FW21

STAFF Editor in Chief — Aryanna Clark Creative Director — Abigail Sikes

Photoshoot Director — Bella Rose Hart Photoshoot Assistant — Cole Brooks Photoshoot Assistant — Madison LowEditor in Chief Assistant — Allen Morton rey Creative Director Assistant — Gracyn Holloway Photoshoot Assistant — Maria Rojas Media Co-Director — Macy Kissel Media Co-Director — Martha Mendoza Media Assistant — Julia McCarthy Media Assistant — Pamela Torres Media Assistant — Sam Lawless Videographer — Kaya Youngquist Videographer — Kenzie Yoakam Content Director — Abi Parratto Content Assistant — Camille Cabrera-Ramon Content Assistant — Natalie Delledone Content Assistant — Rachel Loring Stylist Co-Director — Shannon Mellish Stylist Co-Director — Lily Dougherty Stylist Assistant — Danielle Price Stylist Assistant — Maddy Wieder Stylist Assistant — Mattie Peters Beauty Director — Taylor Stone Beauty Assistant — Elizabeth Diaz Beauty Assistant — Hannah Boucher Photoshoot Director — Ryleigh Taylor Photoshoot Assistant — Layla Matthews Photoshoot Assistant — Sophia Echevery Photoshoot Assistant — Star James

Photoshoot Director — Brooke Johnson Photoshoot Assistant — Amy Bils Photoshoot Assistant — Caroline Schwartz Photoshoot Director — Sophia Villiers Photoshoot Assistant — Anna McGee Photoshoot Assistant — Autumn Hall Photoshoot Assistant — Lauren Stewart Photoshoot Director — Ansley Stevens Photoshoot Assistant — Jenna Evans Photoshoot Assistant — Mila Gamarra Public Relations Director — Savi Calderon Advertising — Joey Farrugia Advertising — Rebecka Phipps Merchandising — Lana Nassir Merchandising — Maya Nadulek Events — Emma Bailey Events — Adrian Junco Events — Karla Soberon Casting Co-Director — Peyton Lantz Casting Co-Director — Ally Jones Content Ambassador — Jentry Smith Treasurer — Davis Johnstone

Love Letters Throughout

A Note From A&A 7 and 8

Inkblot 11 through 22

Romance in Film 43 and 44 Seasons 29 through 38

Lingerie & The Female Gaze 17 and 18

Love and Style in Every Season 39 and 40

Written 49 through 58

The Influence of Princess Diana on Modern Fashion 61 and 62

Paper Heart 77 and 78

Reflect 65 through 74

Meet Me At The Bleachers 89 and 90 Nostalgia 81 through 96

Romance in Literature 99 and 100

Muse 101 through 112

We wanted Issue 30 to depict what intimacy with other people can look like and can mean. Our staff was asked to look further than their initial idea of intimacy, and question where intimacy can appear, even when we least expect it. The familial relationships that transform with time, the friendships we find ourselves lucky enough to cherish, the brief instances we find vulnerability in with an acquaintance or stranger. Intimacy brings a warmth similar to sweaters worn in autumn. It can seem fleeting, and even go unnoticed, but remains essential to a fulfilling life with the people we happen to meet.

Our photoshoot teams were given the prompt (intimacy with others) and, for the first time, allowed to interpret it in whatever way felt most genuine and meaningful to them. Lucky for us, we have a staff of thoughtful and dedicated creators who share not only visuals through clothes and locations, but stories that we as an audience can immerse ourselves in.

These instances of intimacy may be familiar, or give us a new lens through which we can interpret what intimacy can be. This issue also holds a number of anonymous love letters addressed to a variety of important people in the lives of their writers, as well as articles and poetry relating to either photoshoots or intimacy in some form. Every piece of this issue came from a place of vulnerability and care, and we hope you feel as comforted when looking through it as we do.

It’s rare to be assigned a partner who not only shares your creative vision so effortlessly, but also becomes your best friend. We have grown closer every day since we were first introduced to each other in the fall of 2020 as Editor in Chief Assistant and Creative Director Assistant.

Coming into our current positions, we were both determined to establish Clutch as a brand and high-end publication. We created the tagline “Made With Love” to underline what we want everything we create during our time here to embody. This is so much more than a hobby or a club to us. It has quickly become our top priority and our passion project. We are lucky to be able to lead such an inspiring and talented team of people, and to share our work with everyone following along on this journey with us. If you take nothing else away from reading this issue, we hope you know that this and everything else we do with Clutch Magazine is made with love.

A&A

Inkblots

Director: Taylor Stone Assistants: Elizabeth Diaz, Hannah Boucher Models: Lila Garcia, Gabby Grodman, Dominique Hughes Photographers: Abigail Sikes

LINGERIE & THE Brands like Nubian Skin, Jonesy, Lonely Lingerie, and MARIEYAAT all create lingerie through the eyes of women and market to women’s needs and wants.

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s a young teen, nothing made me more uncomfortable than walking by Victoria Secret in the mall. As perfectly airbrushed models in Bombshell bras stared at me from their window displays, I was aware that their gazes were not meant for me. It wouldn’t be until years later that I would recognize this deeply humiliating experience as what it truly was: the male gaze.

And that I wasn’t the only woman who felt like the lingerie industry relied on me while simultaneously selling and objectifying me in order to do it.

The idea of the modern male gaze is usually credited to feminist film theorist Laura Mulvey. Her essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema used the term to describe sexual objectification of women in

media. The idea has expanded beyond the film industry, and today is widely understood as any instance where men are empowered through sexualizing and diminishing women.

I felt like I was being marketed to, and that the women in the catalogs weren’t worried about looking conventionally sexy. They were only interested in being themselves, which didn’t make them any less sexy, just leaps and bounds more While the lingerie industry has been empowering. ripe for the male gaze, in recent years I’ve noticed a huge shift in the This trend continued, and more and lingerie industry. Specifically, mar- more brands found themselves keting to women through a female focusing on lingerie that empowgaze. ered rather than objectified. RihanThe first instance I can remember of na launched her lingerie brand, seeing the female gaze in lingerie Savage X Fenty, in 2018 and it was marketing was Aerie’s 2014 #Aerie- specifically designed for women Real campaign, when the brand without relying on a male fantasy to announced they would no longer sell products. The brand prioritizes retouch any images in its advertise- inclusivity in its size ranges, “nude” ments and social media. It was the shade ranges, and diverse cast of first time I saw lingerie on realismodels. The lingerie was still sexy, tic-looking women who had stretch but it felt like a different type of marks and rolls when they sat down. sexy, one that comes from personal

RACHAEL LORING enjoyment rather than outward performance. This is evident Rihanna’s ethos towards lingerie: “Women should be wearing lingerie for their damn selves.” And she’s not the only one to think that.

vulnerability.”

This switch in perspectives has allowed women to feel and be sexy without also being objectified and used by the male gaze. Amber J. Keyser, PhD, author of Underneath Women are taking the reins by It All: A History of Women’s Understarting their own brands, reclaim- wear, states that lingerie can be “a ing their sexuality, and not being reclamation of something that’s afraid to break down cultural expec- always been put on you.” tations on what lingerie should look like—displaying different body Reclamation is probably the best types, gender expressions/identities, way to summarize how women feel and races/ethnicity in their designs towards lingerie as they continue to and marketing. see all the ways that the male gaze Ade Hassan, founder of Nubian has limited their self-expression and Skin, a company that designs linge- self-concept. Whereas lingerie has rie for women of color said in her historically been an industry that interview with the Cut that sexuality has been happy to dimmish womin the female gaze, “Comes from a en’s bodies and comforts for the perspective of respect… a position of enjoyment of men, now, with the power as opposed to a position of help of women and the female gaze,

it has become an industry that is in tune with women’s individuality and personhood.

Lingerie designer Freyia Lilian Porteous said in her article This is Why Lingerie is Feminist that, “Lingerie is yours foremost, and you are yours…wearing lingerie, you are cocooned within yourself, and the beauty and safety of your own body.” The female gaze allows lingerie-wearers of all shapes, sizes, and walks of life to be safe in their bodies. Finally making the experience of wearing lingerie something that what it has always said to be: intimate wear.

@SOULCANDYBAND_

@NOTMILKFL

Seasons

Director: Ryleigh Taylor Assistants: Layla Matthews, Star James, Sophia Echevery Models: Sarah Kwara, John Phillips Photographers: Layla Matthews, Abigail Sikes

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Love and Style in Every Season Camile Cabrera-Ramon

From spring to summer to autumn to winter, our relationships are continually changing.

As nature cycles through seasons, all relationships go through a number of stages that bring change. Although we all want to believe in the idealized never-ending Hollywood love story, it is never to be. Honeymoons do not last forever, and there is heartbreak in every relationship.

Thus, we can easily parallel the four seasons of the year with the four life-changing stages of every relationship. The photoshoot produced by director Ryleigh Taylor with models Sarah Kwara and John Phillips displays not only the stunning seasonal fashion attire for the upcoming year but the four seasons of a relationship.

Spring is the season of flourishing love embodied in shades of pink. Summer is the season of passion and fiery flames between partners expressed in bright oranges and yellows. Autumn is the season of cooling down reflected in shades of brown and dark green. Winter is the season of frosty fraught embodied in hues of icy blue and pearly white. All of these are captured in Taylor’s physical representation of the seasons revealed through the models’ fashionwear.

Just as we navigate through the seasons’ fashions to create the perfect outfit, how we navigate through the seasons of our relationships will either strengthen or weaken them.

Spring is the first season of any relationship. It is the season of new beginnings accompanied by many “firsts”. Love, like a flower, blooms into existence. All of spring is seen through rose-colored glasses casting beauty and hope over every aspect of a relationship. Kwara’s free-flowing light pink dress and sheer hot pink top seem to summon the fresh winds of spring and the bloom of pastel buds. In the spring season of love, physical touch is minimal, and emotions are overwhelming. The relationship is budding up so quickly that red flags are ignored, and partners are put on pedestals. Spring is the time to sow the seeds of a relationship that will hopefully take root.

Summer is the most carefree season of them all; when creating happy memories with one another underneath the hot sun has come. This is the season that sees les amoureux get emotionally and physically red hot. Phillips’s yellow pants and fluid orange button-down and Kwara’s white mini shirt and orange tie top perfectly capture the vibes of a passionate hot date in a midsummer night dream. Love becomes expressive and obsessive. The intimacy of touch is voraciously explored as bodies become one and strong body language is present. Partners are completely comfortable and discover every part of one another. But can they bear the burden of what they may discover in the heat of summer? Because as we know, those that fly too close to the sun will undoubtedly get burned.

Autumn turns leaves as well as minds. This is when lovers realize it is easy for love to blossom, but it takes real effort to keep it alive when perilous weather approaches. The partners’ true colors begin to shine through in shades of brown and burnt orange. Judgment rears its creepy head and feelings start to change like autumn leaves. Deliberate body language overtakes the never-ending talks of spring and the silence echoes a newfound comfortable ennui, like the comfort of the cozy green blazer and plaid print pants Phillips wears in the shoot.

Partners by now are comfortable enough to notice each other’s flaws and shortcomings. This is the fork at the end of a woodsy autumn trail that can be the start of conflict or the start of a real deepening connection in the relationship.

Finally, winter arrives with its cold blues and whites strikingly displayed by model Kwara in her icy blue leather coat and pearls. Winter is the pivotal season where passion cools off and true lasting love may have a chance if the cruelty of the frigid season doesn’t heartlessly freeze to death the fragile sprout of love. The relationship will either strengthen with the passing of time or commence to freeze over. Partners let go of perfect idealizations of each other and expose the veracity of their emotions. It can be a time of bonding and progress or a time of conflict and disappointing realities. Partners either settle in a comfy sofa in front of the fireplace accepting each other for who they are, or they spear icicles at each other’s throat waging an unwinnable war that will yield nothing but heartache.

And so it goes that relationships just like calendar years go through seasons that bring different phases to bear. Spring, summer, autumn, and winter each with their specific colors, temperatures, and temperaments have one thing in common, change; and so, do liaisons.

Nothing stays flawless with time. But if we are one of the lucky few that can accept the beautiful imperfections and frailties of the human condition, then the seasons will come and go and come again into the circle of a long-lasting relationship that has forgotten its beginning, middle, and end. A relationship that no matter the ups or downs, disappointments, and hardships can forgive and move on to survive in perpetuity. Only then can partners hold hands and look forward to the vibrant colors and fashionable wear of the new season to come.

Romance in film—

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e wish that the relationships we see on screen were, in fact, reality. We are often disillusioned by the romance we see in films and wonder if this type of love is fictional or real? Yet, there is nothing better than watching a romance bloom right before your eyes. Imagine you are settled into your bed with popcorn watching your favorite romance film. All of a sudden, your heart begins to race, and you feel butterflies in your stomach. People grab at the opportunity to witness people falling in love. Love stories make you believe in love. Here are five of the most iconic movie couples in film that make us believe in happy endings.

Vivian and Edward in “Pretty Woman” In this romantic comedy, Edward, Richard Gere, rescues Vivian, Julia Roberts, from her own shame, and Vivian brings to light Edward’s true feelings.

Edward says, “strawberries bring out the flavor of champagne”, and as such partners should always bring out each other’s best. Vivian dreams of living a fairytale life, and in the end Edward and Vivian get their fairytale ending.

Sandy and Danny in “Grease” In this timeless musical, Sandy, Olivia Newton-John, and Danny, John Travolta, traverse through their Baby and Johnny in “Dirty Dancing” roller-coaster relationship while simultaneously In this coming-of-age classic, Johnny, Patrick Swayze, dealing with high school drama. The film is full of teaches Baby, Jennifer Grey, how to dance, which proinnuendos that express crude flirting between charpels her on a journey toward self-discovery. The most acters. My favorite is “a hickie from Kenickie is like a iconic dance scene in cinema history is the couple’s Hallmark card, when you only care to send the very showstopper finale where Johnny lifts Baby into the air best!” Despite the film’s silly and unrealistic nature, to the tune of the song “Time of my Life”. The sensual its moral is that love is about compromise and caring dancing and sexual tension in the film fuel the watchers for the other person. Don’t we all want to fly away with transgressive temptation. into the sunset with our darling sweetheart in a 1948 Ford Deluxe convertible?

Patrick and Kat in “10 Things I Hate About You” This 1999 film is loosely based on the plot of William Jack and Rose in “Titanic” Shakespeare’s “The Taming of the Shrew”. In the film, an My list would not be complete without this tragic overbearing father forbids his two daughters from dat- love story of star-crossed lovers. Leonardo DiCaprio, ing in fear that they will end up pregnant. Heath Ledger, Jack, and Kate Winslet, Rose, board the luxurious Patrick, and Julia Stiles, Kat, are very much alike and White Star Line where they experience love and loss. probably the reason why they butt heads throughout the The chemistry between the two is captivating and exfilm. They both have strong feelings toward each other hilarating. Their romance is short-lived, which makes but are reluctant to show them. The love-hate relation- it all that more passionate and exciting to watch. The ship between the two is an example of how incredible, memorable flying scene of Jack holding Rose on the beautiful, amazing relationships can take root in tough railing of the ship’s bow has turned into an iconic beginnings. But who wouldn’t fall in love with Patrick image and pose. after he serenades Kat with the song “Can’t Take My Eyes off You”?

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Written

Director: Bella Rose Hart Assistants: Cole Brooks, Maria Rojas, Madison Lowrey Models: Gabby FILL IN, Grodman, FILL INAli Aly, Mia PerMuy Photographers: Macy Kissel, Abigail Sikes

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THE INFLUENCE OF Princess diana

ON MODERN FASHION

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he cultivation of fashion is derived from a combination of influences, one of the most important being history. Many modern-day trends can be rooted back to influential figures in time. The most timeless pieces are associated with powerful women in history and their influence on the fashion world.

Most know Princess Diana of Wales as a political figure, but she was also an icon for fashion. Diana’s life can easily be retold by her constant refinement of style throughout her life. Diana first became a member of the British royal family in 1981 after her marriage to Prince Charles. Praised for her philanthropic work and ability to gain people’s affections, people slowly watched as she became a known fashion figure. Her distinctive blonde hair and big sunglasses made her an icon easy to follow; from her most memorable looks down to her street style, she became a fashion reference for the rest of the world. The most significant difference in her style is before and after her separation from Prince Charles. Introducing the trend of oversized suits, she allowed their timeless ideal to overshadow the obligation of dresses and skirts usually expected of royals. An untraditional take, she was the founder of the powerful feminine business classic that has continued to maintain popularity into the twenty-first century.

The rules that Diana must follow as a royal did not allow her to show much skin and subjected her to a more conservative look, up until her separation from Prince Charles in 1992. Married Diana also maintained her most iconic looks through steady designers including but not limited to: Elizabeth Emanuel, Bruce Oldfield, and Catherine Walker.

After her separation in 1992, you can see Diana’s fashion evolve outside of the restrictions she was subjected to by life as a royal. Her time away from Prince Charles was nothing less than another alteration in the fashion world. Diana felt more carefree and happy, and it showed. A memorable moment in history came from the time that Diana learned of Prince Charles’s affair. She was captured in public wearing a black low-cut bodycon dress with a smile on her face. A woman of empowerment, the world stood by and watched as she made a statement without saying one word. Diana took that moment to remove herself from the restrictive dress code of the royal family and break free of her expectations. Steadily, she was able to wear more dresses that showed skin and began presenting her sense of fashion to the world in a different light. Bringing us into her more iconic street style, Diana was seen wearing biker shorts, sweatshirts, high socks, and sneakers. This was one of her most praised looks in street style; she presented a concept so simple, yet so personalized. She started to branch out to more designers such as Versace, Christian Dior, Chanel and Valentino in her time as a free woman. While taking on new designers, she wore Catherine Walker consistently throughout her life. The gradual comfort Diana exemplified was most visible. Stunning the world, her confidence prevailed as she wore a slip dress by Christian Dior to the renowned 1996 Met Gala. One of her most memorable looks, she was able to show the world her fashion away from royal life. Her ability to present trends in her own light and make them unique to herself is one of the most influential elements of Diana’s fashion.

After her tragic death in 1997, Princess Diana left a legacy of not only fashion but empowerment for women around the world. Finally free from the life it seemed she had to live, she is remembered through her charisma and the moments she generously shared to the world through her fashion. Her influence will always be remembered as nothing short of powerful.

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Reflect

t4 Director: Brooke Johnson Assistants: Caroline Schwartz, Amy Bils Models: Sam FILLMartinez, IN, FILL Josh IN Emmanuelli Photographers: Veronica Rushton, Abigail Sikes

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Paper Heart

BY: CAMILE CABRERA-RAMON

My heart became a lovely paper plane Unaware of all the pain It was thrown astray As a cigarette onto an ashtray My paper heart crumpled up It grew true and nothing let up No more sweet innocent eyes No more waiting to devour your lies My paper heart will gently rise To bare and catch its vice Amidst its great plight It spots a light My paper heart now alive Helps me survive This time I will hold it as mine My paper heart holy as wine My heart no longer a lovely paper plane Has learned how to sustain My heart ready to seize the day Can never fade away

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Nostalgia

5 Director: Sophia Villiers Assistants: Autumn Hall, Anna McGee, Lauren Stewart Models: Everett FILL IN, Reed, FILL Francesca IN Alfano, Dillon Photographers: Fox, Lauren Orie, Abigail Ava Courtney Sikes, Gracyn Holloway, Macy Kissel Abigail Sikes, Gracyn Holloway, Photographers: Macy Kissel

ROMANCE IN Romance is both physical and metaphysical, mystique and intimate, describable and uncertain; how do you define an emotion that can be manifested in so many forms? Yet, romance has been written into literature as far back as the 17th-century classical English period. There is little ambivalence surrounding the fact that romance in literature has had to adapt to ever-changing perceptions of relationships, love, and lust. No longer is romance about chivalry and enchantment. Instead, romance has often become trivialized to performative displays of affection. Even so, this does not mean that the quality of literature has regressed; rather, ideas of romance in literature have simply been modernized. The notion that life imitates art and art imitates life has proven truthful when looking at the transgression of romance in literature.

Funnily enough, the first example of romance in literature that comes to my mind is the tragic play Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare. Antony and Cleopatra are two of history’s most well-known lovers, despite the unfortu-

LITERATURE ABI PARRATTO

nate circumstances of their deaths; but, I am getting ahead of myself. I was first introduced to Antony and Cleopatra in a Women in Literature course, where we dissected Cleopatra’s role as the female protagonist. Antony and Cleopatra’s plot is built upon the relationship between Mark Antony, one of the three assuming power over the Roman Republic, and the Egyptian Queen, Cleopatra. Antony and Cleopatra sustain a passionate yet complex love affair, complicated by a disingenuous bond between Antony and his wife Octavia. Despite the clarity of Antony’s platonic behavior towards Octavia and Octavia’s innocent nature, jealousy and distrust create cracks in Antony and Cleopatra’s relationship.

Antony believes that Cleopatra has betrayed him in battle and plans to take her life. Out of defense and desperation, Cleopatra instructs her servant to send word to Antony that she has committed suicide in his name. It is this message that compels Antony to kill himself, with Cleopatra following suit soon after.

Similar to Romeo and Juliet, Antony and Cleopatra’s deaths were at the hand of their love. It almost begs the question: what could be more romantic than committing to join the afterlife together? While Antony and Cleopatra’s romance did have some particularly modern components to it, flirtation and power struggles, it effectively represents how

romance was written in the 17th century.

Quite the opposite, the coming of age novel Looking For Alaska by John Green is exemplar of romance in the 21st century. Miles Halter, the main character and narrator, meets the beautiful Alaska Young upon transferring to Culver Creek Preparatory School in Alabama.

Miles and Alaska’s attraction to each other escalates as they grow closer, eventually resulting in a fleeting, intoxicated night together. Alaska then leaves Culver Creek in a frenzied state, where she gets into a deadly car accident. Following Alaska’s death, Miles and his close friends Chip and Takumi dedicate the remainder of their semester to unearthing the details and motives behind Alaska’s possible s u i c i d e .

Antony and Cleopatra and Looking For Alaska alike contain themes of death and romance, however, their approaches are almost incomparable. Where Looking For Alaska accurately portrays young adults’ difficulty in ascertaining the distinction between love and lust, Antony and Cleopatra navigates a labyrinthine of a relationship between two powerful figures in history. I, personally, do not see one as being superior to the other. Rather, as I mentioned earlier, I see how literature continues to be a reflection of culture, and it seems that people just don’t die for each other like they used to.

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Muse Muse

6 Director: Director:Ansley AnsleyStevens Stevens Assistants: Assistants:Mila MilaGamarra, Gamarra,Jenna JennaEvans Evans Models: Models:FILL JudeIN, Jones, FILL NicIN Frnz Photographers: Photographers:Mila MilaGamarra, Gamarra,Abigail AbigailSikes Sikes

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