eyes everywhere! —Katy Schneider & Simone Kitchens
This Week’s List
* These expensive dresses by new brand Meruert Tolegen are extremely pretty and cool.
* We can attest that these pink vintage Dosas are the best pants for this summer. (Or any color Dosa. But the pink ones are luminescent.)
* If we had a limitless supply of money, we would probably immediately buy these so-beautiful, generally unavailable-for-casual-purchase Megumi Shauna Arai curtains.
* If you want capris, these from Zara get the job done and don’t feel cheap-cheap.
* Really been wanting a Cynthia Rowley tube dress lately, so slightly stunned to find a good one going for $16 on the RealReal! Wonder why Cynthia Rowley is so devalued. In other pretty-vintage-dresses news: (1) this one from Blumarine, (2) a beautiful Prada for under $200, (3) a beautiful Prada for only slightly over $200.
* MoMA remains a font of nice outdoor furniture. See: this lounge chair. But this $99 wire Ikea one is also good.
* We just found this great Swedish knob company, Spaces Within. We particularly like this sturdy door pull in polished nickel and this elongated swoosh of a handle in dark brass. It’s a big knob week, given that Monica Khemsurov just launched her knob company, Petra. Very obsessed with these spiral knobs.
* We ID’d Hari Nef’s floral Yves Delorme bedding, spotted in her Apartamento home tour. Sold out, it seems, but pieces here and there on eBay. Really love it.
* Koko Momo makes some great giant-fitting kids’ pants.
* Some nice burl pieces in the Housing Works auctions.
Check These Out Too
Justin Dean, men’s buying director at Kith, shares his favorite summer shoes.
* I’ve owned these Lemaire fisherman sandals for about a year and a half. I wear them with shorts, with pants, with socks, without socks. I’ve probably worn them more with pants and socks than with shorts because I love them so much. It’s a very functional historical style with a square closed toe. I love an elegant take on a practical item. I wear them biking, walking, standing at my desk — I wear them all the time.
* There’s also the Paraboot Pacific sandal; I have those in dark brown and black. They’re even a bit more casual, so lightweight and easy. Growing up, I saw the style on older men, and it always inspired me.
* The Keen Targhee sandal is a great everyday shoe that’s not $500. The sandal would look really cool if you were in all Lemaire on top, then a Keen sandal on the bottom. Or just with a pair of Gramicci shorts — that’s a good weekend look. And these sandals are waterproof.
*And I love to wear the Lemaire piped slipper with white Comme Si socks; that’s my spring-summer rotation. Today, I’m wearing that combination with Junya Watanabe pants.
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