Every June for the past nine years, I dread the 27th—the day my mom died. In a death-phobic culture that lacks mourning rituals for honoring those we’ve lost, I never know what to do with myself. Since a death anniversary is something only the bereaved experience, it can be incredibly lonely. My usual response is to hibernate and just get through it. But last year, in the weeks leading up to the big day, I was scrolling through photos of friends’ engagement parties, destination weddings, and birthday trips on Instagram and thought, ‘Why don’t we give death anniversaries the same…

In line at airport security, I never put my liquids in a plastic bag. It’s a small rebellion, but I am often proven right not to. They rarely check, and anyway, can lip gloss really be considered a liquid? I simply think that by now, they should improve travel technology. Some airports don’t even ask to take your laptop out anymore. I have packed a carry-on and only the necessary toiletries, along with several different lip products that I am to put to the test on this trip. I am off to Amsterdam and Berlin for a ten-day sojourn with…

Elizaveta Porodina has shot Vogue covers; she’s photographed campaigns for brands like Armani, Dior, Jean Paul Gaultier, and recently, Orebella; and she’s even released a book, Colormania, in collaboration with Carolina Herrera and the brand’s creative director Wes Gordon. But she does not think of her work as “fashion photography,” and upon viewing her images, that label doesn’t feel quite accurate. Rather, the clothes and beauty are tools and context for her artistic practice. Porodina’s abstract use of color, the otherworldly quality of her models—whom she refers to as muses and co-creators—and the expressiveness of their faces and bodies are…

The Bali-based Banyan Tree Escape defies logic. The property, which is intentionally designed to connect you to nature directly, is so shockingly beautiful that it shakes the senses. Nestled into the jungle, each of the 16 villas is a free-standing treehouse with no walls, doors, or windows and 180-degree views from every angle. The nature is unlike anything you’ve seen before: lush, vibrant jungle with so many green hues that Pantone needs to visit for inspiration, sweeping views of seven mountain peaks, snuggled in beside the Ayung River (which provides a sound machine-like rush of white noise), and, of course,…

Few people have evolved under the microscopic lens that is the public eye quite like Paris Hilton. We first met her in the early 2000s as a budding celebutante ever present at any given high-profile red carpet event or coveted nightclub opening. She was cool but bubbly, owned the party scene of the times, and unfailingly flaunted a pair of low-rise jeans, a trucker hat, or a midriff-baring top. When quoted, it was usually with a phrase that’s since become inseparable from the now-43-year-old mogul: “That’s hot.” The original influencer cemented her mark on the enigmatic industry before it even…