Social

Instagram rolls out a new feature to enable online shoppers to link to product Drops. The Instagram Drops feature will now have a specific spot in the “Shop” tab to enable users to discover new and upcoming product launches. This move is intended to combat rivals like TikTok, organizing browsing in a single location. The drops avail so far include Drake x NOCTA, Wren + Glory and Charlotte Tilbury.

Culture

Vaccination passports are becoming such a polarizing issue. Some experts from this article foresee some backlash to events or festivals requiring “proof of vaccination” as we enter a post-pandemic world.

Electro-pop group Flume collaborated with 3D artist Zawada for an audiovisual NFT experience. The art is on display, and creates an extremely sensory experience for the viewer with sight, sound, smell and touch. An interesting and cool way to blend music and art!

This is a wonderful piece by award-winning writer Osayi Endolyn about the new docu-series on Netflix called, High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America. The series is an incredible reframing of history that reintroduces our country’s culinary past and will change the way you look at American food.

Fashion

Last week, MAC Cosmetics debuted a shoppable Snapchat AR try-on lens. Using technology developed through Snapchat’s partnership with Perfect Corp., MAC is offering four different lenses with 20 lip and eye products. Users can scroll through and test the different shades of each product and then click the link in the lens to purchase on MAC’s direct to consumer site. Estee Lauder’s brands, Too Faced, Bobbi Brown and Smashbox, will also debut on Snapchat with their own shoppable technology over the next few months.

The partnership between Netflix and historic Halston for a fashion line may have been unexpected, but smart. Halston will create a 10-piece capsule collection of gowns priced between $995 and $1,595. The looks—available for preorder this month—are inspired by archival designs featured in the new Netflix biopic about Roy Halston Frowick, the designer who launched the fashion house in 1968.