T LOunge for April 12th 2024

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PinOrigin Restaurant at Amingiri Resort & Spa – Maldives

The dreariest day possible is happening right outside our windows, which is why this FRIDAY LOunge feels even more necessary than normal. Join us on the terrace for drinks and nosh, darlings.

Nicholas Galitzine and Anne Hathaway Give Us a Lesson in Chemistry
Not many actors can convincingly front a fictional boy band, but Nicholas Galitzine is one of them. In The Idea of You, sparks fly and hearts break as the 29-year-old British actor plays Hayes Campbell, a Harry Styles–esque superstar who effortlessly woos Solène, a single mother played by Anne Hathaway. The two of them had such insane chemistry that Galitzine, who can also be seen this month opposite Julianne Moore in the period series Mary & George, was basically cast as soon as he walked into the room. But don’t take our word for it.

Madonna Attends Son Rocco’s New Art Exhibition in Miami: ‘So Proud’
Madonna is mother to daughter Lourdes, son Rocco, son David, twin daughters Stella and Estere and daughter Mercy
Madonna is celebrating her son Rocco John’s latest creative work!
The pop legend, 65, shared a carousel post on April 11 that featured snaps of her and her children at her 23-year-old’s new art exhibition held in the Miami Design District.
“So happy to have the night off to enjoy my son Rocco’s’s latest collection of paintings called ‘Pack A Punch’ inspired by Muay Thai fighters,” Madonna’s caption read. “So Proud ! ♥️♥️♥️. @miamidesigndistrict.”

Lupita Nyong’o Recalls Crush on Leonardo DiCaprio, Crying Inconsolably During ‘Titanic’ on First Date
The Oscar winner accepted a star of the year trophy during CinemaCon’s closing Big Screen Achievement Awards ceremony at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas on Thursday night.
Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o said that when word came her way that she’d been selected to receive CinemaCon‘s star of the year award during the closing night Big Screen Achievement Awards, it led her to ponder what cinema has meant to her.
“One of my strongest memories from my adolescence came to mind,” said the 41-year-old actress while accepting the trophy inside the Colosseum at Caesars Palace on Thursday night. “My very first date was going to see a movie at the cinema in Nairobi, Kenya, where I grew up. I was 16. Not only was I going out with this boy I liked for the first time, but I would be watching my crush Leonardo DiCaprio in none other than Titanic.

Best new books of April 2024, according to literary experts
Attention bookworms: April has arrived, and it’s bringing a huge batch of new books with it. Rest assured we’ll be cancelling all plans to stay out of the rain and hunker down with a fabulous must-read, ‘cos from edge-of-your-seat thrillers and expansive fantasies to heartwarming romances and literary epics, there are some heavy hitters vying for your interest.

Marisa Abela on playing Amy Winehouse in the controversial new biopic, Back to Black: “Amy’s legacy taught me to be brave”
“We felt that it was time to put Amy back in the centre of her own story, as a person rather than a victim of a tragedy.”
It’s the must-see Amy Winehouse biopic that’s dividing critics and Amy fans alike, but there’s no doubt that the break-out star of Back to Black is Marisa Abela, who plays the iconic singer. Marisa – who like Amy, is Jewish – had the unenviable task of not only physically taking on the role, controversially losing a lot of weight to portray Amy when she was in the grips of addiction and disordered eating, but also performing her most famous hits, including Tears Dry on Their Own, Rehab and of course, Back to Black.

The Bar Soap Boom Is Here
Despite endless body wash options, the art of luxury soap making hasn’t slipped away. Many beauty brands are leaning into the centuries-old product, while elevating it with unique scents and ingredients.
To make a bar of soap, you only need two ingredients: an alkaline and a fat. But what’s the fun in keeping things simple? In recent years, the time-honored craft of soap making has gone through a modern and artistic boom—with brands both big and small taking note.
Most people believe the first bars of soap were made in Babylon around 2800 BCE. “All the ancient cultures, in one form or another, were making a soap product. They did it out of necessity back then, for cleaning clothes and sanitizing,” says Leigh O’Donnell, executive director of the Handcrafted Soap & Cosmetic Guild. Regardless of a few ingredient switch-ups (goodbye tallow and ash, hello skin-soothing and planet-conscious olive oil and aloe), bar soap serves the same general purpose today. In a world of constant technological updates, it’s lasted thousands of years, holding strong through a synthetic detergent takeover in the 1920s and the major body wash craze of the ’80s and ’90s.

Prince Harry And Meghan Markle Are Launching Two New Reality Shows
One will see the Duchess of Sussex ‘celebrate the joys of cooking, gardening, entertaining, and friendship’.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are are getting into the reality television business. According to an announcement, Harry and Meghan are launching two non-fiction programmes on Netflix, which will be unscripted, reality-style shows.

The Women Leading Pop Music Now
Female artists dominated the brit awards and won every top prize at the Grammys – Is this the end of the patriarchy’s grip on the music industry? Here are the faces storming the charts and redefining pop.

The Women’s Prize for Fiction Longlist is so good, you’ll want to cancel all upcoming plans
Hot girl reads incoming.
Gorgeous girls that read, and all fellow bookworms from around the world will agree that the Women’s Prize for Fiction Longlist is our Eras Tour. This year, in it’s 29th iteration, the Women’s Prize for Fiction might just be the best yet: a treasure trove of stories, each one a powerful testament to the diverse experiences of women around the world. The. Dream.
Women’s voices have always been a force to be reckoned with. We’ve got tales that’ll make you laugh, cry, and everything in between.

Celebrities Wearing Vintage: From Kylie Jenner To Kate Moss, Here Are The Best Vintage Red Carpet Moments
Opting for pre-loved never looked so good.
Everyone from mainstream celebrities such as Kim Kardashian to royalty like Meghan Markle and fashion world darlings like Adwoa Aboah have all opted for distinctly ‘old’ dresses on recent red carpets.
We don’t know if it’s a growing awareness of fashion’s ecologically damaging love of ‘new’ or a desire for individualistic style in the face of Instagram homogeny, but either way, we are very much on board with celebrities wearing vintage.

How To Read the Bridgerton Books In Order
Get to know every single one of the Bridgerton siblings in Julia Quinn’s bestselling series.
Netflix’s addictive Regency-era drama Bridgerton swept us all away in 2020, and has kept us watching (and rewatching) in the years since. Now, season three is just around the corner, with part one set to premiere next month. Before the third season premieres, however, if you’ve yet to read Julia Quinn’s wildly successful Bridgerton book series (on which the show is based), this is the perfect opportunity to get caught up.
Quinn’s series consists of eight novels—one for each of the Bridgerton siblings.

In Dark Times, Käthe Kollwitz’s Raw Prints Burn Bright
I’m not sure it’s possible to glance at a Käthe Kollwitz print without feeling something. Kollwitz’s subjects, mostly women, carry a world of agony, resistance, and love in their carefully etched faces. Whether grieving the death of a child, revolting against power, or lamenting social conditions, the figures in her oeuvre can whip up empathy in even the coolest of hearts.
Kollwitz (1847–1945) worked predominantly in printmaking, drawing, and sculpture in Germany during five tumultuous decades, starting in the 1890s, when industrialization meant progress for some but disease and poverty for others, and then through the political and societal upheaval of two world wars in the early 20th century. She captured the strife—and persistence—of women, children, and the working class, embracing her own perspective as a mother, a feminist, and a socialist. Hers was an art of social purpose.

Doritos Is Dropping a New Flavor Just for Mountain Dew Fans
It’ll be available nationwide on April 28.
Mountain Dew is celebrating the 20th birthday of its much-beloved flavor, Baja Blast, in a big way.
The flavor, originally created as an exclusive partnership for Taco Bell, is now available in retail stores for the entire year. But that’s not all. Baja Blast is now also in chip form, thanks to a new partnership with Doritos.

O.J. Simpson’s story is built on America’s national sins
O.J. Simpson is dead. His infamous story has become an American myth.
The news of O.J. Simpson’s death — of cancer at the age of 76 — falls uneasily. O.J. Simpson is an uneasy figure. Thinking of him, you think of the power and glamour of his rise to stardom; you think of the horror of the crimes of which he was later accused and, controversially, acquitted. The story has made him an American archetype. Around Simpson, our fraught and confused feelings about race, gender, celebrity, and spectacle swirl into a vexed storm. He is the point in time and space where all our sins meet.

Our Food Staff Shares 12 Recipes That Are (Almost) Inflation Proof
You don’t have to break the bank to make these satisfying, budget-friendly recipes.
Inflation remains stubbornly high, with Wednesday’s report showing a 3.5 percent rise from a year earlier. These days, we’re all paying more for less — food prices inched up slightly in March, too — and, as ever, putting satisfying, budget-friendly meals on the table can be a struggle.
But budget cooking doesn’t mean skimping on flavor or making your meals any less satisfying. Below, you’ll find 12 of the New York Times Food staff’s go-to recipes for eating well without breaking the bank.

In Defense of Never Learning How to Cook
I hated domesticity so much that for years, I lived happily without a kitchen. This $19 device helped me survive.
I found it while walking through the home-goods section of T.J. Maxx, the American retail equivalent of the Garden of Earthly Delights, at 8:00 on a Tuesday night in 2015. It was two days after Easter, and in this Hieronymus Bosch land of shopping anarchy, the shelves were stocked with pastel-colored objects of uncertain usefulness: sacks of fruit-medley popcorn dyed green and purple; a giant tub of millennial-pink Himalayan crystal salt. Somewhere among these novelties I spotted a carelessly abandoned gadget calling itself the Dash Rapid Egg Cooker. The cashier who rang me up did not share my enthusiasm for the cheery cockiness of its packaging, which proclaimed that it “Perfectly Cooks 6 Eggs at a Time!” Baffled, she asked me a question, the answer to which would have embarrassed anyone but me: “Don’t you know how to boil water?” No. I didn’t.

Nicholas Galitzine on ‘Mary & George’ Sex Scenes, Tom Cruise’s Influence on ‘The Idea of You’ and His Disastrous ‘Dunkirk’ Audition
Nicholas Galitzine may have told his parents that he has a lot of sex scenes in “Mary & George” with both women and men, but that didn’t keep things from getting awkward when his mom and dad were by his side at the series’ London premiere.
“I was kind of in hysterics because there is nothing more uncomfortable than watching your son bed a number of characters even within the first few episodes,” the British actor, 29, tells me during a wide-ranging conversation on this week’s “Just for Variety” podcast.

9 Flower Box Ideas That Will Add Charm to Your Windows and Patio
Easily transform outdoor spaces using these flower box ideas, which include cascading blooms, succulent arrangements, and more.
A flower box filled with beautiful plants and blooms is the perfect complement to a front porch, balcony, or patio. They make a visually dynamic and welcoming statement, can be personalized easily to your tastes, and offer a lot of bang for your buck.
“Flower boxes are a wonderful way to bring the outdoors into your home, since you can see your plants just outside your window,” says Amy Hovis, the owner of Barton Springs Nursery in Austin, Texas. “It’s also a great way to celebrate the seasons since you can replace and update the plants [to suit the time of year].” Get inspired by these flower box ideas, which range from succulent-filled window boxes to fragrant and functional herb displays for your porch.

13 Best Indoor and Outdoor Hanging Plants for Your Home
These hanging plants will thrive on porches, back patios, along driveways, and aerial spaces inside your home.
Indoor and outdoor hanging plants are some of the easiest varieties to work with, and can instantly add some dimension to your space. Before you grab hanging plants by the bunch at your local garden center, though, it’s important to understand which varieties will thrive—and which don’t—in a hanging planter.
“Plants that are very heavy or grow very tall aren’t meant to be placed into hanging planters,” says Lauri Kranz, founder of Edible Gardens LA. “If the plant you’re thinking about doesn’t grow down—think plants like ponytail palms or African Mask—they’re not the best fit.”

15 Laundry Room Shelving Ideas That Are Both Pretty and Practical
Upgrade your wash-and-dry routine with these smart shelving solutions.
A laundry room is rarely just a laundry room. In addition to its obvious uses—washing, drying, folding—it often becomes a catch-all space for everything from dirty sports clothes and muddy shoes to household cleaners and extra linens.
Outfitting your laundry room with practical shelving solutions helps you make the most of every inch with custom sizing, smart storage bins, and functional add-ons—like hanging rods, drying racks, and supply hooks—that provide places for all your essentials. But choosing options that are also stylish—like the ones on this list—turns this hardworking room into a space that’s not only efficient but also enjoyable.

Georgia May Be Getting Its First National Park Soon — and It Has More Than Just Scenic Trails
Here’s everything you need to know about visiting Georgia’s aspiring national park.
Taking its name from the word for “boiling waters,” Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park in Georgia dates back more than 12,000 years and features Indigenous earthen mounds used for burials and ceremonies. Today, it’s in talks to be designated a national park with expanded acreage.
“This was a capital city for the Creek Confederacy,” says Tracie Revis, a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and director of advocacy for the Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve Initiative (ONPPI). “The Federal Road, the trade road, below the Fall Line — everything cut through here, so this was the absolute capital of everything.”

[Photo Credit: hilton.com]

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