Summer solstice

Italian cocktails, secondhand SIR dresses, and bedside lamps

Teahouse is a newsletter about home, travel, and community. Here you’ll find renovation documentation and destination inspiration alongside a curation of things I’m creating, consuming, and coveting right now.

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Dear Reader,

After the wettest June in Colorado on record since 1876, summer arrived abruptly this week with a long-awaited 95 degree day. Cue the denim shorts, blender drinks, and grill nights.

We’re getting ready to head to Poland for a COVID-delayed wedding celebration, followed by a week in Italy (we think?). To be honest, our plans for the second half of our trip have changed recently, and we have absolutely nothing booked—down to not knowing what airport we’ll be flying into. But I’m counting on the fact that a summer holiday in Europe is never a bad time.

Below, sharing some summer sippers and other things to read, peruse, and love this week.

Teresa

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1. Italian Summer Cocktails of the Season (via 84 Rooms). Up your aperitivo game with these warm-weather cocktail recipes from the best of Italian hotel bars including Le Sirenuse, Mezzatorre, and Villa Cipriani. Serve with castelvetrano olives, potato chips, and taralli. Denver friends, they sell these at Marcyzk’s—you WILL eat a bag in a sitting.

2. Glass straws to elevate your iced morning brew (Ito En iced tea is my current a.m. beverage of choice). I’ve never loved a paper straw but glass straws? Sign me up. Durable, elegant, and dishwasher safe. 

3. Bring a little taste of the tropics to your kitchen. On our girls’ trip to Oaxaca last year, as soon as we sat down to dinner, we’d order a round of passionfruit mezcalitas for the table. I happened upon these bite-sized passionfruit chunks in the freezer aisle at Whole Foods the other day and immediately notified the group chat. Blend with mezcal and fresh lime juice—personally I prefer them tart and sugar-free, but you can add triple sec to sweeten things up if you’d like. Or, blend with ice and coconut water for an alcohol-free refresher. 

4. Recently realized my vacation wardrobe is mostly made up of secondhand SIR the Label dresses. I love the Aussie brand’s resortwear for their breathable fabrics, distinct cuts, and special prints. You can find screaming deals on Poshmark, eBay, and The Real Real—plus they are typically easy to resell once you’re ready to move onto the next. Have a very similar white dress, eyeing this maxi, loving this for a wedding guest dress, and adored this navy floral number my girlfriend was wearing in Greece—also here in a puff-sleeve silhouette. Count on a fashion girlie coming up to you and asking “SIR?” I’m typically a size 2 in dresses and wear size 1 in SIR.

LED lamps that inspired my Zara Home purchase

5. Bedside lamps with a modern touch. I’d pinned a zillion images of skinny-armed Tommaso Cimini-style LED lamps but was having trouble locating anything that met the aesthetic bar without creeping into the $300+ territory when Zara recently released these for $149. They’re sleek and heavy—a surprisingly great value—and also come in a floor version. Zara Home has been a favorite place to source home items that don’t break the bank for the lake house. If not currently available, bookmark for later, as their items go in and out of stock often. They’re also having a sale that starts tonight at 9 p.m. EST on the app or 10 p.m. EST on zarahome.com.

6. Who am I without my ambition? (via Downtime)

   Alisha Ramos
   , entrepreneur and founder of the Girls’ Night In newsletter, writes candidly about her relationship with ambition in a piece that will resonate deeply with anyone grappling to untangle their identity from work. More than a year after leaving the corporate world—I know I still am. I particularly loved this thought: “That we can be ambitious outside of our jobs has been by far the most beautiful and hopeful realization of all … it’s possible to be ambitious in other ways: in our communities, in our marriages and partnerships, in our parenting, in our creative practice, in our hobbies, and so on.”