No Insta, just nice buttons for texts and calls: The thrill of the ‘Boring’ phone

SPOTLIGHT / DUMBSTRUCK

The Boring Phone: making calls and texts is all a growing number of people want from their devices.

Yearning for a simpler time when your phone only sent basic SMSs, its battery lasted three weeks and its killer app was Snake II? Well, in fabulous news for Luddites old and aspiring, the “dumb phone”, an affectionate term for the basic Nokias and Motorolas we once deemed futuristic, is back. At the recent Milan Design Week, hip fashion brand Bodega premiered The Boring Phone – it does almost nothing except make calls and send texts – to rapturous response. It’s part of the latest Newtro trend, which fuses new and retro aesthetics in a single product (think Bluetooth-enabled record players and 8-bit games on mobiles) and is proving a big hit with Gen Z, who are already starting to question what incessant smartphone use is doing to their brains and their privacy. The Boring Phone was created by HMD, the same company that makes Nokias and which relaunched the classic 3210 due to popular demand for tactile buttons and an Instagram-free device. It’s also made in partnership with beer brand Heineken, which positions it as the antidote to a boring night out (clearly, they haven’t spotted me playing Snake at the bar for four hours). The swing back to retro tech makes sense at a time when social media is causing mass disharmony and some teen smartphone users are receiving thousands of notifications a day. Shame about losing all those group chats and digital payment services, but nobody said being fashionable was easy, darling.
Jonathan Seidler

WATCH / THROWBACK THRILLER

Natalie Portman plays a housewife turned crime reporter in The Lady of the Lake.

Natalie Portman steps back into her Jackie era – think pillbox hat, breathy and brittle – as a 1960s housewife in Baltimore who finds her calling as an aspiring crime reporter in Lady in the Lake. The seven-part series was adapted from Laura Lippman’s 2019 thriller, with Portman starring as Maddie Schwartz, who investigates the deaths of a young Jewish girl and black bartender Cleo Sherwood (Moses Ingram, who was the best thing by far in Disney+‘s turgid Obi-Wan Kenobi). Lady in the Lake is Portman’s first recurring TV role, which makes the limited series intriguing enough, but the series’ re-creation of Baltimore in 1966 and the sexual, racial and religious politics at play tip it into must-watch territory. It isn’t just a murder mystery, after all: it’s about the limits society puts on women and what it takes for them to break free. On Apple TV+ now. Louise Rugendyke

A family torn apart by war, politics and religion, throughout three generations.

READ / CASUALTIES OF WAR

If you enjoy sprawling family sagas set in interesting locations with politics thrown in, American writer Claire Messud’s sixth novel, This Strange Eventful History (Fleet; $35), will appeal. Based on Messud’s own family history, it tells the story of three generations of a French-Algerian family uprooted from Algeria after the war of independence (1954-62). Parents Gaston and Lucienne and their children, François and Denise, become exiles from their colonial homeland, forced to make new lives on different continents (including Australia). Messud’s prose is crisp and flawless as she explores the intimate impact of this geographic, political and social dislocation on the family over seven decades. Nicole Abadee

WEAR / DO ME A SOLID

Smelling good on the go has never been easier (or looked so chic).

Many fragrance bottles have become sculptural works of art, transforming bathroom benchtops into galleries – but making on-the-go refreshes challenging. To avoid the bother of carrying around a heavy glass bottle worthy of Rodin, turning to the past helps: solid perfumes are lightweight and easy to apply with the dab of a fingertip. French perfumer Diptyque’s Eau Capitale ($105) is a chypre scent interweaving rose and bergamot, with a case that satisfies artistic leanings. Damien Woolnough

SHOP / WARM FRONT

Made in Victoria, this hot-water-bottle cover is crafted from recycled wool tartan blankets.

Love snuggling up with a hot-water bottle? You can elevate your comfort level and style quotient with the addition of a cuddly cover. Made from recycled wool tartan blankets, this thoughtful design (those tassels!) opens easily to accommodate a two-litre hot-water bottle ($55). And for an extra layer of warmth, pair it with a matching recycled wool travel throw ($180). Frances Mocnik

LISTEN / TROPIC THUNDER

Western Sydney-born R&B artist Milan Ring has released her album, Mangos.

Western Sydney-born artist, instrumentalist, engineer and producer Milan Ring has long been at home at the mixing desk or in the production booth, her blend of guitar-driven R&B, funk and neo-soul having preempted a cultural shift back to dexterous, jazz-influenced writing in Australia. On her second album, Mangos, she adds sonic imprints (tabla drums, Guzheng harps) of her Indian and Chinese heritage. To see Ring in action, all layered falsetto and Prince-esque guitar solos, is to witness a musician at the peak of her artistic vision. It’s just as easy to hear on tracks like Leo, which combines traditional percussion with a driving synth slap bass, or opener Quicksand, a gem of a tune with fluttering, moth-like electronics and vocals. Mangos is proof of Ring’s confidence in her increasing ability as a writer and, in its light-filled, summery embrace of craft and self, a perfect antidote to these winter chills. Jonathan Seidler

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