New York had its congressional primaries in June, and I spent a couple of hours standing on a sidewalk corner during evening rush hour on primary day, reminding people that they still had time to vote. It was informative. Every African-American woman I spoke to said she had already voted by that point. Black men…
In the News
Throwback Thursday: Appropriate for Tennis
Ten years ago — as part of a runway collaboration with a fashion designer — I created an enormous silver tennis-racquet necklace. Here is a photo of it next to regular-size tennis balls. I took that photo to help people judge the size of the piece (I had the measurements on my website too, but…
RIP, Aretha Franklin
Aretha Franklin — the Queen of Soul — always knew how to create a Moment. via GIPHY She was the diva of divas, as she proved 20 years ago this October, during the debut “VH1 Divas Live” special, at the end of which which she famously dominated Mariah Carey, Gloria Estefan, Celine Dion, Shania Twain,…
Throwback Thursday: My “On Leadership” Interview
I’m neither sorry nor surprised that Facebook — the evil empire I sometimes refer to as Spacenook to avoid attracting its unwelcome attention — took a beating on Wall Street today, with its stock dropping 19% . That’s a well-deserved loss of $119 billion in market capitalization, which is the biggest-ever one-day loss of value for…
Wendy Brandes Jewelry in Paper Magazine
Paper Magazine’s summer publication is its first-ever “Sports” issue, and I’m so excited to see one of my pieces in it! Interestingly, the design is NOT my solid gold Virginia Woolf Whistle. Stylist Shannon Stokes went a less literal route — which I like! — and used my 18K gold Queen of Scots snake tiara…
Independence Day
For your 4th of July reading pleasure. The Declaration of Independence; the way ignorant people react to the Declaration of Independence; a smart Twitter thread about the ideals of the Declaration of Independence. As a bonus, here’s a great illustration by Monica Martino. I think I need to get the Lady Liberty button. It will…
Protestors Turned Up, Chuck Schumer Did Not
On Saturday, I shepherded a group of Indivisible Upper East Side members downtown to the Families Belong Together march to protest the separation of refugee children from their parents. Signs of the times #familiesbelongtogether #familiesbelongtogethermarch #indivisible #indivisibleues #resist #bethechangeyouwanttosee … signs in photo 1 designed by @rowlandpictures A post shared by Wendy Brandes (@wendybrandes) on…
Wednesday’s Videos: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
In case you need a pick-me-up today — as so many do — I find that nothing has been able to dent the pleasure I get from this gif of first-time candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez reacting to winning the Democratic primary in New York’s 14th congressional district last night. The video of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez realizing she…
Wednesday’s Videos: A Sampling of Politics 101
I was planning to share a fun, style-related video today, but considering the news, I decided to go with a few clips from the Politics 101 presentation given at my Indivisible Upper East Side meeting last week. Our guest speaker, Ben Yee of You Matter, actually did make this workshop super entertaining. The playlist represents…
In New York and Worried About the Children?
If you’re in New York and you’re disgusted by the fact that crying and screaming immigrant children are being taken from their parents — while Border Patrol agents joke about it — and kept in cages, check out the action alert I sent to my Indivisible Upper East Side group. STILL HAPPENING RIGHT NOW Tuesday,…