Dear Diary,

I just returned from Anouk’s orchard — that mythical stretch of land where nothing behaves the way logic expects it to. The journey always feels unreal, as if I’m slipping into a story instead of boarding a plane, but her world has that effect on me. Things often shift from metaphor to reality there. Sometimes gently. Sometimes with a wink.

I went to see her as the season began to fold inward, curious about how she prepares for a time that, for many, becomes a blur of logistics, expectations, and the quiet emotional negotiations we make with ourselves.

Anouk prepares differently.

When I arrived, she was already moving through the orchard rows, the light catching her silhouette and the vivid detail of her all-over print world. The trees looked sculpted — branches bowing under the weight of the surreal handbags she grows there. They glowed in that quiet way expensive things do, except these weren’t symbols of status. These were symbols of self.

She greeted me without ceremony, pressed a warm smile into my palm, then handed me a pair of garden shears that looked far too luxurious for actual work. “Come,” she said. “It’s harvest day.”

I followed her between the trees as she plucked the handbags one by one — each more uncanny and editorial than the last, like the-handbags-that-need-no-name reimagined by some muse-god with a taste for irony.

“What’s in this one?” I asked as she lowered a deep aubergine bag into her basket.

“Softness,” she said, matter-of-fact.

“Bruised?”

She shrugged. “A little. Aren’t we all?”

Another bag held boundaries — elegant and structured, stitched with decisiveness. A third held humor — hers always comes with a twist, the kind you only understand after a beat. And the last one… intention. She held that one for a long moment before placing it with the others.

As she harvested, I realized none of these bags were about fashion. They were about preparation. Not for gatherings or tables or the choreography of seasonal expectations — but for herself.

“This is what I’m carrying into the season,” she told me. “Not perfection. Just the parts of me worth bringing along.”

We walked until the sun dipped low, her orchard turning gold around us. When it was time to leave, she pressed one of the symbolic handbags into my hands — a small, sage-colored one, its leather impossibly soft.

“For you,” she said.

“What does this one hold?”

“Discernment,” she whispered. “You’ll need it.”

I carried it with me all the way home — across the orchard paths, down to the dock, onto the ferry, through the airport, past the gates and luggage belts. By the time I arrived back here, it no longer felt surreal. It felt necessary.

I think that’s the quiet magic of Anouk’s world: she turns symbolism into something wearable, carry-able, livable. She reminds me that we move into each season with our year still hanging on us — our softness, our boundaries, our humor, our intention — tucked into metaphorical handbags we shouldn’t be afraid to hold.

And maybe that’s why I love her all-over print tee so much. It captures the version of her that doesn’t apologize for carrying her art, her story, her irony — boldly, vividly, without shrinking.

This season, I think I’ll do the same.

From this season’s orchard to yours,

A Modern Storyteller

Click HERE for the 'Anouk - The Fabled Orchard' tee.