An Ode to a Wendy's Solarium
when the grief of nostalgia makes you ache a little too much
I have spent a lot of time lately thinking about how less color and joy there is in the world. I could say it feels this way because I’m now at the point in life where the current retirement age is closer to me than my birth was, but there have been plenty of think pieces and video essays on this topic. Corporations have long embraced minimalism, houses have lost character, forests are depleting, and everything feels sadder.
The state of the world aside (if we could really even put it aside), I’ve been grappling with a deep sense of what I have decided to identify as grief for what once was. If you regularly listen to the podcast, you’ll know that I have been experiencing a yearning nostalgia that feels almost painful. The more I sit with this feeling, the more it aches. I tend to always have an underlying fondness for the past (re: blatantly obvious Gilmore Girls obsession). But lately, it’s become almost all-consuming.
It all started when I scrolled upon a fashion TikToker, Parker York Smith, who was doing a series of putting together outfits inspired by vintage fast food restaurants. The video in question was an outfit inspired by a 90s Wendy’s solarium. I was immediately catapulted back in time.
I hadn’t thought about sitting in a Wendy’s solarium in forever. I’ll admit, I had practically forgotten all together that those even existed, but I was transported to the salad bar, a yellow paper cup of chili in hand, and the eager anticipation of a chocolate frosty at the end of a delicious lunch (side note, I don’t know if you’ve had a chocolate frosty lately, but THEY ARE NOT THE SAME ANYMORE). And I know if I would actually go back in time to the Wendy’s solarium of my childhood, I would probably be miserable under the hot Texas sun, but memories are funny in erasing the less enjoyable aspects we experienced (and with the rain we’ve been getting in Texas instead of hot sun, I know the vibes of a Wendy’s solarium would actually be immaculate right now).
I watched some more of Parker’s other vintage fast food outfits— a 90s pizza hut (with the cool light fixtures) and a 90s taco bell (turquoise, purple, pink, and yellow color palette, sign me up)— and I felt the nostalgia crushing me. A series of events took this nostalgia from a passing thought to a very present ache: I’ve been working through a rewatch of Friends, one of my friends posted about Neopets on her Instagram story, we recorded an episode on 90s malls stores on Blanket Fort Files, and then Michelle Trachtenberg died, my Harriet the Spy. And before I knew it, I was being served a customized For You Page of 90s childhood and early 00s teenhood TikToks all paired to that eerie aquatic nostalgia ambiance audio and woven between the deluge of the current high stress news cycle. I felt sick.
I know, the 90s and the 00s were far from perfect. In some ways, we’ve made a lot of progress since then, and in other ways, it feels like we’ve fallen further behind the times. I’m looking at my youth through rose-tinted mini sunglasses made popular by Mary-Kate and Ashley, but, I can’t help but wish we couldn’t, at the very least, bring back some of the color and joy from that time period. I mean, what I wouldn’t give to sit in a Target cafe with a soft pretzel and a cherry icee right now.
So what do I do about this? Am I to mope around in this agony of nostalgia? I wasn’t raised by big time fashion magazine editor Jenna Rink to just wallow about the past. I want to embrace the nostalgia somehow and incorporate it into my life, but let me backtrack a little more.
If I’m being honest, this painful yearning for the past did not begin with Parker’s Wendy’s solarium outfit. That was the moment I became self-aware of this deep-seeded ache. Last year, I learned the names of two aesthetics from the 90s and early 00s: “global village coffeehouse” and “shoe diva.” It’s almost comical to me that these design styles are now called an aesthetic. The mere use of the word aesthetic in today’s vernacular is interesting to think about. It’s probably reached the point of overuse, but when did we first start using the word aesthetic colloquially and why? (And why is it so freaking hard to spell)
Back to Global Village Coffeehouse and Shoe Diva. If you are unfamiliar with these aesthetics, let me give you a quick explanation. Global Village Coffeehouse is a design style inspired by cultural diversity often found in coffeehouses at the time. It’s marked by eclectic images, primary colors, wood grain, and earth tones. Think Panera’s old style or even Central Perk from Friends. It wasn’t until last year that I a) knew this design style— aesthetic if you will— had a name, let alone, b) was even a style. But if you lived during the 80s-early 00s and Google “Global Village Coffeehouse,” I promise, you will be transported in time. Discovering this aesthetic felt like peering into a window of my childhood.
However, discovering the Shoe Diva aesthetic was a far bigger epiphany because that describes my own personal design style of my pre-teen and even teenage years. Shoe Diva is the name given to the girly girl vibe of the 2000s, marked by pinks, purples, blues, and greens, curly doodles, shopping bags, Paris, and, of course, high heels. Hallmarks of the Shoe Diva aesthetic were the covers of the book series “Confessions of a Shopaholic” (a personal favorite), the Skinny Girl cocktail brand, and my bedroom. This time, discovering this was an aesthetic last year wasn’t just like peering into a window of my childhood, rather like busting the door down.
It feels like we give everything an aesthetic name these days, but there’s something about having names for design styles of the past that were so prevalent in my life, but I never had words for. In a way, I’m able to give meaning to that part of my childhood, or, at the very least, be able to Google and search on Pinterest by these design styles and walk down memory lane. Honorable mentions go to the aesthetics of Whimsigoth, Utopian Scholastic (Encarta ‘95 anyone?), and Y2K Futurism (seriously, I never knew all of these moments from my childhood had categorical names, but apparently, they do!).
As 2024 came to a close, I began working on a bucket list of 25 things to do in 2025. One entry started out as a joke for a spot I would fill later, but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to keep it. “23. Incorporate shoe diva into my life again (decide what that means).” I’m telling you, I’ve been in the throws of nostalgia for some time now, and I’m only really becoming self-aware. How this joke (really just with myself) started was working on 2025 vision/ mood boards with my friends. We were flipping through old magazines to cut up and collage. I kept seeing elements of the shoe diva aesthetic and eventually decided I wanted to make an entire shoe diva mood board. Later that day, when I sat down to work on my bucket list of 25 things, I jokingly put “incorporate shoe diva into my life again (decide what that means).”
Only it’s not a joke any more, and I think I’ve decided what that means. As I mentioned before, I don’t want to mope around in nostalgia. I want to embrace the past, enjoy things my inner child would love again, and move through life with more intentionality and slow down. Without realizing it, I actually started this mentality last year. Over the summer, Joy and I recorded an episode on nostalgic magazines. My cozy case file was on American Girl magazines. If you listened to that episode, you know I YAPPED. I could go on about American Girl for a very long time. I didn’t have any of my old magazines, but to prep for the episode, I ordered some old editions off Ebay (issues I did have growing up) and pulled out some of the American Girl library books I still had: “Hair: Styling Tips and Tricks for Girls,” “Room for You: Find Your Style and Make Your Room Say You!” (glitz and glam girls were obviously shoe divas), and OF COURSE the bible, “The Care and Keeping of You.” (If you weren’t raised by The Care and Keeping of You, then I’m sorry, but this post probably isn’t for you [just kidding…a little]).
And let me tell you, I was feral over the American Girl magazines. I stepped back in time flipping through the pages again. I live near Dallas, and something I never experienced as a kid was visiting the American Girl Store and Cafe. Well I took my big girl self and my big girl money (and my sister) to lunch there last summer, and it was everything! Sure, the food might have been mid, and there were one too many screaming children, but to experience something my younger self always wanted was so special. I considered getting myself my first American Girl doll, but my parents were right, they’re too expensive.
I want to have more moments like that— moments for little Larisa— whether they’re new ones like visiting the American Girl Store or old ones like watching walkthroughs of the Purple Moon Secret Paths in the Forest computer game (see above Whimsigoth aesthetic). I want to embrace the simplicity of life at that time (not referring to the racism, homophobia, or recession obviously). I don’t necessarily mean I want to go back to dial-up speeds despite Lorelai Gilmore telling me I can make a sandwich while a webpage loads, but I want life to slow down. We are so inundated with information and connectivity that it’s overwhelming and overstimulating. More listening to vinyl, less doom scrolling. More sending snail mail, less sliding into DMs (sorry, Kaeleen, I still need to mail you back).
How does all of this relate to Media on the Menu, you ask? Well for one thing, this is my page and I’m going to write about what I want to. But more importantly, part of all *gestures vaguely* this is that I’ve been watching some older but new-to-me movies. Another item on the aforementioned list of 25 things to do in 2025 is “watch 20 new-to-me movies.” That may not sound like a lot, but as someone who is INFAMOUS for rewatches the same movies and TV shows (re once again: blatantly obvious Gilmore Girls obsession), this is a big deal. A quarter of the way through the year and I’m right on track with 5 of the 20 watched:
Mystic Pizza
Victor Victoria
Hope Floats
Something’s Gotta Give
Finding Neverland
While none of these movies have been HITS for me, there are elements I’ve greatly enjoyed from each one. I’ve been inspired by the Nancy Meyers of it all with Something’s Gotta Give (and also the Diane Keaton, Hans Zimmer, and Barefoot Contessa of it all). And you know if there’s pop culture food, I’m paying attention. You can probably expect something from Mystic Pizza from me at some point during this project.
Many of the dishes I plan to recreate for Media on the Menu come from movies and shows from my childhood, and I think when I write about them here, I want to reflect on how I’m adding moments to my life now for little Larisa. I don’t fully know what that looks like yet, but that’s how I’m incorporating shoe diva into my life again. I hope you’ll join me in living for the younger version of you and doing what they need, and I hope your next chocolate frosty tastes like the old ones used to.
more cheers, less fears,
Larisa
P.S. Why yes I do have three separate playlists titled Global Village Coffeehouse, Shoe Diva, and Sitting in a Wendy’s Solarium, thanks for asking.
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