is a weekly Newsletter written by Lauren Lynch Wemple. We discuss art, history and fashion as well as feature interviews with curators, art dealers, experts and voices in fashion. Subscribe to 21st & 18th for free at the button below.
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First, some housekeeping.
To begin, we have two new segments on 21st & 18th: 1) Take Me Here Now and 2) Meet the Founder, see below for details. Next, 21st & 18th’s VintageFinds edit, comprised of vintage fashion and antique collectibles are available to shop on our website.
Take Me Here Now
In this segment, I will deliver on classic time travel for you. Each Take Me Here Now article features a geographical destination, time and season alongside visual proof of our travels. Today’s article is our first go at Take Me Here Now. This segment will initially be available to read for free.
Meet the Founder
Meet the Founder is a new and exciting interview segment at 21st & 18th, in which we will feature the story of female founders in the fashion and beauty sectors. Our inaugural Meet the Founder feature will hit your inboxes next Wednesday, 15 May. This segment will be available to read for free.
California, USA, Spring, 1999
Where do we start?
Bill Clinton, who was acquitted from impeachment hearings in February, is President and we’re about a year from the whole Monica Lewinsky telenovela, Gray Davis1 is Governor of California, Gwyneth Paltrow has just won the Oscar for Best Actress for her performance in Shakespeare in Love, while wearing custom Ralph Lauren2, and the words: blog, vape, texting and carbon footprint are all added into the library of New English terms.


Stepping back into 1999, I feel a calm. Less people, less things to worry about on a Thursday morning. I begin my day with a tea at Thyme in the Ranch3, in my hometown of Rancho Santa Fe, CA. Thyme in the Ranch is still a proper café in that they only accept cash, are family run and there is barely enough space inside to sit and eat my Raspberry Mango Coconut muffin. It’s glorious and makes me feel even more like a local. I’m here post school drop off rush so it’s local businessmen and women, stay at home moms and retirees, the atmosphere is warm and smells of cinnamon and brown sugar and there’s no music on. No one is staring at their iPhone. The couple that owns the place are taking my order with a pen and paper and brew me an English breakfast tea for take away. Yes, it’s 1999 we say “take away”. I look in the refrigerated dessert display case, they still make their signature chocolate cream pie. Why will that go out of style come 2024?
On my way out of Thyme in the Ranch I wander through the Country Squire Courtyard, been there all of my life, but it looks less manicured and perfect. Country Squire Gifts is still there, with white baby linen clothes and sweet books displayed in the window, there is no one inside the shop, and Mille Fleurs’ courtyard is there in perfectly organized condition as their team preps for an evening of fine dining and to enforce their strict dinner dress code.
I walk through the courtyard’s arches, onto Paseo Delicias and turn right.
What am I wearing?
I’m wearing a classic Lauren Lynch Wemple outfit. A pair of white J. Crew shorts, a Prince tennis off white polo shirt with navy blue striped collar, a wool short sleeve vest with red stripes at the arms and hem from Manors Golf (stole it from my husband, Wemple), my salmon colored LL Bean Barn Coat, a white Polo Ralph Lauren cap with a navy blue polo player embroidered at my forehead and a pair of tube socks and GH Bass loafers. Tortoise shell sunglasses for driving. Minimal jewelry and no makeup.
What’s on my schedule?
When I time travel I like to indulge in sports that I am no good at in 2024. So today I’m on my way to play tennis (the irony of me wanting to escape the Challengers4 climate of May 2024). I’ve a red racket and a pair of white tennis shoes that I’ll change into once I reach the courts.
They’re not proper tennis shoes5, but, as I would claim in 2024, I’m not serious in the slightest about racquet sports it’s just enjoyable to be outside and move.
The boy I’m meeting up with to play is the son of my dad’s business partner, home for spring break because he got in trouble with USC campus police and couldn’t go to Hawaii with the rest of his fraternity. His family has a golden retriever named Dodger.
He sees me and mentally notes that he appreciates the fact that I’m wearing penny loafers walking onto the court, its old school but fashion forward in 1999 and makes him feel like his spring break being home wasn’t wasted if spent with his fly-girl-family-friend. When I see him, I think to myself, “If it weren’t overcast I’d be wearing a pair of black oblong sunglasses, something Gwyneth Paltrow would don.”
How am I getting around?
This is my time travel day dream so I’m driving a Porsche 911, silver with black interior.
After my ‘match’ with golden retriever frat boy I jump into the car and turn on the radio. The number 1 song in the USA is playing, I roll down the window and immediately pull away (with no phone to check why sit in the car?). I’m hanging my left hand out the window, driving by the perennially green Rancho Santa Fe Golf Club. Onlookers would hear the fresh tread of my Porsche tires paddling the asphalt mixed with “Believe” by Cher.
Later tonight I’ll probably watch a rerun of The Parent Trap on CBS at 5.00pm PST/8.00pm Eastern.
Life is good.
What did I learn time on my travels?
I was alive in 1999 (6 years old) but would it have been more fun and fulfilling to come of age on the cusp of the 21st century? Would I have loved to have no iPhone and listen to Cher and hang out with boys name Ethan6 when they were down from university on spring break? Who knows. The grass will always seem greener elsewhere.
What I did learn from my time travel to my home town in 1999 is the importance of being present and forcing our 2024 selves to step away from anything that crowds our mental space. Stepping back in time felt quiet. Maybe because I was listening for how it felt, but now I’m considering that I it was quiet because I wasn’t concerned about my phone or smart watch or self driving car or posting on social media. It was just about me, my surroundings and my inner dialogue. In 2024, I tend to run from my thoughts, I put on a podcast, talk to my cat, call my sister or BFF to drown the thoughts out. Today, I’m going to try to find some quiet.
Production credits:
Creative Direction & modeling: Lauren Lynch Wemple
Photography: Julio Adrian
Vehicle fixer: Alexandra Riley Menendez-Aponte
Author’s Note:
In Southern California in 2024 I’m feeling like my personal style: American prep-school boy with a side of vintage elegance topped with street style wackiness, is no longer unique, and even though I really do manifest these motifs in a distinctly LLW ways, it doesn’t feel authentic right now (particularly with all the Challengers obsessed, tennis white wearing polo usurping GenZ-ers haunting every corner of the interweb).
I traveled back in time to Southern California in the spring of 1999 because it’s nearly my birthday (May 23), I’m a child of the 90s (b. 1993) and in the mood to dress cool but not share it with the world on social media.
I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, I love wearing collared shirts specifically, because popping your collar is, I think, the flyest little everyday style flex. In addition to a popped collar I flip for pleats, navy blue, crisp hunter green piping on a snow white sweater, knitted outerwear, turtleneck tank tops, ironically colored chinos but I draw the line at animal embroidery.
(b. 1942) Joseph Graham "Gray" Davis Jr. is an American politician, originally from The Bronx, NY, who served as the 37th Governor of California. Davis is a member of the Democratic party.
The iconic pink silk dress (!!!!!) I will need to recreate this for myself some day
Thyme in the Ranch was founded in 1995 in Rancho Santa Fe, CA, the original owners a husband and wife duo retired and sold the business in 2019. It was never really the same after the change of ownership BUT it has a place in my heart. Sadly, they no longer make their original chocolate cream pie.
I am hopelessly obsessed with Zendaya’s new film and her co-star, Mike Faist.
SeaVees was technically founded in 1964, so these shoes being in a 1999 time travel montage is not impossible.
Ethan was the #2 boys name in America in 1979 (in this time travel sequence I’m assuming my tennis partner is 20 years old)