It was a cold Sunday night in January — an atypical party setting for a city devoted to hibernation. Zillennials introduced themselves, each a stranger with homemade brownies and non-alcoholic elixirs in hand, in the living room of poet S M “Vandie” Vande Kamp. This was not a dinner – invitees were encouraged to attend already fed – or a book club, although there would be a text discussed. We had arrived at a salon.
“People need community," says Vandie. "We are desperate for in-person, compassionate discussion."
Now, even hotels are tapping into the growing demand for in-person connection among creatives. This week, W Hollywood will host an intimate salon for LA's 'literati’ in their penthouse with the pop culture podcast (UN)COVER GIRL. The show, which dissects memorable celebrity profiles in each episode, will assign attendees a magazine cover story to explore (this time Channing Tatum’s notorious Vanity Fair interview). Adding to the fun, guests will be gifted a pair of pajamas, aligning with the theme ‘Under the Covers with (UN)COVER GIRL.’
“I really care about building community,” says (UN)COVER GIRL co-host, Ivana Rihter. “To me, a salon feels like a liminal space where strangers turn into friends, it lights a fire in you to talk recklessly about whatever moves you. With UNDER THE COVERS, we wanted to host something that felt fun, a salon for the digital age — treating pop culture in a literary way.”
Any Midnight in Paris fan will be familiar with the origin story of the literary salon, where novelist Gertrude Stein gathered the era’s best and brightest in her small Parisian apartment to philosophize about modern art, politics, and literature (attendees included Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald). However, the history of literary salons stretches back much further, originating in Renaissance Italy and flourishing in 17th and 18th-century France, where they became influential hubs for intellectual discourse.
Women played a critical role in salon culture as organizers – adopting the title of salonnières – in facilitating conversation where men and women could engage as intellectual equals, something not common in other public spheres. Salon holders Madame Geoffrin and Madame de Staël hosted Enlightenment thinkers such as Voltaire and Rousseau, helping to spread new ideas about democracy, equality, and individual rights. Rihter believes the ideas born in these settings shaped history in ways we can’t begin to imagine.
“It feels so inspiring to me that a bunch of creatives gathered in an apartment in Paris, and the future was changed because of it,” she says. “In Los Angeles, these kinds of gatherings are rare; events can feel like content mills, and it is objectively hard to make new friends. It just felt especially vital to host a salon here.”Vandie describes her first salon as “joyful and stimulating.” “Many said they get invigorated by diving into details and being in community. They came back the next month.”
While book clubs have thrived for decades, both on and offline, they have often felt barriered. There’s the pressure to find the right dynamic, over-intellectualize, and of course, read a full book. By contrast, salons are unlimited.
“A book club asks a lot of you,” “I'm too old at this point to lie about having read a book I only skimmed! A salon might be rooted in intellectual discussion, but you can also just show up and have a ball. It feels freewheeling in that way.”
Freewheeling can mean dissecting a text as trivial as an episode of reality television, as provocative as a Britney Spears video, or complex as a chapter from Dostoevsky. Regardless of the subject matter, each prompt serves as a jump-off point for discussion ranging from musings on mortality to celebrity notes app apologies. For their assignments, the (UN)COVER GIRL hosts stick to what they know: celebrity profiles.
“They used to be the only way to get to know a celebrity — it was our way into Hollywood,” Ivana says. “But these stories are about so much more than the celebrity in question; they are a reflection of that moment in time, the politics, and the public discourse that was happening when they came out.”
Vandie, who incorporates writing exercises into her salons, says she aims for the topics to be “expansive.” “Each meeting is varied with different topics and activities [shifting away] from a more prescriptive agenda.”
The only parameter Vandie sets as salon moderator is to ensure everyone’s voice is heard equally, with no one participant trying to ‘win’ a discussion. Otherwise, she advises aspiring salonnières to simply remain consistent.
“Create the space,” she says. “Be it a porch or the ruelle between your bed and the wall. People need community — even if just one person shows up to discuss, it's worth it.”
It’s this informality that salon aficionados seem to find most inspiring. The name 'salon' derives from the French word for 'room,' with gatherings often taking place in bedrooms, hosts sitting on beds surrounded by their peers. In keeping with that style, there's no pressure to serve an expensive cheese platter in an extravagant setup. You could hold your salon in a bar, or even a public park. Hell, you don’t even have to read the material. Simply come as you are, and prepare to connect.
“It can be you and a few friends and a bag of Sour Cream and Onion Ruffles,” says Ivana Rihter. “To me, the point of a salon is the messier, the better.
Images: 'The Reading from Moliere,' by Jean François de Troy, UNDER THE COVERS, a salon by (UN)COVER GIRL