Image Courtesy of Frenesy Films, StudioCanal, Sicilia Film Commission & Ministero della Cultura.
To all the people, who have mastered the challenge of a lifetime, to cultivate an invincible summer within themselves, I salute you. You most likely don’t need this list. You most likely are already very self-sufficient. However, if you too are constantly thinking about the sexiest season of them all, then keep on reading, this one is for you. As you know, it’s hopefully only days now until life is beginning over again. Only weeks until we can collectively lean back, exhale and chant: summertime and the living is easy.
Summer has a special flavor. You can add it to anything, it immediately makes everything taste better. I don’t make up the rules, that’s a fact. It’s effervescent and rich yet lazy and slow. I guess every season has its own promise but summer is saying: hush little baby, there’s no hurry. Stop and smell the roses, pick the strawberries, go skinny-dipping, have a picnic, attend a parade, get into your car and start driving. Enjoy yourself for once. Actually, summer is full of promises. It also says here’s your invitation to reinvent yourself, be the person you are when the sunlight is kissing your skin. Or don’t be and just follow the sweet art of dolce far niente, because wasting time in summer doesn’t count as a waste. That’s another fact.
Most importantly, for all those, who are happiest in the sun, summer recharges. Remember photosynthesis? It’s true we are just complicated plants. Here’s comes SLEEK’s summer mood selection, letting your daydream about what might just be around the corner.
Image Courtesy of Sony Music, The Orchard & Perpetual Novice.
1. Caroline Polachek – Desire, I Want to Turn Into You
Caroline Polachek’s new album is a passionate and versatile contemplation on desire. A feeling often related to the mesmerizing and dynamic whirlwind summer can be. Polachek’s alt-pop experimental album is the perfect summer tune because it explores all the different extremes of this particular state of mind in hope to re-harmonize.
Image Courtesy of Frenesy Films, StudioCanal, Sicilia Film Commission & Ministero della Cultura.
2. A Bigger Splash (2015)
Leave it to director Luca Guadagnino to capture the essence of summer. „A Bigger Splash“ is a loose remake of Jacques Derays’ „La Piscine“ and the stuff hot and scandalous summers are made of: a small remote island, Italian food, unrestrained behavior, melodramatic relationships and a lot of sexual tensions.
Image Courtesy of Gimaguas.
3. Gimaguas Semi Transparent Glass Cube Necklace
This necklace looks like it could have been self-made from things you found at a magical beach. It definitely will make you feel like Ariel all summer long and who wouldn’t want that, because under the sea, darling it’s better.
Image Courtesy of Penguin Books.
4. Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan
If the end of adolescence would be a season, it would be the beginning of summer. Bittersweet just like Françoise Sagan’s novel „Bonjour Tristesse“. To love summer also means to deal with the melancholy of it rather sooner than later ending. This coming-of-age-story of the young Céline and her hedonistic father, set against the backdrop of the French Riviera might just be the perfect holiday read.
Image Courtesy of Maryam Nassir Zadeh.
5. Maryam Nassir Zadeh Hydra Dress
Dress for the summer you want with this see-through dream from designer Maryam Nassir Zadeh and become a Greek goddess (it’s in the name). The silk chiffon fabric goes especially well with salty hair and the colors of a beautiful sunset shimmering through.
Image Courtesy of Capitol Records.
6. Endless Summer by The Beach Boys
The Californian natives The Beach Boys are probably the specialists of summer albums. The hit-compilation „Endless Summer“ transports you to the city of dreams to a Malibu beach and fills you up with that 1970s hedonistic spirit and lighthearted beach fun, which lets you forget that summer is in fact not endless.
Image Courtesy of Paramount Pictures, Miramax, Mirage Enterprises & Timnick Films.
7. The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)
The Talented Mr. Ripley might one of the greatest cinematic celebrations of summer. It surely is one of the most stylish and sensual summer movies anyways. It plays almost entirely in 1950s Italy and its vintage feeling leaves you longing for a long lost summer. Like every good summer movie it is centered around a lot of intrigues, heat and the possibility to be somebody else.
Image Courtesy of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Scott Free Productions & MGM-Pathé Communications.
8. Thelma & Louise (1991)
Is there anything better than dropping all responsibilities, jumping into a car and getting on a roadtrip with your best friend? Thelma & Louise teach us that it is all about the journey not the destination, that some wind in your hair might unravel an unknown wild side and cowboys boots always make for a cool summer look.
Image Courtesy of Melville House.
9. How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy by Jenny Odell
The author Jenny Odell helps you master the lost art of doing nothing. In her book, she mind-maps her way through a rose garden, talks about how birdwatching became a hobby and how crows helped her reconnect with herself. It’s an inspiring field guide to enjoy the abundance life has to offer beyond the attention economy.
Image Courtesy of Detour Filmproduction & Alphaville Films.
10. Dazed and Confused (1993)
Dazed and Confused is another quintessential summer movie (and the birth hour of Matthew Mcconaughey’s famous “alright, alright, alright”). It’s another coming-of-age comedy revolving around this special time of the year. The movie follows a group of Texan kids in 1976 after school’s almost out for summer and captures the restless excitement and the thrill of anticipating the season ahead.