This summer, in June I went to Abu Dhabi. This was for me a very unexpected turn of events because prior to meeting my English boyfriend in Madrid who grew up in Abu Dhabi I would have never guessed that I would ever visit this country. 

I love to realize that there was this moment I felt confident enough to go to school wearing something different, different then ‘the rest’.

On the 31st of October of 2023 the brand SKIMS by Kim Kardashian released the “SKIMS ULTIMATE Nipple Push Up Bra”. This product launch in our opinion has loads to discuss. 

The e-commerce platform SHEIN has been around since 2008, I personally first became aware of it around 2017, when it started gaining attention through influencers. At that time, I was about 12. I remember it becoming well-known—not so much for its amazing clothes, but for its cheap prices, which were often linked to controversies like child labour. As a young teenager, I was very much against it. In fact, up until fairly recently, I still refused to order from the brand out of protest.

I feel incredibly lucky to have experienced the phenomena “shopping for the shops”. I know I really could frame this a bit more professionally…like B2B wholesale purchasing or something…but I always felt like I had uncovered a secret way to shop like a manic without feeling incredibly guilty.

 As I grew up, the big fashion chain ZARA has always been a static thing in my life. It has always been there and I have (pretty) much always loved it. From when I was very young I loved their clothing and I honestly still think it’s the brand where I have the most clothing from… (not super proud of that but alright.) 

Sometimes more is less; you usually hear this saying the other way around, but when I moved to Madrid at 18 years old, my idea of style — and what it meant to be sexy — changed completely. Growing up in The Netherlands, I thought sexiness was all about showing skin, highlighting curves, and wearing tight or revealing clothes.

It seems that the older I get the more I fall for fabrics, the softness, the way they feel, and I almost don’t care about the design if I fall in love with a fabric.

Between our generations, we have noticed that even though the unwanted clothes will always be kept in the attic or wherever there is space, one year after the other there are pieces found that have been brought back in style. Proving the Laver’s Law by James Laver that styles always come back