Nicolaia Rips

Bullet Point Skirts, Superstition, Gravlax, and more.

June 28, 2023

By clicking "SUBSCRIBE" you agree to our Terms and Privacy conditions.

—

Nicolaia Rips is a New York City-based writer who grew up living in the Chelsea Hotel and wrote a great memoir about it titled Trying To Float. Rips has bylines in Interview, Airmail, NYT, NY Mag, Elle, and BOMB, and she’s an Editor and Staff Writer for HommeGirls, a clothing brand & magazine that’s featured icons such as Chloe Sevigny, Paloma Elsesser, and Emily Ratajkowski. Nicolaia is also a writer on the upcoming Soderbergh-directed HBO TV show Full Circle which recently premiered at Tribeca, but perhaps most importantly, she’s half of the underground olive review Instagram, Olives of New York. Lucky for us, she’s here to tell us what she’s been into.

Rec

💋

The Party Girl Literary Canon

Collette. Zelda Fitzgerald. Eve Babitz. Elaine Dundy. Cookie Mueller (though her writing makes me seasick!!!!). Honorable mention to Nora Ephron for being a great, though neurotic, time.

Rec

🛸

Earth Girls are Easy

An oft forgotten yet seminal Sci-Fi rom-com musical starring Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum.

Rec

😵‍💫

Superstition

In the morning I attempt to predict my day based on the crema that sits on top of my espresso. Sometimes I have espressos with frightening inky splotches and my days are SCARY and UNFORTUNATE. Sometimes I have perfect espresso days and perfect things happen to me. Good friends will text me pictures of their coffee and ask me to read their fortunes and for them I do.

Rec

🥾

Bogs

My godmother Paulina turned me on to these and I wear them from fall to spring. They’re waterproof and insulated and once somebody asked if they were Balenciaga. “No,” I screamed, “They’re Bogs!”

Rec

🏠

The Chelsea Hotel

I grew up there! And I wrote a book about it! And say hi to my parents if you ever stop by! And if you ever get the chance to wander around uninhibited by security, there’s a free standing pyramid on the brick roof that the artist Sam Bassett used to stay in. Used to be my dream to live there.

Rec

⚾️

Annual Cyclones Game

Once a summer NYT newspaperman and personal BFF Alex Traub organizes a minor league baseball outing and vodka drinking shindig at Tatiana’s. This is the most fun event a girl can attend.

Rec

🩰

Bullet Point Skirts

My dentist’s office is in midtown between On Stage Dancewear (a tiny bitchy ballet store) and the Morgan Library (the best museum in NY after the Neue Galerie). After the dentist I treat myself to a visit to Morgan Library and a new flimsy Bullet Point Skirt. They come in colorways like Cappucino, Meadow and Cloud. I wear them with my Hommegirl’s tube socks and Tods.

Rec

🥯

Gravlax

At the risk of sounding like your grandmother, I believe everyone should have a signature and impressive dish. For me, that is gravlax. Gravlax is the less briny, less saturated, and infinitely more elegant girlfriend of lox. Unlike lox which are smoked and pungent, gravlax is cured, creating a buttery texture and extremely fresh flavor. It is closer to sashimi and is stupidly simple to make. Here is the recipe, originally culled from the Silver Palate Cookbook but since bastardized by my mom:In a tupperware place one filet skin side down, cover with half of the salt/sugar mixture, place dill on top. Generously crack black pepper and put the other filet of salmon skin side up. This creates a sandwich effect. Add the rest of the sugar/salt mixture on top and pop the lid on the tupperware to really smush everything together. Each day, for the next three days, take it out of the fridge and flip the filets, redistributing the liquids that have formed with a spoon. On the third day it is ready to be sliced thinly with a sharp knife and eaten on a bagel, or over a burial plot of arugula.I have taught it to every roommate, boyfriend, girlfriend, roommate’s boyfriend, roommate’s boyfriend’s roommate, and culinarily curious friend I have. People beg for it, I promise!

Rec

👯‍♀️

Vaudeville/Slapstick/Old Jews

I have a strong sense of humiliation and a loose sense of shame. I think it’s best not to take things too seriously and the content I love reflects a certain snarky optimism - The Marx Brothers, Buster Keaten, scripts written by S.J Perlman. To me, Duck Soup is the greatest movie ever written.

Rec

🎶

Rufus Wainwright

When I work I listen to Rufus and only Rufus and only the genius albums Poses and Want One.

PERFECTLY IMPERFECT IS A CULT FAVORITE NEWSLETTER AND AN APP FOR YOUR RECOMMENDATIONS

We've interviewed guests like Lorde, Olivia Rodrigo, Francis Ford Coppola, Charli XCX, Ayo Edebiri, Michael Imperioli, Emma Chamberlain, Clairo, Ice Spice, Molly Ringwald, Weyes Blood, Jeremy O. Harris, Conner O'Malley, Rayne Fisher Quann, Julian Casablancas, Alexa Chung, Mac Demarco, Moses Sumney, Omar Apollo, Suki Waterhouse, Narwuar, The Dare, and hundreds more in the Perfectly Imperfect Archive.

The history of PI is well-documented by The New York Times, NYMag, Vanity Fair, Interview Mag, Flaunt, Office, The Verge, and NPR.

Nicolaia Rips

RELATED

Perfectly Imperfect