The Pleasure Lists Q&A: Mise-En-Scène's Natalie Guevara

Pleasures, Curated by writer Natalie Guevara of Mise-En-Scène

We’re back with another installment of

The Pleasure Lists

: Pleasures, Curated.

I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I enjoy getting to know members of the Pleasure Lists community and what makes their Pleasures tick.

Pleasures, Curated by

Natalie Guevara

of

Mise-En-Scène

Natalie Guevara is a writer, marketing executive, and creative consultant who lives between Miami and the Dominican Republic. She publishes a Substack called Mise-En-Scène.

Location: Punta Cana, Dominican Republic and Miami, Florida

Social: @natisagee on Instagram and Letterboxd

Pleasures

+ 1960s-era music by Henry Mancini, Burt Bacharach, and Quincy Jones that I collectively label as "Soundtrack for a Cosmopolitan Adult."
I watched the Paul Mazursky film Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969) at a little too young an age due to my lifetime love of Natalie Wood, who co-stars in the story about two sophisticated married couples in Los Angeles who try to embrace openness, in all senses of the word. The film introduced me to the music of Bacharach and Jones a good two years before I re-discovered them through the soundtrack of Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997), a movie much more accessible to my age group at the time. This music, along with the scores of Hollywood composer Henry Mancini, crystallized for me as what sophisticated adults listen to as they move through the world—a belief I hold onto to this day. This is the music I reach for when I'm getting dressed to attend someone's dinner party, or host my own! It's also fantastic airplane music: you can imagine you're drinking champagne on a Concorde flight to Paris, decked in your finest Pierre Cardin, as opposed to the demeaning act that passes for most air travel today. If you want to experience complete bliss, hit play on Mancini's "Natalie" (wink) on a clear spring day as you stroll past the W.R. Grace Building across from Bryant Park in midtown New York, a sloping ecru skyscraper that looks like it's been cryogenically frozen since its erection in 1972. You'll feel like you're Jane Fonda: self-possessed, endlessly curious, ethically in tune, deeply romantic, and on the move. I promise you!

nataliewood

A post shared by @nataliewood

+ Heather grey terry-cloth sweatshirts.
Many people have that one item they keep buying variations of, hoping to land on the most perfect version: jeans, black tees, white button-downs. For me, it's the heather grey sweatshirt. As an '80s baby, I grew up associating this garment with the height of acute physical exertion—look no further than Jennifer Beals in Flashdance (1983) or Sylvester Stallone in Rocky (1976). It's still a beautiful exercise look and, were tropical weather not so oppressive, I'd wear it to every gym outing. I can still cosplay by wearing the sweatshirt within my air-conditioned home, paired with smart jeans or streamlined black capris, which lends the garment a bit of an Audrey Hepburn finesse. (There's Henry Mancini again!) I'm drawn to oversized terry-cloth crewnecks with no logos—sorry, Champion—which I drape over my black leotard and navy ripstop pants, another go-to uniform. I'm currently on the prowl for a vintage grey sweatshirt from Norma Kamali's 1980s activewear collection. Her spin on it is visionary and timeless, evoking for me so many different references, including Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker's dance work "Rosas danst Rosas" (1997). It's a unisex look that conveys soft elegance and corporeal engagement, my favorite combination.

+ Doing my own makeup and pretending I'm starring in MTV's House of Style (1989-2000).
If you haven't picked up on this by now, I'm a nostalgic creature. The contemporary fashion scene seems a bit lacking in joie de vivre (who among us...), so the vision of the fashion world I have in my heart is the one I absorbed through watching House of Style on MTV (people will tell you the Cindy Crawford seasons are superior, but Rebecca Romijn is my girl). Beyond the colorful interviews with the era's top designers, models, hair stylists and makeup artists, the show's soundtrack was beyond. I fill hours burrowed in internet rabbit holes searching for some obscure house beat that I remember from House of Style; I've become a walking Shazam app for these deep cuts.

I also indulge in doing my makeup. Even my go-to look—fresh-faced, "no makeup" makeup—can take me up to two hours if I'm being fastidious with every dot of concealer. (I'm a Virgo; you do the calculus.) One of the many beauties of growing older is really knowing the contours of your face, quite literally, and becoming skilled at playing with shadow, light, and color on your own canvas. I prefer to do my own glam for big events—I look to today's top MUAs Katie Jane Hughes and Nina Park for inspiration and subscribe to their philosophy that it's more about the application technique than the product. (Don't let Big Beauty tell you otherwise.) As I perform this ritual, I crank the diligently searched-for tunes (Esthero's "That Girl" is a favorite) and pretend I'm Dick Page gilding the lilies for a Todd Oldham runway presentation.

+ Great cultural activity and food combinations.
When I plan an outing, be it for myself or for myself plus company, I like for it to be a complete experience. (I don't relate to people who limit themselves from doing things just because they're flying solo.) There are some combinations of cultural activity and food that simply can't be beat. At the top of my list is going to see a ballet, opera, or theatre performance at Lincoln Center in New York City and then, post-show, tucking into a huge bowl of Italian wedding soup at Fiorello's across the street. (This Upper West Side haunt looks identical to how it did in Bob Fosse's 1979 movie All That Jazz, which adds to its charm.) Another winner is a pre-movie grilled cheese and tomato soup at The Café at Books & Books, Miami's best bookstore, before crossing Aragon Avenue to take in a matinee at Coral Gables Art Cinema. I love those moments of contemplation and conversation pre- or post-cultural outing. People who want to just "meet at the thing" or go home immediately afterwards alarm me.