The funny thing about today’s trend in throwback barbershops, and the renewed interest in men’s grooming—which I covered in D Magazine’s October issue—is that not even 15 years ago, men who used face cleanser instead of a Zest soap bar and admitted to having a daily cardio regimen were such an aberration, they earned their own term, “metrosexual,” a whole other classification to separate them from those who didn’t care about fine lines or ab definition.
Since there’s no better way explore our past lives than a search through the D Magazine archives, I dug up this gem, found below, a feature on the “most metrosexual men that Dallas has to offer.” While the concept itself is pretty ridiculous, it was made all the better by Laura Kostelny, who I might say—if I wasn’t within spitting distance of Tim and Zac—was the funniest writer on staff in her day (she’s now at a well-known knee-slapper of a publication called Country Living). I highly recommend squinting and giving her prose a good read, or clicking here to read the ancient online version.
Because I couldn’t help but notice that none of the men here were what I, personally, would consider extremely sexy, I contacted Laura to see if she remembered anything about this feature. She wrote back: “Well, I will say, more loving formatting and better photography would probably help the gentlemen and the story itself. Honestly, I don’t remember much about the piece. I was a freelancer at the time—so it was maybe my third assignment? I know I was given a list of folks. (I actually went on to do a piece all about John Reoch.) If I recall, I was turned down a lot. Men didn’t love the term ‘metrosexual’ then. They probably don’t love it now.”
It’s no surprise men didn’t love the word, but fortunately, it went out of fashion along with “cyberspace.” And these days, guys, it’s all cool. No one’s going to laugh if you go sweater shopping or double-tap Instagram pics of trending haircuts. You do you. Just please don’t shave that beard.
