“If LinYee asks me anything, I say yes.”

This tidbit from Guarionex Rodriguez Jr. was my first introduction to LinYee Yuan, curator of the 2026/2027 A!R program at Ace Brooklyn.

In addition to heading up Field Meridians, a Crown Heights-based artist collective committed to ecological resilience through social practice, LinYee is the editor and founder of MOLD Magazine (RIP), a design journalist, parent of two and proud Brooklyn resident.

LinYee began Field Meridians believing that building a deeper community in her neighborhood would result in magic. After speaking with her for just one hour, I believe the magic actually starts with her — she’s brilliant, warm and leaving her corner of New York City better than she found it.

Our conversation taught me how tenderness is a sign of strength, thoughtful collaboration can happen without a strict end goal and illegibility can be a subtle protest against capitalism. We discuss the importance of knowing your neighbors, acupuncture’s influence on Field Meridians, her favorite spots for roti in Crown Heights and much more, below.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

When did you start working with artists?
I’ve always worked with artists because I’ve always worked in media. My passion for magazines started early because they were an aperture to a larger world beyond the Texas suburbs where I grew up.

I worked at one of the very first social media websites, Asian Avenue, where artists were often the focus of the storytelling, and The FADER in my early 20s, platforming emerging musical artists of all stripes. I was also an assistant editor at Theme, a revolutionary magazine focused on profiling Asian creatives, under the editors and co-founders, John Lee and Jiae Kim. These experiences really cemented my interest in artist stories, artist process and working collaboratively with artists.

How would you describe your current initiative, Field Meridians?
Field Meridians is an artist collective first and foremost, grounded in Crown Heights — the neighborhood in which we work and live. Our work is about inviting people to have deeper relationships with their neighbors, whether they are human neighbors or soil, bird and plant neighbors.

There's an illegibility to Field Meridians that I think is against capitalism in some ways because we are not selling anything, but rather facilitating a moment of connection and a moment for curiosity.

What inspired you to start Field Meridians?
Field Meridians came out of three pieces: the desire to gather with people in person in New York, organizing with neighbors towards common goals and becoming a parent.

When I would connect with people digitally through MOLD, I kept imagining what it would be like to be in the same room physically. It would be magical if we convened — I was actually sure of it.

For transplants to New York in their 20s and 30s, it’s so easy to float through neighborhoods without knowing your neighbors. A few years ago, all the neighbors on my block came together against a real estate developer no one agreed with and that made me miss my former life as a student organizer. Through deepening those community relationships, learning what people cared about and having folks across all political, social and economic spectrums come together, we made our own little island in New York.

And then the third piece was becoming a parent, and now I have a five-year-old and seven-year-old. My eldest has always been such a good mirror to seeing the world in a way that is filled with wonder and curiosity, and one day he made bouquets of weeds from a friend’s backyard and handed them out. It was so tender and beautiful, and I wanted to invite other people to experience that sense of curiosity, which is how the Nature School program of Field Meridians evolved.

The first two were the starting points, but the shape of the programming started taking place as I was also finding my sea legs as a parent. Intergenerational community and spaces felt like something I wanted in my life in a potent way ... I was hoping others would join me in wanting that, too.

Where did the name Field Meridians come from?
Food sovereignty is the seed for a lot of the work we do at Field Meridians and what we all forget is our food systems are actually living. Activist and scholar Vandana Shiva writes the web of life is a food web, and Field Meridians thinks about the web of life with food sovereignty at its center. “Field” represents the agricultural, while “meridian” is a term commonly used in geography and acupuncture. In traditional Chinese medicine, meridians are channels of life and energy that move through the body. If you intervene at a specific node, that ripples across the entire body’s system.

How does curatorial work fit into your vision for FM alongside workshops, radio shows, a neighborhood newspaper and so much more?
I think about the work of curating shows and spaces, offering a slate of programming and editing a newspaper as all the same muscle and skill set: it’s about creating a platform for our community to then platform the community’s ideas and voices. The “frame” for our neighborhood news — the voice, people, practices, stories we choose to platform during the solstice and the equinox — is a quarterly print newspaper. Similarly, the “frame” for highlighting artists with practices that intersect with our home borough this year is the A!R program at Ace Hotel Brooklyn.

Since Field Meridians is based in Crown Heights and Ace Brooklyn is not, we wanted to make sure the collaboration made sense for our community. We realized this opportunity could be really interesting for artists in our collective to showcase what they’re doing in the moment that also transmits the narrative of what we’re interested in as a group — seasonality, land work, belonging, rest.

How did you choose the artists who would be in residency for A!R?
We chose artists that could not only use the exhibition space at Ace Brooklyn, but also its robust social offering. Under Darius Garvin’s stewardship, the space has really become a place for people to hang out and we wanted to lean into the social and collaborative aspect of its function.

I joke that Guario (Rodriguez Jr.) is the Mayor of Bushwick and his practice at the intersection of photography, documentation and mood felt really aligned with the space. Whether he’s DJing, photographing people or even capturing flowers that feel like nightlife, he’s tapped into a mycelial network.

With Curry Hackett’s show that’s on view through the end of October, I’m thrilled he saw the residency as an opportunity to reach out to two other academics working at the intersection of critical thinking, Black landscape and Black ecologies. His work is deep in conversation with writer, essayist, poet and designer June Jordan. Many people don’t know June Jordan as a designer, so we also created a print piece for the show — my toxic trait is that my answer to every question is to make a piece of print ephemera or magazine.

Phoebe Tran is in residence this fall and she’s been inspired and excited by Guario and Curry’s work – that also leads to unexpected emergence of ideas. Rachael Louise Elliott will be in residence in early 2027. We started having conversations with artists in February 2026, so she has a whole year to kind of meditate on what she will be doing.

My role is really as a facilitator to hold space for things to happen. Themes are emerging from each artist that are really energizing and anchored in pillars of Field Meridians without forcing it — creating living architectures, transmission of ideas and pollination.

FM is deeply rooted in place — what are some of your favorite places in Crown Heights?
My favorite place in Crown Heights is the Brower Park Library. The librarians are amazing, it’s next to Brower Park where we host a lot of our programs, and it’s free — everyone should go. Another World is a great community hub doing incredible abolitionist work, organizing in our neighborhood and providing a place to rest.

For food, I love Gloria’s! Gee’s Caribbean for roti, Royal Bakery and Trinidad Golden Place for currant rolls and RAS Plant Based for vegan Ethiopian food.

To grab a drink, Rodeo. It’s a great bar that serves natural wine and we’re starting a community radio station that will broadcast from there this fall.

You described MOLD in 3 words as “Design. Future. Food.” in an interview with Mag Culture. How would you describe Field Meridians in 3 words?
Pollination. Transmission. Living Architectures.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Stones Throw turns 30 with a weekender hosted at home in Highland Park.

• Stroll the Stavros Niarchos Park grounds then, inspired, build your own Mediterranean bouquet at Ace Athens this Sunday.

• Twenty years of Glenstone already?

• Untitled Art Fair heads back to Houston.

• Try Tasting Notes: a brand-new food and culinary magazine fair in NYC.

Peanut butter and jelly: either the salty-sweet sandwiching of two classic condiments between sliced bread, or the act of driving a car with the windows down and the AC on. The latter definition according to our friend Kevin Morby, who has a well-documented love of the former.

A lot’s going on in the Midwestern musician’s life at the moment. Fresh off the “Little Wide Open” world tour, fatherhood and his brand-new single “PBJ,” we caught up with Kevin about his packing science, pre-show ritual and the tour wardrobe that accidentally got him jacked.

First off, congrats on the kid! How’s fatherhood so far?

Fatherhood, so far, is truly wonderful. Currently in a little end-of-summer baby bubble dream and loving every second of it.

Do you anticipate having a kid will change how you feel when you’re on the road touring?

I think the big thing will be touring for shorter stints. I’ve prided myself on going out on marathon-long tours; six or seven weeks at a time. I probably should have stopped doing that years ago if I’m being honest and honestly I’m glad I’m gonna have something in my life that probably caps my tours at around three weeks at a time.

Speaking of, you just wrapped the “Little Wide Open” tour. How do you approach packing for the tour bus?

I’ve got it down to a science at this point. The hurdle is always: how do I pack all of my gear, stage clothes, everyday clothes and shoes as efficiently as possible. For me it takes two suitcases: one large, one medium. Then a dual guitar case and a regular guitar case for my three guitars. Then a backpack on-top of all that. It’s a lot, but I can manage all that myself.

The big thing, though, is shoes. I have stage boots, leather slip-ons if I wanna look cool, running shoes for long walks and working out and then Hoka Slides. I honestly wear the slides 90 percent of the time.

Grounding feels important when you’re on the go. What pre- or post-show rituals do you practice?

I have a pretty wild pre-show ritual that begins hours before I play. First off I eat dinner three hours before I play. Let’s say I’m playing at 9:00pm, then I’ll eat at 6:00pm. After that I chill and digest until two hours out which is when I meditate. I do a 20-minute meditation and afterwards I just sorta lay around some more and preserve my energy.

Then at an hour out I stretch for 20 minutes. After that I get into my stage clothes and at a half hour out I do a twenty minute vocal warm up. During this time I drink half a lite beer and a lot of water.

At 10 minutes out, the band gets together and we do a huddle. Then I take the half-drunk beer on stage with me when I walk out and never touch it again. It’s just a strange thing I do.

Does the work you’re touring for influence how/what you pack?

It certainly influences my stage clothes. So depending on the outfit, it either takes up a whole lot of room or just a normal amount of room. On my album “This Is A Photograph,” I’d wear a 15-pound gold fringe jacket. That thing was heavy as hell and crazy to haul all over the place. Also performing in it every night felt like doing hot yoga in a weighted vest. I got super fit during that time on accident.

Memorable past packing mistakes?

The biggest mistake is to underpack. My motto is to ALWAYS overpack. Also ALWAYS bring a rain jacket. Sometimes you convince yourself you won’t need one because the weather says blue skies with no chance of rain and the moment you land a freak storm rolls in. Always pack a rain jacket.

Good sleep must be hard to come by. What tricks have you learned for solid shut-eye on the bus?

Ear plugs are essential. Also I wear a weighted eye mask. Even though it’s pitch black in the bunk I love the weight of the silk mask on my face and it seems to let my body know that when I’m wearing an eye mask it’s time to sleep.

Showering must be difficult, too. I’ve been told you resorted to showering out of a bag.

We have legitimately had to take some grocery bag showers outside the bus in the middle of a parking lot. Sometimes you gotta leave the venue at midnight but bus call isn’t until 4:00am and you go out with the band and it’s a heatwave and you get sweaty as hell and you have to clean yourself off before getting in your bunk somehow. It’s awful getting into the bunk when you’re dirty. Nothing some water bottles and a bag from Target can’t handle.

You’re famously obsessed with PB&Js. When did the obsession begin and what’s your recipe?

Like most people, when I was a child. And just classic: peanut butter, jelly and bread. But I’ve been known to add some kimchi and/or eggs to it from time to time. Don’t knock it till you try it.

Lunya Weighted Eye Mask: Will turn a bright-ass hotel room into a sensory deprivation tank.

Hoka Slides: These are recovery slides. I jump around in boots for an hour and a half every night so these feel essential. Once you put these on your feet it’s hard to ever wear anything else.

Singing Straw: I carry a small metal singing straw for my vocal warm ups. Life changing.

Baseball and Gloves: You’re gonna get bored on the road and a game of catch is one of my first go-tos. Nothing can kill an hour like a game of catch with a friend.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Happy friggin autumn.

• Get a head start on Halloween.

• You can now check out craft kits at the Brooklyn Public Library.

• Sean Sherman aka The Sioux Chef creates a Climate Week menu at Public Records.

• Strategize your exploration of the sprawl that is Los Angeles Design Week.

• That classic combo of chess, tennis, Pokémon and indie folk. The Faye Webster Invitational returns to LA this weekend.

July is the coldest month in Sydney and the hottest in New York. While I was sweating off my SPF every time I stepped outside, Remy Faint was on the other side of the equator wearing long sleeves, creating translucent paintings on silk and site-specific wall decals while in residence at Ace Hotel Sydney.

Remy and I share a fascination with textiles and a history of family migration between Asia and “the West.” Remy’s great-great-grandfather traveled from Southern China to Australia over 150 years ago and his “great-great-grandmother, who came from a lineage of silkworm farming, brought with her a legacy that now finds its way into the artist’s material explorations.”

Through collecting different materials, taking them apart, and reassembling them through stitching, painting and collage, Remy reimagines audience views on inherited histories. His practice explores, celebrates and questions the parallel narratives of his identity, including the history of how Australia has viewed Asian immigrants from the 19th century gold rushes to the present. In addition to his Afterimage installation at Ace Hotel Sydney, Remy exhibited two sculptures at this year’s Sydney Contemporary and has an ongoing solo show, A Site of Unfolding, at UNSW Galleries through November 22.

While he normally works from his inner-city Sydney garage, Remy used his time in the A!R program to disrupt his usual studio practice. Below, he shares the surprising lesson he learned about slowing down, the exhibition in London he can’t stop thinking about and more.

What initially inspired you to start making art?
I've always been curious about history, culture and how people make sense of the world. Art felt like the one place where all of those interests could exist together and evolve through making.

How would you describe your work?
I make paintings, sculptures and installations that sit somewhere between memory, material and abstraction. I’m interested in how images and objects carry history, and how they can be broken apart and reassembled into something new.

Tell us a bit about your relationship with the curatorial partner, UNSW Galleries. How have they supported your work?
UNSW has been an important part of my journey as an artist, from studying there to now exhibiting with UNSW Galleries. Working with José Da Silva has felt like a natural extension of that relationship. I’ve really appreciated his generosity, critical insight and encouragement throughout the development of the project.

How did you prepare — mentally, physically, packing-wise — that felt specific to this experience?
I tried not to over-prepare. I wanted the change of environment to genuinely influence the way I worked, so I packed lightly and brought materials that could adapt as ideas evolved. It felt like an opportunity to step outside my usual studio habits and see what new ways of working might emerge.

What does your artistic process entail? How has it adapted to working from a hotel room?
My practice is quite iterative. I rarely begin with a fixed outcome, instead building through experimentation and responding to what each material suggests. The hotel room encouraged that way of working, becoming less of a studio and more of a space for observation, testing and reflection.

What was your daily routine during your stay?

There was a nice rhythm to each day — coffee, a walk through Hyde Park, then long stretches of making. The changing light, the city skyline and the flow of people through the hotel became quiet influences on the work, reminding me that the studio wasn’t separate from everything happening around it.

Where did you hang out while you were here? Did you find any gems at the hotel or in the neighborhood?
Good Chemistry was definitely a favourite for morning coffee before settling into the studio. I also loved spending time in the Lobby Bar at the end of the day — it was a nice way to shift gears and reflect after making. Outside of the hotel, I loved visiting Cassandra Bird Gallery, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and Bancho in Chinatown.

What’s something unexpected you experienced or encountered during your stay?
I was surprised by how productive slowing down could be. Being outside my usual studio routine gave me space to notice things I might otherwise overlook, and those small observations ended up shaping the work.

What’s one work of art you can’t stop thinking about?
I’ve been thinking a lot about Bharti Kher’s sculptures at the V&A. They feel simultaneously ancient and contemporary, familiar and uncanny — qualities that keep drawing me back.

What’s important to you right now?
I think it’s important to remain curious. The more we listen, share and make space for different experiences, the more connected we become.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• David Lynch posthumously reigns as king of the uncanny with an LA photography exhibit at Pace Gallery.

• Twelve New Yorkers tell their 9/11 stories in a new documentary from Sean Wilsey, screening for free around the city.

• Big Ears is back in Knoxville next year with something for everyone.

• HIP REPLACEMENT records live this Thursday at Ace Brooklyn, comparing culture across Generations X, Y and Z. RSVP to be here.

Carla Lalli’s third tome, “Food is a Feeling,” is a different kind of cookbook. In it, the Brooklyn-based James Beard Award-winning chef — known for her two previous bestsellers and years at Bon Appétit, which included hosting the brand’s “Back-to-Back Chef” YouTube series — tells a tale of transition, beginning with the end of her 24-year marriage.

Through a series of essays that touch on everything from comfort cooking to friendship loss to discovery and reinvention, Carla charts her journey back to herself, reclaiming her time, her tomatoes and her appetite. The recipes remain delicious but she acknowledges in the introduction, they don’t sound the same because she’s not the same.

Ahead of hosting a tea party at Ace Hotel Brooklyn this Sunday, we caught up with Carla about what’s changed (and how to change), how she got the gumption to make the book she wanted and the extraordinariness of ordinariness. Plus, her recipe for Banana Bread with Cocoa and Salted Peanuts from “Food is a Feeling.” Yum.

“Food is a Feeling” opens with an epigraph from Yorgos Lanthimos’ film “Kinds of Kindness” that concludes: “It’s better to eat something that’s always available than to depend on something that runs out early every morning.” How do you interpret that, and why was it a fitting sentiment for the story you proceed to tell?

I was in the pretty early stages of writing the book when I watched that movie and that scene blew me away. I immediately rewound it and played it over and over and made a voice memo of it. To me, what she’s saying is that there may be a desire to save up for a special thing, but actually the most special thing is being able to have something every day. That immediately made me think about having very simple food — knowing that it’s there for you as the most sustaining thing rather than holding out for some big prize. I think it has to do, for me, with what a gift it is to have food in my life every day, and to have a healthy relationship with food and to enjoy food and cooking so much. I don’t have any other creative talents and thank God I have this one.

Also a feeling of — we talk about this a lot in my family — all of it is a special occasion. The special thing could be your everyday thing.

This book came together during a period of transition for you, beginning with the end of your marriage. What changed about your relationship to food and cooking during that time?

I was cooking for one half the time because we were doing one week on, one week off with the kids. When you have kids who need to have dinner, you have to have a plan. But when it was just me, it was like, “Oh, am I eating dinner? What am I doing for dinner?” Lots of different things could be dinner. And so my cooking became more spontaneous, much more simple and also very grounding.

Then I was doing dinner for two with my younger son, which I realized actually you can push a little bit. Cooking for two is faster; there’s less prep. You can pull off something that feels a little bit special because it’s just the two of you. I wrote about the chicken cutlets being a chore for four, but when you cut your work in half … or things that felt a little bit special because it was a smaller quantity. I also was just much more willing to indulge whatever I was in the mood for.

I love the portion on tomatoes. That’s something that had completely been eliminated [due to your ex’s dislike of them], and you were able to reconnect with tomatoes.

That was very much coming back to self and to my own physical wants and needs and what pleases me.

Where else are you finding, perhaps unexpected, freedoms in your life now?

I mean, my current life is getting ready for the book. There’s a line, I think it’s in the beach peaches essay, that’s come up a lot ever since, which is: because I can do whatever I want, I fill in the blank. So in that essay, I decided to go to the beach in the middle of the day. I’ve been having a lot of “I can do whatever I want” where I can go out dancing by myself and roll up alone at 1 a.m. and that is totally fine and acceptable and good. Being self-employed, I have a tendency to work seven days a week. And it’s been good to kind of give myself moments of compartmentalizing. Like, today we’re going to just pretend it’s the day off.

The book is so personal that people initially dissuaded you from writing it. How were you able to trust your gut and get it done on your terms?

The initial response was really disappointing. This was my third book with the same publisher, and I did not anticipate that they would be so skittish about the fact that it was going to deal with the topic of my divorce. Everyone I had told what I was working on — people my age, friends who are in their 30s who are not married, queer friends — everyone’s response was like, “Fuck yeah.” So, I thought I had something pretty hot and they were so hesitant and concerned about it being a downer. I found myself having to do a lot of reassuring and convincing.

I also was dealing with the reality of selling a cookbook, which is that there aren’t an unlimited amount of people you can pitch to. I accepted an offer that was quite a bit lower than what they paid me for my second book. Part of how I went into the rest of the project was like, “Until I hear no, until there’s very firm pushback, I’m not interested in compromises.” And that was super important.

This is also a theme of, when you’re in either a long relationship whether it’s professional or personal, compromise can become such a big part of how you relate. I knew that if I didn’t have the confidence to just keep going, at the end of this I might really regret that I didn’t do exactly what I wanted. Part of that was also assembling my own team: I had my own outside designer; we pitched and got the photographer we wanted; my sister was my prop stylist, which she did for my last two books; my food stylist is my friend Cybelle Tondu, who I had worked with for years on videos and I trusted them; and Alex Beggs was my top editor who I hired separately from the publisher. I was so invested in their opinions, and that was the truth board.

Do you feel like the end result is true to that vision?

A million percent. Somebody asked me the other day, “Is there anything about the book that you wish you could change?” They wouldn’t let us have any embossing on the cover because it’s too expensive. That was a mini-heartbreak, but no, not really.

What advice would you give to folks out there thinking about taking a risk or making a big change?

I believe that a certain amount of discomfort is absolutely necessary for change. The times in my life when I was the most scared, the most in over my head, didn’t know what I was doing — those moments ended up being the beginning of some other new transition that I could never have gotten to if I didn’t put myself in that situation. When I got hired at Bon Appétit, I was given a title and an expectation of a job that I was like, nobody knows that I literally don’t know how to do this. I was really scared that someone was going to figure it out before I could figure out how to do it.

I think also in the separation, I had to believe that I wouldn’t put myself through something so difficult, and put my family and friends through something so difficult, if I didn’t believe that it was going to get me somewhere where there was future happiness. I think if you’re just comfortable all the time, you’re probably avoiding something.

Tell us about bringing a tea leaf reader along for the book tour.

We’re actually working with local tea readers in all the cities that we’re doing tea reader parties. This was an idea when the tour conversations were starting to happen and I was thinking back to the other tours that I’ve done for my other books. The best part of every event is when the event is over and people just come up to talk to me one-on-one. That’s always when the most impactful moments happen, or when people tell me really personal things that are amazing. One woman told me she had an estranged relationship with her mom and then they started cooking together once a week and it repaired their relationship. So I was like, “How can we skip the boring Q&A part and just have these moments?”

The tea reader events were just a dumb pun, basically, where I was like, “It’ll be like a tea party and then I’ll do a reading, but then there’s also a tea reader.” Get it? Does everybody get it?

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Turn up with Carla’s brand-new banana bread — recipe below.

Banana Bread with Cocoa and Salted Peanuts

Makes 1 loaf

Softened butter, for the pan

1¾ cups (210g) all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons (14g) unsweetened cocoa powder

2 teaspoons (6g) kosher salt

1½ teaspoons (9g) baking soda

1 cup (192g) dark brown sugar, not packed

½ cup (96g) granulated sugar

12 tablespoons (170g/ 1½ sticks) butter

4 large very ripe bananas (1½ pounds total)

2 large eggs

¼ cup salted roasted peanuts, roughly chopped

2 tablespoons turbinado sugar

Flaky salt

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Butter a 10 × 5-inch loaf pan, preferably metal, then line it with parchment (if your pan measures 9 × 5-inch, use that; bake time may be ever-so-slightly longer). Let the parchment overhang on the long sides, trimming excess.

In a medium bowl, toss together the flour, cocoa, salt, and baking soda. In a large bowl, combine the brown sugar and granulated sugar. Melt the butter just until foaming, then pour the butter over the sugars. Stir to combine.

Mash the bananas in a medium bowl until shiny and loose, then whisk in the eggs. Wait until the butter mixture has cooled a bit, then add the banana mixture and whisk to combine. Add the flour mixture and fold together just until no floury bits remain.

Scrape the batter into the pan and smooth the top. Sprinkle the peanuts over, then the turbinado sugar, then some flaky salt. Place the loaf pan on a rimmed baking sheet and transfer to the oven.

Bake until the top is very dark brown, firm, and almost burned at the corners, 1 hour 25 minutes to 1 hour 35 minutes. (If you’re using a glass baking dish, turn on convection for the first half hour, if that’s an option.) A cake tester should come out clean; if you have a digital thermometer, check at dead center — it’s fully cooked at 210°F. If the bread is underbaked, it will buckle and the center will be claggy.

Let the banana bread cool in the pan for 30 minutes. Lift it out of the pan, peel off the parchment, and leave it be on a rack until completely cooled. Lovingly and patiently place your hands on the long sides to check for warmth. This is even better the next day. I like it well-toasted, slathered with softened butter or cream cheese, and a little salt.

Excerpted from FOOD IS A FEELING: Recipes & Stories, With Love by Carla Lalli. Copyright © 2026 by Carla Lalli. Photographs copyright © 2026 by Lucia Bell-Epstein. Published in the United States by Clarkson Potter/Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.

It’s been a year of loss, with some of our brightest luminaries leaving us at a time it feels like we need them most. Gloria Steinem is one such wonder, a woman who lived a life that changed the lives of so many. We’re looking back at the conversation we had in 2019, on the eve of her live event at The Theatre at Ace Hotel DTLA, and reflecting on the bits that resound in our hearts. Rest in power, Gloria.

Gloria Steinem has been a sterling champion of feminism and social justice for over 50 years, a fixture in our collective imagination of what it means to choose connection, to intuit each other’s uniqueness and to believe that “hope is a form of planning.” Her words, the vascular roots of her activism, welcomed so many of us into the fold at different points in our lives — dogeared in textbooks, passed along to friends and colleagues, written with a hasty flourish across a chalkboard, as if to say, this is that feeling we share.

The community she’s built has always offered us choice. The choice to exist beyond scripts, the choice of everyday rebellion, the choice to rely on each other and believe in the radical potential of a movement. For showing us these things and helping us see ourselves more clearly, thank you.

For a peek into her acerbically witty, serially optimistic brain constellation, read on and find the full thing on Ace Reader:

I think young people feel this sense of despair or hopelessness about the state of the world, especially lately. How do you nourish hope in a climate that feels starved of it?
I do think it helps to organize across a lot of different ages because it is true that us old folks (laughs) probably have a little more hope because we do remember when things were much worse. But we need younger people who are mad as hell at what it is now. We need each other and it’s not practical to be divided by age either. But if those hopes weren’t already real inside you, you couldn’t hope them. So it makes no sense to allow those to be taken away from you because you have the power to hang onto them.

One of my favorite quotes of yours has always been, “hope is a form of planning.” How has your relationship to hope changed over the years?
That’s a good question. I’m trying to think. It’s hard to think oneself back into a previous state of mind (laughs). I do think my hopes are a little more realistic than they used to be because there was a certain amount of naïveté as I was saying, we thought, well, this injustice is just so great. Surely people will realize, if only we tell them. We weren’t patient, let me put it that way. We didn’t understand that movements weren’t something you did for five or 10 years. It was your whole life.

Right.
But now, I do think we understand it. And also we have the reward that comes from that, which is the movement itself. Which is a chosen family, I mean, we are communal animals so it’s important that we have the support of other people who share some of the same hopes. We can’t survive alone for very long. And that’s what movements are for, and there is an incredible joy to having a movement.

Hi, friend. We’re taking the rest of August off to touch grass and all that. We hope that wherever you are, whichever season you’re in, you get some time to yourself, too. Below, a few recent favorites to keep you busy during the break.

Micro-Rituals for Self Preservation with COOL MOMS’ Elise Peterson

FoR 001: Print is Dead/Long Live Print

Hyungi Park Defines Multidisciplinary

FoR 005: Finding Joy Through Samiro Yunoki’s Works

Fran Miller’s Toronto Guide

Stay cool,

—Ace

I visited my older sister in Boston last weekend to honor the anniversary of my dad’s passing. We originally made plans to do something he loved doing with us — go to an art museum and look at paintings he admired. Instead, we walked through Boston Common and along Newbury Street, pausing to notice all the small moments of beauty — flowers in the park, architectural lines of historic churches, graphics in grocery stores — that he would have appreciated just as much as a still life by Matisse.

During a pit stop at Reiwatakiya along the way, I noticed the illustrations on IHADA skincare boxes. The blue and orange color combination (perfectly of the moment) paired with bold, simple and clear illustrations of a character dealing with blemishes felt delightfully charming and familiar. Turns out, they were designed by Noritake, this summer’s Artist in Residence at Ace Hotel Kyoto.

Noritake is an illustrator known for monochromatic drawings that “distill emotions and actions into beautifully crafted one-liners” across a wide range of media, including movie posters, CD covers, advertisements for brands like Steven Alan and magazine covers (the BRUTUS ones are some of my favorites).

Noritake’s illustrations reminded me that simple joys can impact us just as much as momentous ones. His solo show, KYOTO, depicts that feeling and is on view at Ace Hotel Kyoto through October 31. The exhibition features new illustrations and a new artist book created for the occasion, as well as wearables with Noritake’s designs.

In his Kyoto diary, Noritake describes his process for choosing locations and subjects to draw, his favorite method of traveling around the city and the unexpected interaction that made him feel like a local.

What inspired your art during your stay in Kyoto?
I travel to Kyoto several times a year, so I revisited those memories and looked back at my photos. I also read numerous magazines and books featuring the city. From these sources, I selected the locations and subjects I wanted to depict and made preparations for my trip. Once I arrived in Kyoto, I cycled around the city following a pre-planned itinerary, while also incorporating new subjects that caught my eye along the way.

年に何度か京都に旅行しているので、その記憶を思い出し、写真を見返しました。また、京都が特集された多くの雑誌、本を読みました。 それらから、描きたい場所、物をピックアップして、事前の準備をして滞在に入りました。 事前に考えた工程表に基づいて、自転車で街中を回りました。その途中で気になったものも、モチーフとして追加されていきました。

How did you prepare — mentally, physically, packing-wise — that felt specific to this experience?
Since I was working under a deadline and didn’t know Kyoto well enough to improvise, I familiarized myself beforehand with the locations of shops and other spots — ranging from the area around Ace Hotel Kyoto to the stretch between Marutamachi and Gion. I already had a few specific subjects in mind that I wanted to draw, so I took the necessary steps to secure permission to sketch at those particular locations. Realizing it would be difficult to bring along all my usual art supplies, I selected a minimal set of tools to take with me.

期限もありますし、行き当たりばったりで行動できるほど、京都を把握していませんでしたので、 エースホテル周辺と丸太町から祇園付近までのお店などの立地を把握していきました。 いくつかの描きたいモチーフは事前にあったので、そのいくつかのお店などには作画許諾を進めておきました。 普段使っている作画道具をすべて持ち込むのは難しいと判断して、最小限の道具をそろえました。

What was your daily routine during your stay?
I would wake up around 7am and have a morning meal at the hotel or a nearby coffee shop. Around 9am, I’d set out to explore on a bicycle borrowed from Ace; since most shops opened just after noon, I made my rounds to the places I wanted to visit. In the evening, I would return to my room to work on my drawings and flesh out the details. On days that didn’t follow this routine, a friend would drive me around to visit areas that were difficult to reach by bicycle, such as temples.

朝7時ごろ起床して、ホテルや近所の喫茶店でモーニングを食べました。9時ごろからエースホテルの自転車で散策、だいたい昼過ぎにお店が開くので、訪問したいお店を順々に回りました。 夕方には部屋に戻り、作画をして内容を詰めていきました。イレギュラーな日は友人に車を出してもらって、お寺など、自転車で行きづらいエリアを巡りました。

Where did you hang out while you were here? Did you find any gems at the hotel or in the neighborhood?
I enjoyed breakfast and lunch at Smart Coffee in Teramachi. I also cycled up and down along the Kamo River. Although I wasn’t looking for subjects to draw, I visited various bookstores, shops selling used books and record stores.

寺町のスマート珈琲店でモーニングやランチを楽しみました。鴨川も自転車で上下に走りました。作画対象ではないですが、本屋や古書店、レコード屋さんも巡りました。

What does your artistic process entail? How has it adapted to working from a hotel room?
Typically, I finalize an illustration through a repetitive process of sketching out rough drafts and getting client approval, utilizing both manual techniques and a computer to achieve the best possible result. I rarely go outside for the actual drawing process. Although working on a large screen is preferable, I had to use a laptop in my guest room; while the small screen made the work somewhat difficult, I was still able to handle the essentials. What differed most this time was venturing out to seek subjects and making new discoveries through interactions with people.

普段は、ラフを考案して、相手に確認して、というのを繰り返して仕上げていきます。手やPCをつかって、最善のプロセスで一枚のイラストを仕上げていきます。作画のために外に出ることは、ほぼありません。 PCは大きい画面で作業した方が良いのですが、客室ではノートPCで作業を進めました。小さくて、やりづらかったですが、最低限のことは行えました。今回もっとも普段と異なったのは、外にモチーフを探しに行ったことと、人と交流していく中で発見を繰り返していったことです。

What’s one work of art you made that you can’t stop thinking about?
I hold a deep personal attachment to all the drawings on display — they are pieces I truly love — so it is difficult for me to single out just one right now. Many of the works featured here depict objects crafted by artisans, created with their express permission. Redrawing these items as monochrome line art gave me the sensation of re-experiencing the artisans’ own dedication to their craft. I believe that this experience — catching a glimpse of their meticulous attention to detail — will influence how I approach my own work in the future.

展示する絵はすべて思い入れがあり、気に入っているものになりましたので、一つを選ぶのは今は難しいです。 今回、許諾を得て、作画したものの中に職人が作ったものが多くあります。 それらをモノクロの線画に描き改めてみる行為は、その職人のこだわりを追体験するような感覚をもちました。 細部へのこだわりの一端を感じ取れた経験が、自身の仕事への向き合い方に今後反映されそうです。

What’s something unexpected you experienced or encountered during your stay?
I had obtained permission to draw a particular shop, but after attempting it, I decided it wasn't working out and gave up on the project. When I went back a few days later to explain that I was abandoning the idea, the owner told me, "It’s a bit of a shame, but I’m happy that you gave it such serious consideration." It was an experience that allowed me to feel a genuine connection with someone from Kyoto — something that went beyond the act of drawing itself.

作画許諾を得たお店がありました。描いてみて、うまくいかないな、と判断して、作画を断念しました。 数日後、作画を断念したことをお伝えしにいったら、「なんだか残念だけど、真剣に考えてくれて、うれしい気持ちになりました」と言っていただきました。 描くこと以前に、京都の方との縁、関わりを感じられた経験でした。

What’s important to you right now?
Getting along with the people around you and being honest.

関わる周りの人と仲良くする事と正直でいる事。

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Murder ballad moment: Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue perform “Where the Wild Roses Grow” in Brighton.

• Visiting London? Take a day trip to Charleston to see this exhibition of the early works of Hogarth Press, the publishing imprint founded by Virginia and Leonard Woolf.

• Congrats to Rosie, top dog at the World Dog Surfing Championships.

• Presented by our friends at LAND, Harrison Kinnane Smith’s “Qualified Opportunity” examines how the federal Opportunity Zone program shapes real estate in LA’s West Adams neighborhood.

• Lauren Halsey’s sculpture park.

• The Arab Food Dynasties of New York, including some of our favorite spots within walking distance of Ace Brooklyn.

• Cake Zine’s free and outdoor September reading series to give a taste of memory, summer and New York.

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At the top of the year, Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Madison Cunningham kicked off tour in support of her latest album, Ace (a coincidence, we swear). We asked Madison about memorable packing mistakes (never getting the days-to-underwear ratio right), something new she’s bringing on the road (a mini steamer) and the essentials she never leaves home without. Without further ado, here she is:

”Packing for tour usually starts with a frantic display of indecision. Every shirt (and jacket) I own gets laid out on the bed until I can convince myself to part with something. I think it’s the equivalent of my dog hopping in my suitcase the night before I go. It’s this fear and dread of leaving the comforts of home and the ability to change what clothing I’m feeling on a dime.

I usually try to give myself a few days to talk through what the practicals are versus the variables. The number one rule is to leave space for a few fabulous items and, most importantly, space for a few souvenirs to bring home.”

Everyday Oil: To make me feel like I smell classy enough to greet the world.

Salt & Stone Lotion: It keeps my desert skin sane.

Dry Shampoo: For hair survival and confidence.

Dry Brush: A tool to keep skin smooth and the lymphatic system moving.

Vaseline Lip Therapy: It is always in my pocket. I put one in every strange compartment of my bag. It’s a strange addiction at this point but I don’t go seconds without it.

Candle and Fancy Matches: Thankful Greetings matches and Flamingo Estate’s Adriatic Muscatel Sage candle.

Running Shoes: Running keeps my mind agile and makes me speak a little kinder to myself.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• The woolly wilderness of Donna Wilson’s pillows.

• Creatives, including FoR columnist Shama Rahman, share their best advice.

• Lots of lovely in the second Pierce & Ward x West Elm release.

• Sapphic in traffic.

• Los Angelenos: good noise is upcoming at Hollyhock House and the Hollywood Bowl.

The inaugural Grand Parade of Caribana wound down Queen Street West in 1967, snaking and shaking past the future site of our Toronto home. Inspired by the Carnivals of the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago’s in particular, the celebration came together for Canada’s Expo 67 Centennial, organized by the Caribbean Cultural Committee.

A resilient and joyous display rooted in commemorating the abolition of slavery across former British colonies including Canada, Caribana originally featured Afro-Trinidadian calypso music — described as “folk poetry set to music.” Over the fêtes that followed, the festival’s sound expanded to encompass the kaleidoscopic music of the Caribbean diaspora, from soca to dembow to dancehall to Drake.

“The second any DJ drops [Drake’s “Controlla,”] everyone is on their feet dancing and singing every word,” says Haitian Canadian DJ Taima. Sensing a dearth of proper dancehall parties in Montreal, DJ Taima launched her Whine & Kotch event series in 2018, before bringing it annually to Caribana beginning in 2023. This year, on the Friday of the festival, she’ll be posted up on the rooftop of Ace Hotel Toronto until the wee hours, delivering Island Sounds. Can’t make it? Catch Whine & Kotch at the Portland Room in Toronto on August 1, and on September 6 at Ace Hotel Brooklyn.

Ahead of the merrymaking, we asked DJ Taima for a festival pregame playlist. Get ready to sweat.

Caribana Pregame Playlist by DJ Taima

“Fall In Love” by Popcaan

The perfect summertime whine. This song makes me feel like I’m in love by the water, and there’s something special about capturing that carefree island feel in the middle of a concrete jungle.

“Controlla” by Drake

Even though this song is 10 years old, it’s the Toronto summer anthem. The second any DJ drops it, everyone is on their feet dancing and singing every word.

“She’s Hot” by T.O.K.

This one instantly takes me back to the LimeWire era. It’s a classic bashment record that lives up to its name; it makes you feel hot and confident.

“Bashment Party” by Rayvon & Red Fox

The title says it all. This is exactly the energy we aim to create at our events: a packed dance floor, nonstop movement and a real sweaty function.

“So Special” by Mavado

My favorite track from the Unfinished Business riddim. It’s timeless, always gets a great reaction from the crowd, and never fails to bring the right energy.

“Ballerina” by Silent Addy, Rema, Skillibeng & Disco Neil

This song is special to us for two reasons: not only is it one of the songs of the summer, but it was also produced by our longtime Whine & Kotch collaborator, Silent Addy, which makes it an easy addition to the playlist.

“Talk To Me Nuh” by Shenseea, Vybz Kartel & Rvssian

As a longtime Shenseea fan, I’ve loved watching her evolution, and this is one of her biggest recent hits. It sounds just as incredible blasting through speakers as it does on your headphones.

“Whine & Kotch” by J. Capri & Charly Black

This track means everything to us; it’s where Whine & Kotch got its name. That alone makes it a permanent fixture in our sets.

“Go Go Wine” by Vybz Kartel

An underrated banger. Not nearly enough DJs play this one, which is exactly why I love dropping it at Whine & Kotch. The reaction is always instant, and the crowd goes wild.

“Gallis” by Mr. Vegas

A certified crowd favorite and one of those songs everyone knows. The moment it comes on, the entire room is singing along from start to finish.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Caribana takes over Toronto this weekend, and DJ Taima summons Caribbean sounds Friday on Ace Hotel Toronto’s rooftop.

• On August 6, Ace Brooklyn Artist in Residence Curry J. Hackett opens It Can Happen…Still Time to Try, an exhibition in collaboration with J.T. Roane and Jona Alexander. On view in the Gallery through October.

• Tomayto, tomahto — the whole thing’s on for Produce Parties’ next shindig happening August 6 in Brooklyn.

• Bringing Homer home, in a design sense. Elsewhere on the internet, the Homeric epic’s never been more lost: “There are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible.”

• Ready your Goodreads goals: the Booker Prize 2026 longlist has arrived.

Everyone’s setting up their OOO messages, including on Substack. To honor the breaks we all deserve this season, I’m sharing some personal recommendations for recurring reads about artists, architecture and design. These are best enjoyed in print and outside — in the park, on the beach, by the pool, on your fire escape or just propped up against a window when it’s too hot to function.

Let me know in the comments if I missed a good one and I’ll see you in two weeks with the next edition of FoR.

xShama

Bulletin in Ursula

Ursula is a magazine of contemporary culture from Hauser & Wirth edited by Randy Kennedy, formerly of The New York Times. While it has some of what you’d expect from an “in-house” venture like deep profiles of artists whose exhibitions are on view in the gallery’s spaces around the globe, the magazine has continued to delight me with its recurring features like letters between creative minds, the art that made the greatest impression on leading curators and the same three questions posed to very different artists. Out of all of them, my favorite is their Bulletin portfolio, which highlights the things artists keep on their walls for inspiration. It’s a peek behind the curtain you rarely get to see and feels like an adult, art world version of I Spy I really enjoy (especially in print).

The PhotoBook Review in Aperture

The PhotoBook Review used to be a standalone publication that came out twice a year, but is now published quarterly in Aperture magazine. All of their book reviews, in-depth opinion pieces, artists’ selections, publisher spotlights and interviews use photo books as an entry point for larger conversations about the history of photography.

One of my favorite interviews from the magazine-within-a-magazine is between managing editor Brendan Embser and curator Oluremi C. Onabanjo on Africa’s political transformations and the role of publishing in shaping artistic knowledge. In it, Oluremi shares some favorite research references, including Air Afrique — a magazine named for the defunct West African airline. She will continue her research in her new role at The Met as the institution’s curator in the Department of Photographs.

Room with a View

Frame of Reference 01: Print is Dead/Long Live Print

Hi and welcome to the first edition of Frame of Reference, a biweekly dispatch about the world of (and around) A!R, Ace Hotel’s Artist in Residence program. Celebrating over 10 years of supporting creative voices, A!R provides artists across the globe time to think and space to create…

Read more

6 months ago · 52 likes · 7 comments · Ace Hotel and Shama Rahman

Portfolio in BOMB

During a recent stay at Ace Brooklyn, I spent some time with the Spring 2026 issue of BOMB, where I was excited to find my friend Ali Rosa-Salas’s name in the recurring Portfolio column. This edition was all about the Lower East Side Yearbook, an initiative started by native New Yorker Destiny Mata. Growing up across the five boroughs (but calling the Lower East Side home), Destiny comes from a long line of photographers. She combines art and community care in her practice, using her learnings from photographing punk shows to teach students from the Lower Eastside Girls Club about black-and-white photography. When she saw how those photos inspired neighbors to share stories about the changing neighborhood, she decided to create a “yearbook inspired by punk zines and filled with photographs, collages, poetry and artwork made with and by my neighbors.” For those of us who couldn’t catch the accompanying exhibition Lower East Side Yearbook: A Living Archive in person, this Portfolio serves as a way to experience the photos on your own time.

Tools Magazine

Tools is a visual feast. An annual magazine published in English and French that chooses a different design technique to use as an editorial thread with recent editions focusing on spinning, cutting, molding and more. My favorite issue has been one all about folding, including how folds show up in bed skirts, Shaker baskets, dinner napkins and fans.

I’m fascinated by shared visual language across time periods, media and geographies, which Tools does a great job of exploring in an expansive way without overly simplifying how they’re connected.

Looking for even more columns, magazines and books to read this summer?

Wherever you end up this season, there’s a great art bookstore or specialty newsstand around the corner ready to give you a recommendation. Here are some of my favorites from around the globe:

• Athens: Hyper Hypo

• Kyoto: Media Shop

• London: Shreeji

• New York: Casa

• Sydney: Title

• Toronto: Issues

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Protect Jimothy at all costs.

• The art of cover art.

• All ears for Lizzy McAlpine’s latest, arriving September 18. Lobster roll in hand, see her sing this Saturday at Newport Folk Fest.

• The Haller System rethought through the lens of Portuguese craft and materials in the NKYINKYIM A CASA collection from Armando Cabral and USM.

• The Wallpaper* US400 is here and includes friends, collaborators and our very own Brad Wilson.

  Thanks for reading Room with a View. Subscribe to keep the goodness going.

“We all come to queer books for different reasons,” says Yo Katami, proprietor of Tokyo’s loneliness books. Part bookstore, part independent publishing label, loneliness specializes in books and zines from across Asia exploring queer identities, gender, solidarity and, well, loneliness.

“Sometimes, we want to better understand the discomfort or uncertainty we carry within ourselves,” he says. “Sometimes, we hope to find people living with the same loneliness or struggles. And sometimes, we want to connect with lives and experiences different from our own.”

In June, loneliness brought pages of Pride through the doors of Ace Hotel Kyoto, curating bookstores and publishers for our Queer Book Fair. Among them, Kyoto’s Megaphone Books, whose mission it is to “deliver small voices loudly.”

We asked both Yo and Megaphone’s Takumi Wada for book recommendations that explore belonging — courageous and complex displays of vulnerability, affirmation, warmth and connection. Says Yo: “Together, these books chart a path: finding yourself in loneliness, finding others and eventually reaching toward someone farther away.”

Yo Katami of loneliness books recommends:

Ano Toki mo “Kō Arubeki” ga Shindokatta by Palettalk

『あの時も「こうあるべき」がしんどかった』　パレットーク著

“Boys should be like this.” “Girls should be like that.” “Love should be between a man and a woman.” “Marriage and family are the natural next step.”

We are surrounded every day by countless ideas of how we are supposed to be.

Through manga and short essays, this book shares the experiences of people who have been hurt by these assumptions and social expectations. Covering not only sexuality and gender, but also work, relationships, family and marriage, it thoughtfully explores the pressures and frustrations many of us have felt at some point in our lives.

The book gently suggests that the source of our struggles may not lie within ourselves alone, but also within the structures of society around us. By giving shape to feelings that often remain unnamed, it offers the reassurance that we are not alone. For those experiencing loneliness or uncertainty, it can feel like a small place to rest.

「男の子はこうあるべき」「女の子はこうあるべき」「恋愛するなら異性と」「結婚して家庭を持つのが当たり前」——私たちは日々、たくさんの「こうあるべき」に囲まれて生きています。

この本は、そうした社会の中の思い込みや決めつけによって傷ついた人たちの経験を、マンガと短い解説を通して紹介していきます。セクシュアリティやジェンダーだけでなく、仕事、恋愛、家族、結婚など、誰もがどこかで感じたことのある息苦しさが丁寧に描かれており、「生きづらさの原因は自分自身ではなく、社会の側にもあるのかもしれない」と気づかせてくれます。自分の中にあるモヤモヤに言葉を与え、「自分だけではなかった」と感じさせてくれるこの本は、孤独の中にいる人がひとまず腰掛けることのできる、小さな居場所のような存在になるかもしれません。

Love in the Big City by Sang Young Park

『大都会の愛し方』　パク・サンヨン著

Once we find a name for our sense of difference, we often begin searching for others who are living with similar experiences.

Set in Seoul, Love in the Big City portrays not only romantic relationships, but also friendship, family, loss, uncertainty and the many complexities of modern life. Its characters are neither idealized nor perfect. They stumble, make mistakes and get hurt, yet continue searching for ways to connect with one another.

The novel reminds us that even when we feel alone in a vast city, our lives are intertwined with countless others. It is a story about finding companionship and connection in unexpected places.

自分の違和感に名前を見つけたあと、人は次に「同じように生きている誰か」を探し始めます。

韓国・ソウルを舞台にしたこの小説には、恋愛だけでなく、友情や家族関係、将来への不安や喪失など、さまざまな人生の風景が描かれています。登場人物たちは決して理想的でも完璧でもありません。不器用に傷つき、失敗しながらも、それぞれの方法で誰かとつながろうとします。大都会の中でひとりぼっちだと思っていた自分が、実は誰かと地続きで生きていること。その素晴らしさや、やるせなさも含めて、誰かの存在がとても愛おしく思えてくる一冊です。

To a Friend Somewhere Far Away: Poems by Toshimi Funaki

『どこかの遠い友に　船城稔美詩集』　船城稔美著

Even after we find words that affirm our identity, no one lives through a single identity alone.

This collection brings together the work of poet Toshimi Funaki, who spent more than sixty years writing poetry while living at Tama Zenshoen, a sanatorium for people affected by Hansen’s disease. Admitted at the age of fifteen and separated from mainstream society, Funaki continued to write words that were urgent, humorous, compassionate, and deeply human.

His poems speak to the lifelong act of searching for one’s own voice, and to the possibility of connection through language. Across time, distance, and difference, they remind us that words can become bridges between people.

It is a powerful testament to solidarity, and to the enduring possibility of reaching one another.

自分アイデンティティを肯定する言葉を見つけたとしても、人はひとつのアイデンティティだけでは生きていけません。

『どこかの遠い友に』は、ハンセン病療養所・多磨全生園で暮らしながら60年以上にわたって詩を書き続けた詩人・船城稔美さんの作品を集めた詩集です。15歳で療養所に入所し、社会から隔絶された人生を送りながらも、誰かへ向けての切実で、ユーモラスで、力強い言葉を書き続けました。自分の言葉を探し続け、そしてその言葉を橋渡しにして、時が流れても、どこにいても、誰かとつながることができる——いつだってどこかの遠い友を探して。さまざまなアイデンティティの枠を超えて、自分とは違う他者との連帯の可能性を想像させてくれる一冊です。

Takumi Wada of Megaphone Books recommends:

One Year of Staying with the Life That Holds Me by Shonen Aya

『ぼくをくるむ人生から、にげないでみた１年の記録』(少年アヤ/双葉社)

An autobiographical essay by writer Shonen Aya, chronicling the long journey of coming to terms with his sexuality and learning to face his friends, family and partners as his true self.

This book taught me the importance of feeling righteous anger toward a society that often seeks to erase the existence of queer people and their partners, and of raising one’s voice in resistance. It was also one of the books that inspired me to start Megaphone Books.

A deeply personal and powerful work that speaks to identity, visibility and the courage to live authentically.

エッセイストの少年アヤによる自伝的エッセイ。自身のセクシャリティと真正面から向き合い、親友や家族や恋人と本当のじぶんで対峙できるようになるまでの長い道のりを記した一冊。ゲイとして生きる自分自身の存在やパートナーをないものにしようとしてくる社会に対して、真っ当に怒ること、声をあげて抵抗することの大切さを教えてくれた、本屋メガホンを始めるきっかけにもなった大切な一冊です。

Shimizu and Yamauchi: We, the Lovers Who Don’t Exist

Manga by Nao Yamauchi, Text by Esuko Shimizu

『シミズくんとヤマウチくん　われら非実在の恋人たち』(漫画：山内 尚,文：清水 えす子/柏書房)

A comic and essay collection that follows the everyday life of a queer couple.

There have been times in my own life when I felt compelled to hide my partner’s gender or treat our relationship as if it didn’t exist. Because of that, I found great comfort in this book’s honest portrayal of the joys, sorrows, conflicts and acts of resistance that shape queer life and partnership.

With warmth, humor and vulnerability, it offers a deeply human perspective on love, belonging and the many forms that partnership can take. A book that creates space for its readers and reminds us that there is no single way to build a life together.

クィアカップルふたりの生活を描いたコミック+エッセイ集。自分自身、何度もパートナーの性別を偽ったり、非実在のものとして扱ったりしてきたことがあるので、クィアな二人の暮らしの中での喜びや悲しみや葛藤や抵抗を、等身大で受け取れる作品にとても助けられてきました。様々なパートナーシップのあり方を受け止めて居場所になってくれる一冊だと思います。

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• The Emperor of Gladness goes on tour.

• Eat the Sydney Opera House and other architectural landmarks with these cookie cutters.

• The next Martha’s Vineyard and definitely not cursed, if you haven’t already.

• The new class of American fashion archetypes.

“Fashion girls just want to be art girls.”

As a former art world girl who, before turning 25, had worked at some very famous museums, I read that line with a sense of (shameful) pride. I thought it was a marker of prestige, creativity and merit to have “made it” into spaces I had studied from a distance just a few years prior.

But, I also disagreed with it, especially after leaving behind my underpaid marketing gigs for the lucrative world of legacy media. Fashion and art are so intertwined (and have been for so long) that people seem almost bored when someone tries to debate the relationship between the two. Today, the conversation has shifted away from trying to clearly define the differences between the fields, especially when events like this year’s Met Gala have “Fashion is Art” as their dress code.

Australia-based Jordan Gogos and his practice — at the intersection of art and fashion — challenge the debate of whether a hierarchy exists between the two industries. With his signature compression technique, which turns deadstock fabric scraps into new textiles, Jordan explores the intimacy and tension between the two fields, where “fashion becomes conceptual and political, while art becomes wearable, performative and socially circulated.”

Jordan’s pursuits vary, from his collaboration with fashion designer Akira Isogawa for Australian Fashion Week to his first solo exhibition at the UNSW galleries (on through August 16). Additionally, a large-scale wall hanging made from responsibly sourced ABC Bullion gold and silver reflects a sustainability through line.

For his time with A!R at Ace Hotel Sydney, Jordan pulled from an unfinished series of work from 2023 inspired by maps. In a recent interview with Esquire, Jordan mentions this practice of pulling from his personal archives (physical and mental) isn’t new: “I sit on a lot of things until I see the right fit and space for a work to exist. I put a lot of random bits and pieces into a folder to save for later.”

Working between his studio at the Powerhouse Museum and his room at Ace Sydney, Jordan transformed remnant fabric into stitched, folded and illustrated works that explore color, texture and memory. His final works are on view at the hotel in “Ace Accordions” through July 31. Below, he shared how the light in the hotel influenced his final artwork, why reflecting on a finished piece is part of his completion process, the music he listens to during his studio hours and more.

What did you decide to work on during your residency?
I started with an unfinished series of work from 2023, which was all about mapping. I wanted to bring that to the hotel because I could work on it within the constraints of a hotel room. I’ve essentially created an illustrated map that fits the vibe of the environment — relaxing and mobile. I wanted to capture the ability to move between the cafe and listen to music or have a drink at the bar or go to the gym. I wanted something that reflected movement and the feeling of relaxed freedom of thought.

What’s influenced the work and your process while you’ve been here?
I’m really interested in mapping and I’ve been working between Powerhouse, where I physically stitch the maps with my machines in really free flowing ways, and my room at the hotel, where I bring back what I’ve made and draw, fold and stick to create vectors.

I love working with the beautiful lighting within the hotel because I can form lanterns and shadows that evoke different moods and atmospheres. Having the time and space to finish things and then reflect on them is a part of finishing an artwork as well. The residency gave me the opportunity to look at my work and genuinely process the work. During the general frenzy of fashion week and art shows, this project was relaxed and gave me a pace that was gentle.

You mention listening to music while you work. Are there any songs or albums in rotation right now that you can’t stop thinking about?
I’ve been listening to Nick Wales’ music because he’s doing the music for my show. It’s full of experimental, classical tunes and having that in the background has been perfect. It matches the music that is played in the Lobby, so it fits seamlessly into my day.

What was your daily routine during your stay?
A typical day here? It’s the best. I get coffee and a chia bowl downstairs at Good Chemistry or have my breakfast sent up to my room. The chia bowl is vegan and they have different flavors, so I had it with rose water yesterday. Then I head out to Powerhouse and do my studio thing there and then come back to my room to draw, catch up on emails, listen to music, have a drink at happy hour and then wind down with TV before bed.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• “For me, dress designing is not a profession but an art.” —Elsa Schiaparelli

• Sister-run Block Shop’s new textiles inspired by Shaker design.

• Denim 101: Removing jeans starched up to the 900th degree.

• Read like Maggie Rogers.

• “Architects of Liberation: Modernism in Western Africa” opens at MoMA.

• Swiss-born artist Urs Fischer puts on a twofer in LA.

We teamed up with the footy fanatics behind Saturdays Football — retailer of vintage soccer stuff and cultural community hosting free pickup games countrywide — on a limited merch run marking this summer’s global games. The collaborative collection includes our take on a couple Saturdays signatures, as well as the jersey we’d wear if Ace were a sports team.

We took the opportunity to ask Saturdays founder Mat Davis what to watch for during the 2026 World Cup. Below, five facts and observations as worthy of the new football fan as of the one who’s been watching way too many games.

1. The More the Merrier?

The World Cup used to be a lot easier to follow: 32 teams split into eight groups of four. After having played each team in their respective group, known as the “Group Stage,” the top two teams in each group emerged to compete in the Round of 16 “Knockout Phase.” From here the competition operated like tournaments we’re more familiar with: you win, you advance; you lose, you go home.

This year, the ever-magnanimous FIFA decided to invite more teams to the party — expanding the field to 48 teams, with 12 groups of four. Following suit, the Knockout Phase expanded from 16 to 32 teams. This new format leads to some unwieldy math; the top two teams from each group will still advance (24 teams total), but now an additional eight third-place teams from the groups will also move on to fill the 32-team draw.

What does that actually mean? A more forgiving format, with more teams advancing out of the group stage, means a team losing its opener is no longer cause to panic. Teams can drop a game, scrap a draw and still be alive. No doubt it will also create some confusion for fans, particularly those tuning in for the first time. We’re not into it initially, but let’s see how this plays out.

2. Four Nations Playing in Their First World Cup

Cape Verde. Curaçao. Jordan. Uzbekistan. All countries competing in the World Cup for the first time. These are your underdogs, and at least one is going to give you a moment you’ll be telling people about for years. Curaçao is the unlikeliest newbie: The island has a population of roughly 156,000 people (fewer residents than Pasadena) making it the smallest nation by population ever to qualify for a men’s World Cup. Cape Verde, the third-smallest nation by population to ever qualify, has significantly more Cape Verdeans living outside the island nation than on it. Uzbekistan is the first Central Asian nation ever to make it. Jordan, the 64th ranked team in the world, finally arrives on the big stage after decades of failed attempts.

These teams aren’t lifting the trophy. But the World Cup has never been only about who wins. It’s about the moment a country of 156,000 people shuts down to watch its flag on the same pitch as the giants of world soccer.

3. Heat, Altitude and Time Zones — Added Opposition

The 2026 World Cup has been tagged the most environmentally extreme World Cup ever played. Fourteen of the 16 host cities are projected to face dangerous heat. Ten are at very high risk of severe heat stress. At the 2022 Qatar World Cup, all of the stadiums were within driving distance of one another. This year, split between three countries and multiple time zones, some grueling travel schedules will be a much bigger factor. Not to mention, in the same tournament, teams could go from playing one game at an elevation of over 7,000 ft in Mexico City, to sea level in Boston.

FIFA, in anticipation of these harsh conditions has mandated three-minute hydration breaks in each half, also a first. These outside factors are the kind of things that can lead to surprising results. No doubt the team that lifts the trophy in July will have won as much off the pitch — sleep, recovery, hydration, the boring stuff — as on it.

4. A First: The World Cup Halftime Show

The first men’s World Cup final was played on July 30, 1930. In the nearly century since, the game has never had a halftime show. Until July 19, 2026, at MetLife Stadium, when Madonna, Shakira and BTS will take the stage.

If that sounds like FIFA imitating the Super Bowl, that’s because it is. FIFA president Gianni Infantino has been open about wanting to “Americanize” the commercial moment for the U.S. market.

Music and pop culture have always played a role in marketing the World Cup, from Pavarotti in the ‘90s, to this year’s official tournament anthem, “Dai Dai,” by Shakira and Burna Boy, but never has it been inserted into the match experience itself.

Whether you love it or hate it, it’s certainly a shift in how the tournament treats itself culturally.

5. The Away Jerseys are the Real Fashion Story

If you only watch the home shirts, you’re missing the show. The most interesting design work for this tournament is happening on the away kits. This is not totally surprising as teams are always more conservative with their home jersey designs, honoring, in some cases, over a hundred of years of color tradition. Teams tend to give themselves much more design freedom with their away jerseys and this year was no exception.

This is the most maximalist World Cup kit cycle in memory. Brands are leaning into national craft, indigenous patterning, historical reference — anything but a safe design template. A few examples: Portugal’s away kit, with a deep V-panel of crashing waves — a nod to the country’s seafaring history. Or the soft purple floral pattern in South Korea’s away kit. Spain’s away kit goes deep on the layers, with graphics pulled from classical Spanish manuscripts. Paraguay broke from their red-and-white stripes entirely for an away shirt that looks like a fever dream of light and motion.

For collectors, this is a defining drop. For the new fan, one of these might just be their first WC kit purchase.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Ranch dressing, America’s softest power.

• Thoughts and prayers for Jackie, Shadow and their fledging eaglets.

• Ordering The Swimmer via the Libby app, then reading Mary HK Choi’s new book Pool House.

• 100 brave books curated by Dua Lipa and housed in one of Europe’s most storied bookshops.

• Quintessential July 4 viewing.

On June 18, Ace Hotel Toronto received Canada’s 2026 Governor General’s Medal in Architecture. The awards highlight projects of all sizes that exemplify Canadian architecture and stand as institutions committed to the future.

In the words of Jonathan Bisson, President of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada: “This year’s recipients remind us that the most enduring architecture is measured not only by its form, but by its contribution to people, communities and culture. Their work reflects a remarkable diversity of places, voices and aspirations, while advancing a common vision of a built environment that is more inclusive, resilient and connected to its context.”

We feel immense gratitude. Ace Hotel Toronto was recognized alongside a breadth of architectural marvels including traditionally constructed summer powwow structure, net-zero energy fire station and more. Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, our partner on Ace Toronto, built it from the ground up with materials valued for their integrity and functionality: red Toronto brick, weathered steel and Canadian timber. Together, we crafted the hotel as a home for big thinkers, a place to gather and trade in words, intimacies and bright ideas.

In celebration of our collaboration and this award, we’re looking back at a conversation with Brigitte Shim, co-principal of Shim-Sutcliffe, first published on Ace Reader in 2023.

“We were thinking about how the brick, the copper, the fire would contribute to a delightfully cozy and intimate feeling in the lower-level restaurant, particularly when it’s really cold outside in a Toronto winter.

We started with that idea of being in a particular feeling. And working back from that, as architects we made thousands of decisions, you know, from very typical things like colors and material palettes, but in the end, there I was at dinner, and in the feeling that we had actually imagined six years earlier.”

Brigitte Shim is touching on a recent experience dining at Alder, the restaurant at Ace Hotel Toronto, exploring what it means to design a feeling. A co-principal at Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, Brigitte founded the world-renowned firm in 1994 alongside her partner, Howard Sutcliffe.

She is also someone who understands light, form and landscape on what must be a cellular level. And Brigitte’s keen ability to critically and meticulously translate her foundational feeling for such forces into architecture has earned her and Sutcliffe a bevy of accolades, including 16 Governor General’s Medals [Editor’s Note: Make that 17!] and the Order of Canada.

Shim-Sutcliffe helmed the design of Ace Hotel Toronto, and Brigitte returned her expertise to our Toronto home during the “How Do You Design A Feeling?” panel we hosted in partnership with Wedge Studio during DesignTO Festival. We caught up with Brigitte about inspiration, a sense of place in design and her love of Toronto.

What typifies modern Canadian architecture in your mind? What aspects of the field do you feel are important to continually reexamine and push boundary-wise?

Our studio has always defined design as straddling all scales from landscape to architecture to furniture to hardware. We delight in working at all scales.

The panel we hosted recently that you participated in, as part of DesignTO Festival was about the elusive task of designing intangible feelings. Any best practices you could share on the matter?

We were fortunate to visit all of the Ace Hotels before designing the Ace Hotel Toronto. We learned that most were pre-existing buildings that were converted into Ace Hotels. We wanted to embed the intangible notion of time into the design. Even though the hotel was built all at once, we wanted the hotel guests and citizens of Toronto to feel a blurred sense of time. In a way, you can’t tell immediately if this is an old factory that has been repurposed as a hotel, or a new building — and that ambiguity makes us really happy.

“The architects designed panels of precast concrete with inset iridescent brick, turning a generic product into poetry. Inside, the streetside restaurant and bar sit within a two-storey armature of sculpted concrete, accented by warm plywood and bespoke details. This is a space for the ages.” —The Globe and Mail

What feeling(s) were you designing toward with Ace Hotel Toronto, Shim-Sutcliffe Architects’ first hospitality build?

For Shim-Sutcliffe, we wanted our first hotel to create a civic place providing a place to gather in the city we love. I always wanted to design a hotel, because I love how it addresses the scale of the city, the community, and the room. Architecturally each of these places can inform the other, they have different roles to play, and they create in effect a rich sequential experience — which for us was a great opportunity.

Speaking of feelings, is there one you get when a design you’re working on suddenly strikes you as complete?

No project is ever fully complete. The citizens of Toronto and Ace Hotel Toronto guests complete the hotel space. The spaces Shim-Sutcliffe design are always intended to be a backdrop for everyday life.

Shim-Sutcliffe is known for a wonderful weaving of landscape and place into architectural design. Where did you seek creative fuel for Ace Toronto?

This neighbourhood, which is actually a very unusual place for a hotel, was our greatest source of inspiration. Ace Hotel Toronto is situated in the Garment District in downtown Toronto, was once full of robust warehouses. Across the street from the hotel site is St. Andrew’s Playground Park. With the deep, red brick exterior there’s a robust materiality and inside the structure is exposed — creating a unique space in the city that reinforces the surrounding warehouses, and you see the large windows opening to the park, drawing a connection to the park and Toronto’s varied light and seasons.

Do you have a favorite design detail from Ace Toronto? One of ours is the orientational effect of Howard Sutcliffe’s work “Horizon Line” — how it positions viewers on the northern shore of Lake Ontario, which you explained was how people arrived in Toronto for centuries.

Howard Sutcliffe’s three story mural “Horizon Line” does a terrific job of placing you in the City of Toronto. If there were no buildings between the hotel site and the lakeshore, you could be viewing the sparkling waters of Lake Ontario.

“Horizon Line” reminds us that we are on the north shore of Lake Ontario looking south and an integral part of the Great Lakes, which is the largest grouping of fresh water lakes in North America. The art piece is an eloquent reminder of place.

Toronto’s undergoing a building boom of late. Is there a unifying feeling you hope the city builds to as it continues to expand?

Toronto has been going through a huge building boom for several decades and most new buildings start by erasing all traces of the existing site.

Our starting point for the Ace Hotel Toronto was to celebrate and honour the robust red brick warehouses that once populated this part of our city. Inviting to the public. We hope this building takes a different position than many buildings in the city. It’s robust, warm and welcoming — feelings that are key to the whole hotel experience. It’s a building that gives back a neighbourhood living room — so memorable and civic — and we hope it’ll make a great contribution to the city overall.

How does emotion inform your decision-making process while designing?

Our aspiration for our spaces is that they evoke a feeling that is distinct and palpable.

As architects, we make thousands of decisions when designing a space and we use all of our emotional intelligence to make good choices that results in a feeling.

When creating intended civic spaces such as Ace Toronto, are there certain designed elements you consider or include to make the space inherently feel like it was built for gathering?

At Ace Hotel Toronto the lobby feels like it’s hovering. It’s actually hung from rods connected the larger concrete structure. For us that’s really important because it builds a sense of difference between the very grounded lower-level restaurant, and the lightness and airiness of the lobby. But there’s also a fluidity and connection between these pieces and also the key spaces around them — the local park, the neighbourhood — which are really anchoring the whole building.

Still in a Kyoto state of mind after the latest edition of Frame of Reference, I was excited to experience everyday life in the city through the eyes of photographer Satoko Imazu.

Satoko is the first artist in this year’s A!R cohort at Ace Hotel Kyoto, selected by BRUTUS editor Ro Tajima. When I think of my favorite issues of the iconic Japanese men’s magazine, I usually think about their strong points of view on style, architecture, design and city travel. BRUTUS is so much more than these, though, and the magazine has explored the natural environment in ways that surprised the eternal city kid in me. BRUTUS has published full editions on fishing, which it considers “the perfect time to connect with nature”; curiosity and adventure; plus bizarre insects and plants, among other themes related to our natural world.

The magazine’s combination of nature and style perfectly complements the work of Satoko, who focuses primarily on travel and portraiture. She has photographed chefs and costume designers conducting their daily rituals for BRUTUS, flower arrangements for &Premium, subjects in transit across the world, as well as vibrant spiritual and character studies seen in the southern Indian town of Kannur.

During her residency, Satoko chose to focus on how local residents spend time in and around the Kyoto Imperial Palace, which reminded her of Central Park, another public place simultaneously rooted in history and part of contemporary everyday life for city residents. Her solo show at Ace Hotel Kyoto, Echoes, is on view through July 31, and in her Kyoto Diary, she gives us a behind-the-scenes look at the “everyday Kyoto” she enjoyed, the famous photographer she met during KYOTOGRAPHIE, the advice she’d give to first-time visitors to the city and more.

_{Photos and videos of Kyoto taken by Satoko. Portrait of Satoko in the mirror by Showgo Nishino.}

What was your daily routine during your stay?
For the first week, I dedicated myself entirely to visiting the Kyoto Imperial Palace, which was the central theme of this project. I photographed at different times of day — early morning, morning, midday, evening and on weekends.

My personal impression is that the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, where I live, feels like a place people intentionally visit for sightseeing, for things like cherry blossom season or autumn foliage. In contrast, Kyoto Imperial Palace is also visited by many tourists, of course, but it feels much more integrated into everyday life. People pass through the grounds on their daily commute or school routes, weekend baseball games are held on the grounds, and there are tennis courts and children’s playgrounds. I feel that this closeness to daily civic life is something unique to Kyoto Imperial Palace.

How did you adapt your artistic process to working from a hotel room?
In the latter half of my stay, I began selecting from the images I had taken, printing them in smaller formats and composing the work in my hotel room.

I spent a significant amount of time on this process. The room had a large white wall, which made it very convenient to visualize and build the exhibition layout. I also completed the framing in the room. Thanks to the spacious accommodations provided by the hotel, I was able to work comfortably and without stress.

What’s something unexpected you experienced or encountered during the residency?
During my stay, I experienced a number of unexpected and meaningful encounters. It was a stay filled with both chance and inevitable connections, and I strongly felt the unique “pull” of Kyoto. I was there during the KYOTOGRAPHIE period, where I happened to meet Pieter Hugo in the hotel Lobby and even had the chance to take a photo together.

Shortly after arriving at Ace Hotel Kyoto, I also ran into an old acquaintance with a unique connection to coffee at the Stumptown Coffee Roasters in the lobby of the hotel. I’ve developed a long-term personal project called “Coffee Time Dialogue,” where I document coffee scenes and the surrounding culture across different cities and countries through photography. In 2023, I held a traveling exhibition across four coffee shops in Okinawa, and a staff member from one of those cafes now works at the Stumptown in Ace Hotel Kyoto! Meeting again across cities, in a coffee space, felt like more than coincidence — it felt like a kind of connection or continuity shaped by coffee culture itself.

Where did you hang out while you were here? Did you find any gems at the hotel or in the neighborhood?
Throughout my time there, I often spent time around the hotel, near the Imperial Palace, as well as in the Demachiyanagi area and along the Kamo River. The Karasuma Oike area, where the hotel is located, is dotted with traditional wagashi shops, miso stores, and obi shops housed in Kyoto machiya townhouses. Although it is a well-known part of the city, the area around the hotel is relatively quiet and not overly crowded. Much of its atmosphere seems to remain unchanged, almost as if it is still quietly holding onto its past.

In a Kyoto that is increasingly shaped by inbound tourism, and even within walking distance from the city center, this neighborhood still feels like “everyday Kyoto”— a place where daily life and tradition continue to coexist in a calm and familiar way.

What’s one work of art you can’t stop thinking about?
One of the most influential works for me is a photograph by photojournalist Hiromi Nagakura, which captures Ahmad Shah Massoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. I encountered this image when I was in junior high school, and although it is a piece of reportage, I was struck by its beauty. It was the first time I truly felt the artistic power of photography.

The path of photography is not always smooth or easy, and in difficult moments, I still return to this image for inspiration and encouragement.

What’s important to you right now?
What matters most is connection — not only now, but always. Also, the ability to make choices and good health.

What do you recommend for first-time travelers to Kyoto?
Kyoto is a very compact city. I recommend taking your time to walk, or renting a bicycle from Ace. If possible, try a regular bicycle rather than an electric one and explore at your own pace. Evening walks are also highly recommended.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Write outside your routine with Moon Lists’ prompts for travelers.

• Lilith Fair walked so Daisy Chain could…

• Stack paper(backs) like HOV.

• Raising our glass to Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, recipients of Canada’s Governor General’s Medal in Architecture for their work on Ace Hotel Toronto.

• ^See award-winning architecture and Spain vs. Uruguay this Friday at Levi’s Ace Hotel Toronto Watch Party.

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Launched in 2022, FUNCTION is a Toronto-based platform for everything Ballroom: culture, stories, events and education. They’ve brought Ballroom royalty through the doors of Ace Hotel Toronto and Ace Hotel Brooklyn as part of a collaborative series centering sexual health, community and movement — we’d gather monthly to talk about history, sex ed and the courageous creative expression of voguing.

Tears, cheers, breakthrough moments on the floor; FUNCTION reminds us how staggeringly inextricable sweetness and pain can be. Below, they lay down five pillars of Ballroom.

Photography by Kirk Lisaj. Editor’s Note: This piece first ran on Ace Reader in 2023.

Ballroom’s been around for over five decades but has grown to be all the rage over recent years — at least, for the public. It always has been for us. Its resurgence in pop culture, reminiscent of the times following Madonna’s “Vogue,” has brought both challenge and opportunity. Opportunity, because we’re able to gain mainstream traction, helping better fund community initiatives and propelling some of Ballroom’s top participants into the limelight. Challenge, because more and more people want the clout with absolutely nothing to do with what sits below the glory, extravagance and glamour.

Chatting with our guests, we found similar themes often bubbled up. We selected five. Five principles to inform your approach to Ballroom. Five things we think you should know whether you’ve been around for 10 years or you’re just now getting a first peek into our world.

PARENTHOOD

Parenthood lays at the very core of Ballroom. It always has. Mothers and fathers — tenured community members, with more experience and better resources, having often gone through the ringer themselves — have swooped in, one generation after the other, taking queer youth under their wings and making up for the shortcomings of their kids’ biological families. From housing to emotional support and teaching them the skills needed to venture out on their own, parents have held this community together, laying the groundwork for the culture to blossom.

PRACTICE

Like any other art form, we all experience plateaus. Self-doubt settles in, and we wonder if we’ve still got it. Weathering the ebbs and flows and keeping to our craft is how the best of us become Ballroom royalty. Turning inward through practice, withstanding the pressure and remaining consistent, on and off the floor, helping define the culture of tomorrow, always pays off in the long run.

PERSEVERANCE

Ballroom is part fantasy — a world where folks, kicked to the curb for being who they are, get to experience a sliver of what life could have, should have, would have been had they fallen within the confines of heteronormativity. But dreams are often more ripe for the plucking than you’d imagine, and Ballroom can be an incredible launchpad for those who relentlessly gun for what’s soon to be theirs.

PAIN

For many of us, our Ballroom experience is so intrinsically linked to pain. Facing alienation from friends and family, systemic inequalities targeting BIPOC and queer folks and society telling us we’ll never be worthy enough to belong — it takes a toll. But, Ballroom is how we cope. It’s how we find deliverance. It’s why our art resonates so deeply. It’s a reflection of our struggles and the resilience we need to overcome them.

PROGRESS

There comes a point where the path, forged by those who came before us, comes to an end. Honoring our history — those we’ve lost and those still around to enjoy the fruits of their labour; a labor of love, of sacrifice, of joy and freedom — newer generations have the important duty to carry Ballroom forward with intention. It’s saved the lives of so many and is bound to save the lives of many more. It wouldn’t be fair to jeopardize the chance — already so rare and fleeting — for future queer and BIPOC youth to come into their own, too.

Here’s where we meet, at the end of the path, with learnings of our own and a bit of advice. Learn first and be thoughtful in your approach. If you’re one of the girls, help us build an even greater legacy for our children to enjoy — and for them to do the same for their own.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• New York or nowhere tomorrow.

• Tempted to tile?

• Gossip you can feel good about.

• Doug Aitken’s new show opens at The Shed.

  Thanks for reading Room with a View. Subscribe to keep the goodness going.

During my interview with Emma Kohlmann, she mentioned how admiring the noren curtains and banners in the Lobby of Ace Hotel Kyoto led her down a rabbit hole about the artist who made them, including a visit to the Kyoto Museum of Crafts and Design to see an exhibition of their work. That artist was Samiro Yunoki.

Samiro Yunoki was a mingei artist (folk artist), educator and textile designer who worked well into his 100th year. Born on October 17, 1922 (a Libra), Samiro was a former president of Joshibi University of Art and Design, Japan’s only fine art institution for women. For more than 50 years as an educator, he was as committed to teaching as he was to his own practice, advising young artists to experience things for themselves rather than simply reacting to the constant influx of images available in modern society.

At 94, Samiro’s vision and practice became cornerstones in the visual story at Ace Hotel Kyoto, touching everything from the hotel’s signature typeface and the fabrics in the Lobby to the artwork in the hotel rooms. Roman Alonso, Principal at Commune Design, led the interior design for the Kyoto location and recounts how Samiro became the “graphic godfather” of the project after an in-person visit at the artist’s home in Shibuya. In an interview with Roman after the hotel had opened, the artist reflected that his inspiration for the work was rooted in the notion that it’s good to be able to be free, to express and create natural forms. Though he conceded, “Life is not all fun and games,” he added “if you can find even just one fun thing for yourself, your life and work will be more enjoyable.

The intergenerational openness and joy he brought to his everyday life felt especially apparent when I learned about his 2023 exhibition at Ace Hotel Kyoto, East Meets West, a collaborative show with Kori Girard (b.1979). Despite their nearly 60-year age gap, the two artists each created six new works of collage that celebrated play, geometry, color and form. Girard mentions being inspired by Samiro-san’s energy in preparation for the show and in a full-circle moment, the elder artist was heavily inspired by Girard’s grandfather Alexander Girard, having visited Santa Fe in the ’70s to see his collection of folk art donated to the Museum of International Folk Art.

Seeing the joyful patterns in Samiro’s textile work, reading about his openness to new projects leading into his centenary year, noting that books about him are titled simply — such as Time with Samiro Yunoki or Words from Samiro Yunoki — and hearing about the thoughtful advice he gave effortlessly to students, I realized my admiration and awe weren’t just with Samiro’s beautiful work. They also stemmed from his deliberate choice to bring an unpretentious human joyfulness and empathy to every single aspect of his life.

Below, I share some of my favorite Samiro works from his extensive career, which he maintained until his passing in 2024, paying special attention to those that felt as bright as his spirit and the forthcoming summer season:

Coffee-Kan was created by Koichiro Nagata and has been a cornerstone in in the Kagoshima cafe scene for more than 35 years. Samiro designed the logo and menu utilizing a stencil-dye technique.

The red, green and white dyes on these textiles appear similar and in conversation, even though Samiro made the works 13 years apart.

Samiro’s ability to treat all surfaces as canvases is deeply inspiring. I love seeing the collection of matchbooks he designed included in the anniversary book above, reading about his telephone directory ads for a long-established confectionery shop and learning he designed fabric for the brand Hida Sangyo.

To commemorate Ace Hotel’s first home in Japan, Samiro designed a limited-edition print produced in Kyoto. It feels like he was always keeping an eye towards the present and joyful future in his designs.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Take sartorial inspiration from Samiro, too.

• Tribe: Night Market brings a Juneteenth bazaar to Ace Brooklyn, with sounds by DJ Mustafa and a photo booth by André Uncut.

• Derrick Gee takes Radio Hour on the North American road.

We turned to our friends at Perfectly Imperfect to build our ideal guide to Brooklyn — an ode to the borough’s never-ending nooks and crannies, spotlighting newcomers alongside the stalwarts we still love. PI’s community of in-the-knowers helped fill it with the good stuff, stretching from the blocks surrounding Ace Hotel Brooklyn to far-flung pockets worth the MTA fare.

In their words: “One minute you're waiting under the glow of the Brooklyn Paramount marquee, the next you're sprawled out in Prospect Park’s Long Meadow watching the sunrise, arguing about the best scallion pancake breakfast sandwich in Williamsburg.”

The guide’s print release was celebrated with a raucous Lobby party featuring live performances by ideasforconversations and smush and DJ sets from jauwshewuh and Gavin Oswald. As the night wound down, everybody spilled into the street, stopping for one last chat on the stoop. All in all, the perfect spring night in the city.

Equal parts practical and whimsical, the Perfectly Imperfect x Ace Hotel Brooklyn guide yours to consult round the clock when you download the full thing here. Get a taste of their taste below.

Photography by Dylan DeJong Doughtery. Illustrations by Callum Abbott.

Note: All transit times and directions calculated from Ace Hotel Brooklyn.

BROOKLYN PARAMOUNT

WALK: ~0.2 MI / 4 MIN

LOCAL TIP: Grab cheesecake at Junior’s across the street before the show. Arrive early to take in the restored 1928 interior and the vintage Wurlitzer organ.

IDENTITY: For the music lover chasing gilded-age grandeur.

ROYAL BAKERY (CROWN HEIGHTS)

WALK: ~2.3 MI / 45 MIN

TRANSIT: A OR C FROM HOYT-SCHERMERHORN → NOSTRAND AV, ~10-MIN WALK (~25 MIN TOTAL)

LOCAL TIP: Get the doubles (Trinidadian curried-chickpea flatbread). Ask for “slight pepper” if you don’t want it too hot. Closed Monday and Sunday.

IDENTITY: For the traveler who knows Brooklyn for its Caribbean culture.

BABY BLUES LUNCHEONETTE (EAST WILLIAMSBURG)

WALK: ~2.3 MI / 45 MIN

TRANSIT: G FROM HOYT-SCHERMERHORN → BROADWAY (~20 MIN), 5-MIN WALK

LOCAL TIP: Order the baklava banana waffles or the Zorba plate. Tiny space — aim for a weekday to avoid the Saturday-noon crunch.

IDENTITY: For the brunch-hunter with a soft spot for Greek-diner nostalgia.

MELODY LANES (SUNSET PARK)

TRANSIT: D/N/R FROM ATLANTIC AV-BARCLAYS → 36TH ST OR 25TH ST (~20 MIN), SHORT WALK

LOCAL TIP: Every Tuesday is ladies’ night with discounted lanes and shoe rental if you are on a girls’ trip!

IDENTITY: For the traveler who wants to live like a true local.

ATLANTIC AVENUE SHOPS

WALK: THE STRIP STARTS 5 MIN FROM THE HOTEL AND RUNS WEST TOWARD THE WATER

LOCAL TIP: The good stretch is Court St. to Hicks St. Hit Horseman Antiques, Sahadi’s (legendary Lebanese grocer for olives, bulk spices, baklava), Outline and the vintage boutiques. Saturday mid-morning has the best vibe.

IDENTITY: For the slow-browser who likes a shopping street.

PROSPECT PARK

TRANSIT: 2 OR 3 TRAINS FROM NEVINS ST → GRAND ARMY PLAZA (~15 MIN)

LOCAL TIP: Enter at Grand Army Plaza and head straight to Long Meadow for a picnic. In summer, check the Lakeside splash pad; in winter, LeFrak Center for ice skating.

IDENTITY: For the traveler who wants to live like a Brooklynite for an afternoon.

MOLASSES BOOKS (BUSHWICK)

TRANSIT: L TRAIN FROM UNION SQ (VIA 2/3 FROM HOYT-SCHERMERHORN) → HALSEY ST (~30 MIN), 5-MIN WALK. OR M TO CENTRAL AV

LOCAL TIP: It’s a used bookstore, café AND a wine bar where you can trade books for store credit. Grab a coffee or natural wine and stay for hours.

IDENTITY: For the bookish wanderer who likes their third place slightly feral.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Where to go during Copenhagen’s 3 Days of Design festival. And while you’re in the neighborhood…

• For champions: Breakfast with Flo. Head to Ace Reader where the NTS mainstay and “Digging with Flo” host shares her garden-heavy guide to Sydney.

• Summer Fridays are back for those who celebrate.

• Ace Shop’s new swim suite.

• Smol natural wine goes good with the season.

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Tender, empathetic, energized, open — these are the words that came to mind when I met photographer Guarionex Rodriguez, Jr. (Guario) for this edition of Checking In, an interview series with A!R participants past and present. Jaded from my time in the art world, I’ve been letting go of the ill-conceived notion that artists can’t be talented, appropriately celebrated and generous at the same time, and my conversation with Guario helped me shed it even more.

Born and raised in Lynn, Massachusetts, Guario is Dominican American artist currently based in Brooklyn. His practice feels intimate and intuitive, even when he’s applying his vision to commissions for Nike, Total Luxury Spa x Sun Ra, Document Journal, Architectural Digest, The New York Times and others.

Guario stayed at Ace Hotel Brooklyn in April as part of the 2026/2027 A!R cohort curated by Field Meridians, and his show, Planets in Transit, is on view through July 31. Even though the works in his exhibition document the people and communities ushering in a new era of nightlife, Guario didn’t go out much during his monthlong residency.

Over coffee, bread and an octopus salad at Lele’s Roman, we talked about his mornings walking alone for hours, how talking to strangers led him to nightlife portraiture and the piece of equipment he couldn’t live without during his stay.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What initially inspired you to start making art?
It started with my mom. She documented a lot of life, hundreds of photos done on 35-millimeter point-and-shoots. I adopted that from her. She had so many cameras that I just took one of them and it started my interest in photography as an art.

I also went to an after-school program called Raw Artworks, where a teacher named Chris Gaines taught me how to do photography for real. He bought me a film camera and funded my first 10 rolls to get me into the medium. That art program got me into art school.

Tell me about your relationship with this year’s curatorial partner at Ace Brooklyn, Field Meridians.
I’ve known LinYee Yuan for half a decade. I was on assignment from Deem Journal, whose cofounders, Alice Grandoit and Nu Goteh, I knew from Boston. They sent me to photograph LinYee and her baby Alvaro. We hit it off during the shoot.

That led to her inviting me to work on a video project during the pandemic. I also worked on some stuff for MOLD, a past magazine project of LinYee’s, before working on Field Meridians projects. We got more familiar with each other and became a community. Her dinner parties are big hangouts — everyone is close and no one is pretentious. If LinYee asks me to do anything, I say yes.

How did you prepare — mentally, physically, packing-wise — that felt specific to this experience?
I was actually in the midst of a move, so I brought 20 percent of my life with me to the residency. I had just moved out of a sublet and a lot of my stuff was in storage, so it felt like perfect timing. I brought all my camera gear and my scanner, which is a big, important part of my practice. I usually travel a lot for work so the first two weeks it felt like I was visiting a new place, but after that I had the reality check of “I’m still here” and focused even more on the work.

I was in a room on the 13th floor, facing the city. I never closed the curtains; I loved waking up with the sunrise and taking pictures. The most sloppy, half-asleep photos.

What was your daily routine during your stay?
I kept joking to my friends that I was visiting New York for the first time during this residency. I have a regular routine of meditating then going for a walk or run. I leave my phone and I don’t connect with anyone during my walk. I pray it’s at least an hour, but sometimes it’s three. I got familiar with walking towards Crown Heights and also walking in the other direction, towards the water. Then I’d go to the Lobby and get coffee. I’d start eating around midday and I tried almost everything from the menu at both the Lobby Bar and restaurant. A lot of my friends ended up visiting me, unsolicited. They would just text that they’re coming to the Ace and they’d see me in the Lobby.

The Lobby was my living room and it felt pre-internet in a way — when friends would just call and say they’re coming to visit you and you can’t not meet up with them.

Where did you hang out while you were here? Did you find any gems at the hotel or in the neighborhood?
I loved walking to Yemen Cafe and Al Badawi. I had been to both before but it was great to go again.

My favorite artwork right now is Time Pockets (2021) by Do Ho Suh, which was created as a way to save objects the artist’s children used most during a specific period of time. I’d love to know what you would save from this experience if you had your own Time Pockets without size limits.
I took the little soaps with me for remembrance of this time. And I’d make a bouquet of every flower that I saw on my walks. It was peak spring when I stayed here. I’m big on flowers — I have a whole project on them.

Speaking of, how does your photography focused on nature interact or inform your nightlife photos? When I saw your Flowers for Anacaona series for the first time, they felt like nightlife photos.

Nature is just life. When I do my meditation, I do the expansion and then a grounding practice where I feel myself with the earth, and then I feel myself outside of my body and into space. I think they’re all interlinked and flowers are powerful in that they can immediately make humans switch up their energy.

How did you discover that photography was the right medium for you?
I started understanding photography in college as a way to connect with people. During my freshman and sophomore years, I was making a lot of work that was hyper-familiar — of my friends, my family. It was very easy to make that work. When I studied abroad in Barcelona during my junior year, I decided if I’m going to be good at this, I have to photograph strangers.

The first couple of times I asked a stranger, “Can I take a photo of you?” and they said no, I was devastated and I didn’t shoot for the rest of the day. I had to learn how to accept noes and that helped me learn my own confidence, which in turn got me more yeses from strangers. Those yeses turned into hangouts, and every time I photograph someone, they’re happy that I’ve spent time with them, which created my community.

On your website, you say: “After getting a BFA, I became broke and partied a lot. Disappointed, my parents were like ‘siempre está de fiesta.’ But interacting with folk actually led me to understand community. None of my works could’ve been done in a vacuum.” What’s your relationship to nightlife in this context?
It was always a form of escapism, not wanting to be home. I loved dancing and partying, but the Boston scene right after college wasn’t great until I met specific people, including Nu from Deem Journal. He threw this party called A Little Louder with some friends where the slogan was “Come as you are.” I was going every month because the DJ always had all the right music, but my parents had this stereotype that the party functions as a way to get wrapped up in drugs and alcoholism if you do it too much. But going out helped me meet really cool people, including someone who got me a job at Puma. Then my parents realized I was getting work from these events.

What was the focus of the work you made here, and why did it feel important to focus on that right now?
During the month-long residency, I had two images in mind: I was thinking about the party Soul Summit and the party Papi Juice. I feel like anyone could feel at home at these two parties, so I decided to focus on both as aspects of what connection means on the dance floor.

The way I think of the dance floor is kind of like a bed of flowers, and I had a lot of ideas on how I wanted to present that.

What kind of energy did you want the work to bring?
Those two parties bring a level of intimacy that is like a blazing sun. Anytime Soul Summit is happening in Fort Greene Park, you walk towards the park and you can just feel it becoming warmer and warmer. All of the energy is flocking into the middle of that park and everyone wants to be on the dance floor. And one of the reasons I picked Papi Juice is that no matter where they’re hosting around the city, it’s gonna be the same energy.

Wherever Oscar is DJing, there will be the most intimate, loving people. And it could be anyone — whether it’s a baby queer or nightlife veteran, a veteran in fashion or art, or even a politician.

Lastly, I love the list of people on your site that you wanted to highlight. How did you decide to include that section?
My friend showed me a few artists’ websites that highlighted people in interesting ways, and it really spoke to me. I didn’t want to just credit people that were part of projects I worked on because I’m always going to do that. I wanted to shout out people that I think deserve to be shouted out. I want people to explore, click on a random name and then learn about something that has nothing to do with my work.

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Got plans tonight? We do.

• Another reason to dance: it’s AI-proof.

• Oh Yoko!

• Get those beauty Zs now — Pride is nearly upon us.

• File under Things to Do for $1: This pool is lake-size.

• Dream series, dream setting.

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You couldn’t put Mei Semones in a box if you tried. On her 2025 debut album Animaru, the 25-year-old Brooklynite songwriter and guitarist delivers tracks in both English and Japanese that span genres from jazz to baroque pop, bossa nova and indie rock — Mei calls it jazz-influenced indie J-pop. (Her mom drew the album art.)

Mei’s currently on tour and we caught up with her to see what stuff she brought along. “I am mostly just focused on making sure I don’t forget anything, while also not overpacking,” she says. Wise.

Mini Amp: I got a mini amp from Blackstar that I have been bringing on tours, so that I can play my electric guitar in my hotel room and hear myself.

Emergen-C: I usually bring some Emergen-C to try to help my immune system stay strong so that I don’t get sick on tour!

Hoodie: I always make sure to bring a hoodie because wearing a hood helps me sleep on flights and in cars.

Face Masks: I like to bring some face masks since touring can be tiring on the skin. Right now I am using the Japanese sake ones.

SEA Pink Pajama Set: I like to have a nice matching pajama set for tour so that I feel comfy in the hotels.

Manga: I usually bring a couple manga to read! Right now I am reading Kimi ni Todoke.

Candy: I like to pack some sour candy! For this tour I have a few packs of sour grape fettuccine.

Something new I’m bringing on this tour is: A new backpack from MONO which has been really nice!

Turndown Service from Ace Hotel

A roundup of rabbit holes to bed down with.

• Stick Nation, lock in. On the ground stick reviews from artists at Kilby Block Party.

• Seated for the new publication on creative process from former Pitchfork editor Puja Patel.

• Hungry for eye candy? Eat up Frank Dobson’s textiles at the V&A.

• Three things for the NYCers among us: Perfectly Imperfect x Ace Hotel Brooklyn party, paper lamp workshop courtesy of Como Demo and the art of keeping the dance floor alive.

  Thanks for reading Room with a View. Subscribe to keep the goodness going.