Welcome to STAR⟡MAIL — the new newsletter from HALOSCOPE. From weekly roundups to what’s happening in fashion to exclusive content from your favorite culture commentators, we aim to be the coolest thing in your inbox every Friday.

Letter from the Editor ✉️

Hi, angels — welcome to STAR⟡MAIL.

Over the past few months, our fearless Newsletter Editor Ella Gray (hi!!!!) and I have been building our perfect vision of what a fashion newsletter should look like. The ideas were thus: our favorite HALOSCOPE articles; news and trendspottings; fun links to some of the coolest fashion things on (and off) the Internet; essays and contributions from our lovely friends; and a peek behind the curtain into our little world.

I’m so happy we can finally share STAR⟡MAIL with you. It’ll be delivered to your inbox every Friday morning with a glittery, overarching theme (HINTS: 🌸📹🤠👩‍🎤🛒🍝🪩💍🛩️).

The best part of this newsletter? YOU. Our inbox ([email protected]) is open for all questions, suggestions, or ideas. We’d love to hear from you.

Now, I’ll hand it off to Ella…

x Savannah Eden Bradley, Editor-in-Chief

A Note from Ella

Hi! I’m Ella Gray and I think about clothing too much. Ever since I was old enough to wield fabric scissors, I’ve been designing and dissecting apparel with the kind of obsession usually reserved for boy bands or religious mania. These days, I work as a design assistant in New York’s Garment District and spend my free time writing about trends on my Substack blog, Ella Going Gray. You may have seen my work as a researcher and script co-writer for Mina Le’s YouTube channel or podcast, High Brow.

Let’s get into it.

To celebrate the launch of STAR⟡MAIL, I’ve thrown together a list of a bunch of my favorite fashion flicks:

True Stories (1986) dir. David Byrne

True Stories, an absurd Talking Heads-soundtracked romp through a small Texas town, has as many phenomenally colorful costumes as it does colorful characters. My favorite costumes are the garments paraded down the runway at the local mall fashion show.

The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (1972) dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Much to say about the psychodrama, but let's talk about those clothes! Almost entirely restricted to a designer’s apartment and studio, we’re looking at wall to wall gorgeous gowns.

To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar (1995) dir. Beeban Kidron

If you have yet to enjoy this drag road trip classic, change that soon!

Pandora's Box (1929) dir. G. W. Pabst

Louise Brooks, queen of the bob, turns in a dazzlingly modern performance in this silent Weimar noir.

The Josephine Baker Story (1991) dir. Brian Gibson

Lynn Whitfield is captivating as Josephine Baker and the Emmy darling has pretty great costumes for a 90s TV movie. A lot of the clothing is era-inaccurate, but I forgive the anachronisms on account of the lovely hazy glow throughout.

Slaves of New York (1989) dir. James Ivory

Set against the backdrop of the late 80s downtown arts scene in Manhattan, Benadette Peters finds creative fulfillment and personal freedom as a successful avant garde hat designer. Is the movie good? Eh. Is she walking so Carrie can run? Yes!!!

Viva (2007) dir. Anna Biller

Lesser known than Biller’s The Love Witch (2016), this campy sex comedy is definitely worth a watch.

Auntie Mame (1958) dir. Morton DaCosta

Canonically, Rosalind Russell serves so hard in her Orry-Kelly-designed costumes that The Great Depression ends. I think.

This month has seen so many incredible cover girls. Between Ella Purnell for The Cut, Ayo Edebiri for Vanity Fair, Hunter Schafer for Vogue Italia, and Melissa Barrera for Polyester, we have been so blessed lately:

This old New Yorker piece by Sischy has me obsessing over Prada more than usual:

This swan-shaped wig created by Viktor Komskii:

The inspired trendspotting of Elizabeth Goodspeed, who is always pointing out the most niche fads in print ads:

This essay, wherein Brendon Holder declares this the Summer of Hating (love reading this in conversation with Kaitlin Owens’ piece on the current state of fashion policing as well as…

…this old Sassy Magazine spread I can’t get out of my head):

And, lastly, how are we feeling about this “Brand Magic Matrix” released by BOF last week?