Advertisement - Continue Reading BelowJennifer Gach, Assistant Fashion Editor, in Lanvin patent leather sandals


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All week long, as part of our ongoing Shame Issue, ELLE.com will be digging into the uncomfortable, unacceptable, and universally human emotions that keep us down. Hopefully, by addressing these issues, we can make strides in banishing those feelings of guilt, fear, and not-enoughness. Here's to just letting. It. Go.
I am ashamed of at least 70% of the articles I wrote between 2009 and 2011. It could be more, except I haven't yet mustered the courage to go back and read all the "content" I generated during those years to see just how bad it was. I just know it wasn't good. And worse, often stupid. This is a tough thing to admit. Like anyone who grows up wanting to be a writer, I consider writing, good writing, to be one of the more important things a person can do with their time. Moreover, I am proud of the fact that I have been able to make a living doing it. But as I get further away from that period, I would like to sweep most of what I wrote into one folder and hit delete. I find so much of it to be shameful and embarrassing and in opposition to what I believe good writing is. Perhaps some explanation is due. I officially became a full-time writer in 2008 when I was hired by Mediabistro's FishbowlNY blog to cover the media scene in New York. I had done some freelance writing before this, but always as a side project to my full-time job in an office.
Advertisement - Continue Reading BelowGetting the job was an affirmation that my desire to be a writer was not simply the pipe dream of another starry-eyed New Yorker who talked a big game, but the real deal.
That I got the job at all had a lot to do with timing. The internet was only just arriving as a serious news force to be reckoned with and hadn't yet decimated the media world. This meant I was able to fast-track past a lot of the lower rungs of a writing career, and also that at many of the election events I was covering, I was working alongside well-established and well-known men and women who'd been at their craft for decades.
More from The Shame Issue16 articles My Private Shame: I Am Thankful for My Abortion Why Women Face "Worse" Online Shaming Than Men My Private Shame: I Lie to Myself About Food Channing, Chris, Ryan, and More on Their... It was exhilarating. A dream scenario. Then the bottom came out. The double whammy of the 2008 recession and the full-blown onset of the digital age gutted journalism. Media jobs disappeared; the same men and women I'd been looking up to, just weeks before, were now out of work. That I was able to stay employed had a lot to do with my ability to be nimble and do what was required of me. What was increasingly required of me in those days were articles that would generate traffic. Hyperbolic headlines, barely-considered thoughts, outrage. And lots of it. Lots and lots and lots. In short order, writing simply became a means to an end. Grammar and spelling, never my strong points, were afterthoughts. The point was speed and splash. Every job, even dream jobs, has its downside, but at the end of the day there was nothing I could hold up and say, I'm really proud of this. Days became months became years. The apotheosis of this period was a post I did titled 'Watch Sarah Palin Shoot A Caribou.' The morning it posted my boss stopped me in the elevator to congratulate me on how "smart" it was.

At the time I wrote it, the fact I was being paid, and paid well, to write was enough to assuage the undercurrent of anxiety I always felt about what I was writing. Whenever I felt especially bad about what I was putting into the world, I would just remind myself I was lucky to have the job, lucky to be a full-time writer. That what I was doing was good for my so-called career (and in fact, there may be some truth to that). That on paper I was very impressive. Eventually however, the unease took over and was a contributing factor to the rather spectacular burnout I later experienced.

The thing I had once most valued had become my biggest source of shame. That I could say I was a writer, but never produce what I considered to be good writing, left me feeling like a fraud. And even more confusing, the worse my output the more I was rewarded for it. So even though I felt bad, I felt even worse for feeling bad because it was making everyone else feel so good.

I don't think I'm alone in this. I've since talked to plenty of people who were writing full time during this period and feel very much the same way. Still, there is part of me that wishes I had done it differently, had possessed the confidence to step away instead of allowing myself to get caught up in the frenzy. This inclination may seem silly now; these days the internet is basically like one big first draft—this is true for nearly everyone now, not just writers tasked with capturing "outrageous" missteps by public figures as great speed. And the result of that for many people, whether through ill-considered photos, comments, or swiftly-sent Tweets, is shame. But it's also just how we live now.

Of course, even though I say I'm ashamed of 75% of what I wrote, it might actually be less. Shame has a way of looming larger in the peripheral, lolling about unexamined. The less we examine it, the bigger it gets, and the more powerless we feel. There is nothing worse than feeling powerless. In her new book, Rising Strong (read Miranda Purves's powerful essay on it here), Brené Brown, who has made a career writing about female shame, says that one of the ways we can confront the feeling is by turning it into a story.

This may sound like a simplistic solution, especially for shame that is rooted in things far more serious than crappy writing. However, the core truth remains that sharing the burden lightens it, and in the sharing what we are really doing is telling a story. And, most importantly, by telling that story we are taking control of our own narrative, whatever that narrative may be. There are few things more powerful than being the author of your own story.

Maybe if I really sit down and consider it, I'm really only bothered by, like, 30%, and the rest of it was just me learning out loud. For instance, instead of all those rungs on the writing ladder I gleefully managed to skip—getting coffees, writing subheds, event listings, venue blurb—maybe I was writing an entirely different sort of crap. I was learning how to do it fast, under pressure, and gaining the confidence to know that even if I don't know exactly what I'm trying to say when I start, I will figure it out in the doing. These are all skills that have served me extremely well in my subsequent careers. As for Sarah Palin and her sorry caribou, like most stupid things we do in life, if we're lucky and can muster the nerve, as Nora Ephron says, it can eventually make for great copy. Literally.

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I have a special place in my heart for designer Geren Lockhart and her seven-years-young line, Geren Ford. Our mutual affection for high n' sexy showpiece necklines aside, Lockhart, unlike many designers in her peer group, isn't afraid to evolve the Geren Ford aesthetic slowly, folding new trends like cropped leather trousers and draped bubble mini skirts into her collections when and where she feels they make sense, not simply because they're au courant. Her pieces are artful, transition extremely well from weekday to weekend, and often offer unexpected details that make its wearer feel like she's wearing a one-of-a-kind.
More From ELLEAnd if that weren't enough to entice you to click over to the line's newly launched e-commerce site, let me share a little known secret with you: Geren Ford designs are sketched and stitched with good luck. It's true. Just ask GF fan Lauren Conrad, whose first novel went straight to the top of the NYT Bestseller's List. Or Nicole Ritchie, whose House of Harlow accessories line defied all odds to become a critical and retail success, even finding its way onto Madonna's new album cover.
Or, just ask me, because when I found out I'd gotten the position at ELLE last December, I was wearing Geren's signature halter-cut, ruffle-neck top (new iterations of which are shown at left).
All that, plus a consistent, affordable price point (most non-leather items run $100-$300), and you have no reason not to give in and buy yourself a pretty new good luck charm for Fall.
Photos: courtesy of gerenford.com

Photo: Getty Images
Advertisement - Continue Reading BelowJoe Manganiello may be off the market (yes ladies, he has a girlfriend), but that doesn't stop women from ogling, drooling over, and Twitter-propositioning the True Blood star. We saw it first-hand.
More From ELLEManganiello was in NYC today to cheer on athlete Diana Nyad who is swimming for 48 hours straight to help victims of Hurricane Sandy. We managed to steal a few minutes with the small screen hunk, much to the dismay of the throngs of tweeting fangirls.
The women of social media aren't shy about wanting the actor's, ahem, Big Dick Richie (his character from Magic Mike, of course). As Mickey Rapkin pointed out in his interview with Joe Manganiello in ELLE's October issue, when Octavia Spencer, Community's Yvette Nicole Brown, and Retta, from Parks and Recreation got into a Twitter-feud over the actor, he weighed in himself, tweeting, "Can't we all get along here! #FourWay." Or this sample tweet after ELLE's latest interview with the 36-year-old hunk: "kgeorge520 @ELLEmagazine @joemanganiello knows what women want? I want an at-home personal training day. No shirt needed, Joe. #ManCrushMonday."
So Manganiello is well aware of the R-rated social media outpouring he inspires.
"I love interacting with the fans, but I never cease to be amazed by some of the things that get [posted] on my Twitter feed," he told us.
There's also the fan site F*** Yeah! Joe Manganiello that keeps tabs on the actor's whereabouts. It keeps such close tabs, that Manganiello's own parents log on to see what their son is up to. "It's kind of nice because family members of mine can go on that website and find out what I'm doing," he mused. "My dad goes on that website all the time. I'm amazed that they find pictures that I didn't even know existed. It's kind of like a video diary."
But if you're trying to Tweet your way into Manganiello's heart, it won't work. "I'm a sucker for good home cooking," he revealed, noting steak as his alpha-male preference.
Time to dust off those grill pans.

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Taking in the sunny garden of the private Carlsberg Brewery, only opened one other time to the public; this has to be the single most enjoyable venue for a fashion show of all time! I have to pinch myself.
—Kate Lanphear
Click here to see Bibi Ghost's spring 2010 show
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Photo: Courtesy of Copenhagen Fashion Week

Juan AldabaldetrecuAdvertisement - Continue Reading BelowAvon's global research center in Suffern, New York, a small town about 45 minutes north of New York City, feels like something Walt Disney might have built had he been into skin care instead of talking mice. Not only does this $100 million facility boast state of- the-art labs, but it also features an "inventables" bar stocked with swatches of odd, apparently cutting-edge industrial materials (honeycomb cardboard; something called "ceramic foam") intended to keep employees' minds nimble during coffee breaks, and science-themed rooms that got their names through a staff contest The entrance to the "Dermal Junction," for instance, is wallpapered with a blown-up photo of cross-sectioned skin. "Blue Sky," more appealingly, is a domed, all-blue chamber; a literal interpretation of the words think tank. It was in this room, on a recent visit, that Avon's latest breakthrough— a way to make skin heal itself in order to reverse aging—was revealed.
More From ELLE Turns out, the latest developments in skin care share a basic theory that actually isn't all that new: the notion that skin aging isn't just one more example of the body's gradual, inevitable decline, but rather the
result of a series of mini injuries—as if skin cells were constantly inflicted with microscopic tears or cuts—which never heal properly and, over time, add up. What is new? The rather promising science and the novel ingredients—emergency proteins, electric charges—companies are injecting into your daily dollop of skin cream in order to teach your face to resolve these insults as they occur. Eliminating damage before it can build up? You do the math.
In Avon's case, its team of scientists has spent the past five years zeroing in on activin, one of several proteins that are alerted when our skin is cut or wounded, instructing cells to produce fresh collagen.
Like so many things, our activin emergency system slows with age. Just think about how fast your skinned knees healed when you were a kid—how long does it take now?
Activin itself is too bulky a molecule to breach skin's security system; instead, Avon Anew Reversalist contains the extracts of two plants that have been used medicinally in Southeast Asia for generations:
the mellifluously named Amorphophallus and Sesbania. This cocktail, the company claims, can charm skin into producing its own activin supply. (No word on whether Reversalist helps with skinned knees. I, for one, will be keeping an extra jar on hand just in case.)
As for those aforementioned electric charges? Cosmetics formulators are tapping into a rather kooky-sounding—but increasingly promising—corner of scientific research: bioelectricity, a version of the energy that fuels our households and reboots our gadgetry, which is also the driving force behind our skin, heart, and nerve cells. When your brain tells your big toe to point or your ears to wiggle, it does so with electricity: Tiny pulses leap from one nerve tendril to the next, and, voilà, you point and wiggle. If you've visited an ER (or tuned in to House, M.D.), you've witnessed bioelectricity in action: The peaks and valleys on an electrocardiogram are, in fact, a chart of the perfectly coordinated electric charges we know as heartbeats.
Almost every living cell, in fact, has an essential electric charge. Cells' outer membranes are permeated with tiny, high-traffic tunnels, which conduct charged ions—primarily sodium, potassium, and calcium—
in and out. "Cells are like tiny batteries," says Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, PhD, a professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University. "There's more sodium outside the membrane and more potassium inside of it. This generates polarity, or voltage, which is essential to the normal function of the cell."
Bioelectricity, as it happens, is also a key factor in wound healing. As early as the 1830s, it was observed that injured tissue generates an electric current—though no one was exactly sure why. Scientists now know that these currents fuel repair by moving cells to where they're needed. "The charges send signals that instruct the cells to move toward them," says Alexa Kimball, MD, an associate professor of dermatology at Harvard Medical School and consultant for Neutrogena. Kimball says cells are surprisingly mobile; in some studies, the cellular movement that occurs during healing has appeared almost as if a magnet had pulled the cells into position.
According to Vunjak-Novakovic, externally applied electricity can have profound effects on skin cells' function, too, either stimulating or suppressing proliferation. Indeed, in her lab at Columbia, electricity is being used to help individual stem cells mature into potentially lifesaving heart, bone, and blood vessel tissues.
But what about the idea that a jolt might be good for your face? That will come as no surprise to celeb-beloved facialists such as Tracie Martyn, Susan Ciminelli, and Joanna Vargas, who have used microcurrent treatments in their regimens for years. At her wildly popular L.A. clinic, Kate Somerville gently squeezes and prods cheeks and jowls using two sets of metallic prongs, crafting perfectly—if temporarily— sculpted cheekbones, lifted brows, tightened turkey necks. (It sounds about as fun as waterboarding, but produces, at most, a painless tingle.)
Somerville believes the microcurrent revs up collagen production, enhances circulation, and acts as a "gym for the skin," causing minute, toning muscle contractions. Without ample studies to back them up, Kimball says the first two claims are tough to evaluate. "And the concept that muscle contractions are helpful is likely not correct," she says. "After all, Botox works by preventing muscular contractions." Still, Somerville devotees (certain ELLE editors among them) anxiously await the at-home version she has in the pipeline; the DermaLucent Handheld, a palm-size microcurrent gizmo, is currently up for FDA approval.
As for creams with a little extra zip, La Mer first tapped piezoelectricity—in which mechanical energy is converted to an electric charge—back in 1997. Last year, the company introduced The Body Refiner, a diamond-dust-flecked scrub that contains piezoelectrically charged bits of tourmaline. According to La Mer, rubbing the product into skin converts the gemstone's charge into electric energy, which acts as a mini generator, not only stimulating microcirculation, but also potentially changing skin's bioelectric current. (Again, Kimball says she has seen scant clinical data on piezoelectric ingredients— not that La Mer addicts are likely to be deterred.) Also charging ahead: L'Oréal's new Ideal Skin Genesis Complexion Equalizer is sprinkled with micronized pink tourmaline from Brazil, while By Terry's superluxe moisturizing balm, Or de Rose Baume Précieux, owes its glow to 24-karat pink gold flecks that the company claims "generate electromagnetic microstimulations."
But Neutrogena is the first brand to go deep on bioelectricity; in particular, they're tapping into biomimetics—the science of using technology to copy biological systems. The new Neutrogena Clinical collection contains zinc particles that are coated in copper. Though you can't feel them, the company claims these microbatteries— each roughly the size of a skin cell—create a current that revs up cells' abilities to communicate with one another, just as they would in normal wound healing (telling one another, for example: Make collagen!). Duracell-inspired skin care certainly sounds like science fiction, but Vunjak-Novakovic seems remarkably optimistic that it might actually work: "The idea is to wake up the native mechanism that the body already knows but, over decades, has forgotten."
Of course, exactly how it works isn't completely understood. "The charge sits on top of skin. It's superficial, but the cells can still detect it, like wireless technology," Kimball says. And though Kimball confesses that she was skeptical at first, she says the proof is in the pudding. According to the brand's studies, testers' skin formed up to 20 percent more collagen after sticking to the regimen for eight weeks. Aging skin? Heal thyself.

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