By Emma Khayat When you first get to college, you will meet a ton oftons of new people, but how do you know who to avoid? Today, we'll cover red flags in college friends, so you know what to look out for. Personally, or I suppose, luckily, I wasn't sure where to start with this, so I asked all my friends their thoughts. The most common answer I received was, "No friends back home." While some people just had a bad high school experience, having no friends from home could

By Salma Zerhouane For me and many other students, fall means the arrival of our best-, layered fits! With fall fashion comes an array of warm and neutral colors. According to Vogue’s article on the “10 Best Fall Fashion Colors 2023 to Wear This Season,” olive green, latte brown, and classic camel are just some of the colors that we are seeing this fall season, and the best way to do it is monochromatic! The definition of monochromatic is “containing or using only one color,”

By Libby Evans Image from The Kitchen Community As a former barista and latte lover, the secret of coffee making is a skill I will carry with me for the rest of my life. Once your eyes are opened to this new trade, you will watch your baristas make your $5 coffee and think, “I could do that,” or you might long to be back there yourself, steaming milk to perfection.  Luckily, you don’t have to work as a barista to be a barista from home. By the end of this blog, you can be a b

By Aubrey Cline When it comes to achieving beautiful, well-manicured nails, there are various options to choose from. Two popular choices are press-on nails and salon nails. Each has advantages and drawbacks, and deciding between the two is a matter of personal preference.  I used to go to a salon every 2 weeks for a nail appointment. Now, as a broke college student, I use press-on nails frequently, and they are super low maintenance, affordable, and have the cutest styles to

By Joey Earley | Executive Editor Variant had the absolute pleasure of being invited to the Anatomy Fashion Show this year, which took place on October 22nd. The Anatomy Fashion Show is hosted by Phi Delta Epsilon, a Pre-Med Fraternity and happens annually across the nation to raise money for the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. Ohio University’s chapter, the Ohio Eta chapter, is in its second year of this event and plans to make it an annual occurrence. Before the eve

By Ethan Hofer Footwear has evolved over time to the point where we now have an extreme plethora of shoes and boots to wear for a variety of occasions. There are some amazing fashionable footwear choices, but wearing a piece of footwear like the Rick Owens Kiss Boots on the hilly grounds of Ohio University would be extremely challenging., Sso, we need a combination of something both fashionable and comfortable that fits most color palettes whilst giving us stability. While th

By Kennedy Hall While enjoyable and aesthetically pleasing, the Barbie movie lacked discussion of the intersectionality in feminism because of race. Barbie has themes of feminism, specifically white feminism. Was it a cute, witty, and quirky movie? Yes. However, groundbreaking and revolutionary? No, it was not, and maybe that was the goal. The film tried to convey a very loaded message in an hour and 54 minutes; there is only so much that can be said in that time frame, and

By Tay Carthon It’s a big day for 20-year-old teenage girls, Olivia Rodrigo has released her new album: GUTS . Olivia elevates her signature pop-punk sound for this new album. I’ll be going track by track to talk about what each song does well and what each song could use some work on (this is all an opinion and a pretty biased one, too, because I did listen to this album on repeat for a whole week). Olivia starts the album off with all-american b*tch . all-american b*tch sta

By Emma Friend, Editor in Chief Over the course of the last two years, starting in April 2021, Taylor Swift has been rerecording her old music. These rerecordings have been dubbed “Taylor’s Version” as a way to indicate that she now owns the rights to her songs, not her old record label (for more on this, click here ). Even without the rerecordings, Taylor has a huge discography, but these rerecordings have given her an opportunity not only to own her own music, but to releas

By Salma Zerhouane HallOUween, is arguably one of the biggest weekends in Athens, and the time is creeping upon us. Whether you’ve been in Athens for the weekend previously or this is your first time, I believe we can all agree it's part of the culture at OU. Discussions of costumes and which parties to attend are looming in the air as the weekend approaches. The holiday is a time to celebrate with friends and express yourself through your costumes, but it's also a time to s

By Emma Khayat This year, cinema made a significant comeback. With movies like Barbie, Super Mario Brothers , and The Little Mermaid , the possibilities are nearly endless! Whether you want to dress up with a group, a partner, or show out solo, there are plenty of potential costumes. Group Costumes: If you and all your best friends want to show out together, then look no further. Barbies The sky's the limit. You and all your friends could pose as different Barbies. There’s

By Libby Evans 1. Hocus Pocus (1993) Taking place in Salem, Massachusetts, this family-friendly favorite has all our classic Halloween essentials: three fashionable, eccentric witches, a talking black cat, teen romance, and a perfectly disastrous Halloween night. It might not be your first choice for an adrenaline-rushing scary movie, but you can’t deny the nostalgia of Halloween night these witches bring. 2. Halloween (1978) When an iconic horror film has the same name as o

By Joey Earley, Executive Editor As the fall semester starts, there’s much to look forward to: parties, seeing friends on campus, moving into dorms or new apartments, classes, new organizations, and for freshmen, starting a new journey in their lives. Even so, as we move into the semester, we should all be on alert for something very important. During the first semester, typically from August through November, there is a 50% increase in sexual assaults on college campuses. Th

Bekah Bostick, Associate Editor Nerd or not, “Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves” is a hilarious must see. Directed by Jonathan M. Goldstein and John Francis Daley, the movie follows Edgin and his band of adventurers on a quest to retrieve a lost relic; however, like most action movies, things quickly take a turn when the group runs into the wrong people, causing a whole mess of issues they have to attempt to overcome. Just a note- it is not necessary for the audience

Olivia Lutz, Head of Videography @cameronhughes Read it and weep your going to need more time to make something like this. @gigihadid @Tan France for #nextinfashion ♬ original sound – Cameron Hughes What do Gigi Hadid, Doja Cat, and Tiktok trans activist Dylan Mulvaney all have in common? They all have worked with New York based Cameron Hughes, who is a pioneer in the tech and fashion worlds, popularizing fashion tech. Fashion tech is a term used to describe a categor

Jack Wilburn, head of makeup Hello, my name is Jack, and I am an avid fan of Melanie Martinez. Melanie saw success early in her career after a strong run on “The Voice.” Shortly after, her single Carousel was picked up by 20th century Fox to promote the fourth season of “American Horror Story (Freak Show).” Her success skyrocketed, leading to two successful albums. On March 31st, 2023, she released her third and newest studio album, “PORTALS,” with which I am undeniably smi

By Sophia Ball Photos taken by Nandi Gott Feature photo taken from the Athens County website The Athena Cinema is a historic movie theater located in Athens, Ohio. Formerly known as the Majestic Theater, The Athena opened in 1915 and has been ever-growing since. In the early 2000s, the theater was renovated and transformed into an art-house cinema that features independent films, documentaries, and other specialty programs. The theater includes three screens, 35mm and digita

Bekah Bostick, associate editor Shania Twain’s Queen of Me showcases her new genre that she’s moving into in a dissatisfying collection of 12 songs. Growing up, I remember my mom playing the 1997 hit “Man! I Feel Like a Woman” constantly. This album is anything but her past hits that brought the Canadian country star to fame. After a decade that gave Twain a son, a divorce, and an illness that brought the fear that she would never be able to sing again, she’s back and ready

Anna Birk, Executive Editor Image from Cleveland.com Cierra Boyd Cierra Boyd was one of the founders of The Scene magazine at Ohio University. Today, that magazine has become the first mass-print fashion magazine on campus and is known as VARIANT. Boyd has gone on to create a sustainable fashion brand with nearly 50,000 followers on Instagram. She has styled celebrities such as Cardi B and been featured on HBO’s show, The Hype . Her fashion brand boasts creativity by creati

Katie Johnson, Head of Styling 1. Anita Pallenburg photos Dating not one, but two members of The Rolling Stones was step one of becoming an It Girl. German-Italian actress and model Anita Pallenburg also had her own coolness about her that was independent from the rockstar men she dated. She had a bohemian-meets-rocker-groupie style that she smoothly flaunted. In the ’60s and ’70s, Pallenburg rocked power suits, chunky belts, big coats and scarves, disco tops, and platform