Photo: Tayler Smith for The Wildest (x)

Why subscribe?

I write about beauty as an act of devotion, an art form, and a means of control. I ask painful questions about beautiful things and tender questions about ugly experiences. As I’ve written before, beauty is my favorite mythology. It is a love of my life, and a familiar one. I am not ‘conned’ by the industry of beauty. I am entertained by it, preoccupied by its promises, and its lies are bedtime stories to me. I don’t need to believe in them to love them; they are the sheep I count at night. I don’t mind never reaching a final destination, a perfect beauty, as long as I’m having fun and making someone feel better on the ride. We can’t get off it. There is no opt-out or unsubscribe to the consequences of appearance in our daily lives.

Given that, let’s get everything we can out of the ride together, ok? We will learn everything together. All the rules, so we can break them, and make new pathways to better places. That is the point. To get free. Together. Isn’t it?

Here are some signposts that guide me on this journey - maybe they’ll help explain my agenda:

(Source - i don’t mind being a shapeshifter. it makes me feel powerful, even when i am unsure)

“The ability to ask beautiful questions, often in very unbeautiful moments, is one of the great disciplines of a human life. And a beautiful question starts to shape your identity as much by asking it as it does by having it answered. And you don’t have to do anything about it. You just have to keep asking. And before you know it, you will find yourself actually shaping a different life, meeting different people, finding conversations that are leading you in those directions that you wouldn’t even have seen before.”

— David Whyte, On Being interview “The Conversational Nature of Reality”

To me, contemplating beauty and how to use it to survive a collapsing, self-immolating world is my devotion. Sharing what I learn on that journey as writing to you is something I cherish every day.

Whether you have the means to support as a paid subscriber or hang out with me on the free plan - thanks for spending time with me!

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A beauty industry newsletter that publishes news, beauty criticism, and longform essays. Beauty is terror, but it can be care, too. I walk the line between these landscapes.

People

I write about beauty as an act of devotion, an art form, and a means of control. 🥀 The Cut called me “The Thinking Woman’s Beauty Writer” but you can call me Arabelle. My book on the beauty industry, The House of Beauty, is forthcoming.