It’s been another huge week in the world of culture and entertainment, from the BAFTA TV awards to Eurovision starting, the Archibald prize, Australian Fashion Week, and the opening of the Cannes Film Festival.

But I was not in any of those places this week. Instead, I was in Parliament House for the Federal Budget, because I am a woman who wears many hats.

(Metaphorically, of course. I’ve never had the right head shape to pull off a great chapeau, but a beanie sure would’ve come in handy in Canberra on Tuesday night.)

“I’m truly sorry for anyone this hurt, and want to make it clear this was not a serious call to action, but [a] poorly aimed joke at the violence of incels and commentary about the interesting reaction to Luigi Mangione… I do not think political violence is ever okay.”
Abbie Chatfield has apologised for a video she posted last year, following speculation that her online criticism of Donald Trump contributed to a U.S. visa ban on her partner, Adam Hyde, aka musician Keli Holiday. Hyde has been touring North America this month. After performing in Canada, he was blocked from re-entering the U.S. for a scheduled show in New York, “despite having the proper visa documentation in place," he said.

Two weeks
How long it took The Devil Wears Prada 2 to surpass the original film’s entire box office earnings. The sequel has grossed over $US422 million globally since its 1 May release, compared to the total $326.5 million the original film earned over its 2006 theatrical run.

‘Strike Force Five’ (Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver) reunited on the set of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ahead of its final broadcast on 21 May. The group paid tribute to Colbert’s 11-season run – with some gentle roasting, of course. As the CBS series prepares to wrap for good, both of the Jimmys (Fallon and Kimmel) confirmed they’ll air reruns of their respective late-night shows during Colbert’s last episode next week. I’m not crying, you are.

It's fashion week again – the time of year when your feed is bombarded with edgy runway videos, thinkpieces about understated street style, and TikToks answering age-old questions like: do influencers wash their legs in the shower?

The 2026 edition of Australian Fashion Week (AFW) wraps up tomorrow, hosted for the first time at the Museum of Contemporary Art on Sydney Harbour.

If you've ever scrolled past it all and wondered what the hell is going on… don’t worry, me too! This week, I channelled my inner Andy Sachs and went straight to the belly of the beast to find out how it all works, why you should care, and how a local dad unwittingly became the viral centrepiece of Australian fashion’s biggest week.

In places like New York, London, Milan and Paris, fashion week sets the global agenda. Those events are referred to as the “Big Four” fashion weeks and the rest of the industry usually follows their lead.

AFW isn't trying to compete with these long-established institutions. Officially, it’s classified as a trade event. Designers show collections to buyers, press, and industry figures. Commercial outcomes are the whole point. It's how Australian labels get in front of international stockists and build global profiles.

While AFW may be about pure commerce for some, not every designer sees it that way. COMMAS creative director Richard Jarman, whose men’s resortwear brand showed on Sydney’s Tamarama Beach this week, put it simply: "I think it's each to their own, really."

It hasn't always been a smooth ride for this local event. Until recently, AFW was run by global events company IMG. When IMG pulled out in late 2024, the whole thing nearly collapsed.

Designers, models and industry figures came together to rally for its survival, and the NSW Government stepped in with funding to keep AFW alive.

The Australian Fashion Council (AFC), a not-for-profit representing the local industry, took over in 2025. Speaking at the time, AFC chair Marianne Perkovic said: “The time has come for Australian fashion to be represented by those who know it best, our own community.”

Model Jessica Gomes, who opened Mariam Seddiq’s show this week, has seen a lot change since her first Aussie fashion week over a decade ago.

“I just feel grateful to be here still, and still working, and still being a part of this creative industry… I would hate to see that die,” the AFW veteran told TDA.

This year, AFW opened its runways to the public for the first time – though some events came with price tags up to $300 for a ten-minute presentation. Designers like Jarman have been pushing for similar innovations. His menswear label COMMAS hosted its 2026 AFW showing on Sydney’s Tamarama beach.

“We wanted something accessible to the public where people could see into this world and be part of it,” he told TDA.

In 2024, Australian Fashion Week didn't have a single dedicated menswear show. This year, COMMAS was one of three, and it’s having a viral moment online right now.

Just before the models set out to strut along the sandy runway, a local man wandered down to the beach, completing his daily stretch and swim, unfazed by the rows of fashionistas and photographers.

At more high-profile fashion weeks internationally, that man would have likely been escorted off-site. But a bloke at the beach refusing to let anything get in the way of his morning swim was perhaps the most Australian thing that could have happened this fashion week. As Jarman told TDA, that's "the realness" of Aussie fashion.

Reporting by Elliot Lawry.

Glass skin is having a moment – and No7's new Good Intent range makes it actually achievable

The UK's #1 skincare brand just launched exclusively at Priceline, with 12 mix-and-match products all under $30. We're talking the Glow Grind Cleansing Balm, Skin Sip Moisture Milk, and a HydroGel Mask for $9.99 – innovative textures designed to deliver real radiance without the luxury price tag.

Great skin doesn't have to be complicated (or expensive).

Over the last few weeks, a rash of U.S. artists have cancelled or downsized planned tours.

‘Rash’ is an apt collective noun here. Page Six reporter Ian Mohr was the first to label the trend ‘Blue Dot Fever’, citing industry sources, in reference to the blue dots representing unsold seats at a concert venue on the Ticketmaster website.

Long-time readers of this newsletter will know all about Ticketmaster’s grip on the U.S. music industry, but for once, this is a touring story that’s not only about the Live Nation-owned ticketing company.

So, why are artists cancelling their tours? Let’s find out.

The first sign of a touring issue came by the end of May 2024, when Jennifer Lopez cancelled a series of U.S. dates. 

At the time, the singer said she was “heartsick” about the decision, while Live Nation said she needed to take “time off to be with her children, family and close friends.” 

Industry publications reported the tour was not selling well, though Variety cited “sources close to Lopez” saying poor sales weren’t the reason it was cancelled (she and then-husband Ben Affleck had already quietly separated by that point).

If we choose not to believe “sources close to Lopez,” why weren’t tickets selling? Lopez tried to rebrand the tour before abandoning it altogether, perhaps to distance it from her new album that year, This is Me… Now, which peaked at 38 on the overall Billboard album chart. 

There were also economic reasons. I know, this is the Culture newsletter, and it was your understanding that there would be no maths. I’ll keep it brief. 

In early 2024, U.S. economic authorities were fighting off lingering post-COVID inflation by increasing interest rates, which make it more expensive to have a mortgage and borrow money. 

By the time JLo’s tour dates went on sale, U.S. interest rates were at a decade-high, making life expensive. Meanwhile, grocery prices were also surging, and petrol prices were at a peak that wouldn’t be exceeded until Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz this year. 

High interest rates + high grocery and petrol prices = no spare money to see JLo live in concert. 

While we can’t know for sure why Lopez pulled the plug on her tour, we can consider her patient zero of Blue Dot Fever. 

Almost two years later, in arguably worse economic conditions, a series of artists have recently cancelled or downgraded their U.S. tours. 

The first was singer/songwriter/professional-earworm-creator Meghan Trainor (🎶 I could have my Gucci on 🎶), who cancelled her Get In Girl tour in mid-April, two months before it was due to begin. 

Trainor had intended to perform in 31 arenas across North America, with each venue seating 12,000 to 20,000 people. She said the cancellation was due to having too much on her plate, between planning the tour, releasing her latest album, and her new baby, though Variety reported low sales at some venues. 

Then came Post Malone, who nixed the first few weeks of his planned Big Ass Stadium Tour Part 2, citing the need to finish new music. The tour was the second half of a series of dates that had already seen him travel around the U.S. and Europe in 2025, promoting his 2024 album F-1 Trillion. The genre-shifting artist had already spent most of 2024 touring the same album. 

Per The New York Post, some of Post Malone’s cancelled shows had many tickets still available weeks out. Could it be that he’d exhausted the audience with multiple dates in the same cities over back-to-back years? 

Finally, the reunited Pussycat Dolls (a trio down from PCD’s original six) cancelled all of their North American tour dates, seven weeks after announcing them. 

“After taking an honest look at the North American run, we’ve made the difficult and heartbreaking decision to cancel all but one of [those] dates,” the group said in an Instagram post. 

PCD are the only one of these acts to allude to poor ticket sales as the reason for cancelling tour dates. In other words, they were brave enough to say, in essence, they’d come down with Blue Dot Fever. 

While touring can be a lucrative exercise for the world’s biggest artists, it’s increasingly difficult for other musicians to make money on the road.

Aside from the likes of Ed Sheeran and Luke Combs, you’d be hard-pressed to name many musicians with a microphone and a guitar who can sell out arenas in 2026. Even more stripped-back tours still need roadies, sound and lighting techs, merch and people to sell it, a tour bus and someone to drive it, fuel to power it, and food to feed all of those people. That’s before the cost of renting a venue, security, and buying insurance in case something goes wrong.

In response, artists need to keep increasing the cost of tickets to turn a profit. However, the very reasons ticket prices are increasing are also making it harder to buy them – fans are also subject to high food and fuel prices.

In this economic environment, for many fans, it makes more sense to save up and try to see a really big artist touring a really big show, e.g. Olivia Rodrigo, who just sold out the North American and European legs of her upcoming Unravelled tour.

We also have to consider that in North America, many venues are not accessible by public transport, meaning fans have to factor in the costs of fuel and parking.

TL;DR: Artists are struggling to keep up with the costs associated with touring, fans are struggling to keep up with the knock-on effect of higher-priced tickets, and basically everybody loses… Except for Taylor Swift.

Reporting by Lucy Tassell.