Current Issue
Intimacy & Inquiry
June 2026
Summer has a way of forcing adaptation.
The boots come off. The long sleeves retreat to the back of the closet. Suddenly, the challenge becomes finding ways to stay comfortable without feeling disconnected from the styles, and, by extension, communities that make us feel most like ourselves.
This issue explores the many ways people rise to that challenge, and others.
Lindsay Kaye reflects on bringing gothic style into everyday life through Gothleisure™, while our summer fashion and beauty stories explore Southern Gothic romance, Yalternative style, soft goth beauty and footwear designed to survive a heatwave. These stories celebrate the small adjustments that allow an aesthetic to evolve out in the wild.
Elsewhere, we celebrate the people shaping alternative culture. Our PRIDE guide highlights queer-owned brands creating on their own terms, while Dr. Lindsay Byron reflects on reinvention, community and embracing life's many chapters.
At its best, gothic culture has never been about standing still. It adapts. It experiments. It finds new forms without losing sight of what made it meaningful in the first place.
Thank you for spending part of your summer with us.
For free, subscribe below and/or read the full issue digitally here.
With devotion,
Amanda
Cover: courtesy of Lively Ghosts shot by @cinemuseo and featuring @_lunesolace + @elizacuzzo.
Feature Articles
The PRIDE Guide: 19 Queer-Owned Alternative Brands We Love
These independent labels create everything from jewellery to fashion, fetish and art
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
While we love the celebrations and parties, PRIDE Month has always been about more than rainbow branding and corporate campaigns. It remains rooted in visibility and the ongoing support of queer people building lives, art and businesses on their own terms.
This month, we’re spotlighting independent queer-owned brands shaping alternative culture through fashion, jewellery, fetishwear, literature, leatherwork, design and more to shop all year.
Backstage with Dr. Lindsay Byron: Pole Stories & Plot Twists
The award-winning stripper, scholar and pole community pillar discusses how connection became the foundation of her life's work
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
One of the great frustrations of being a woman is how often the world asks us to pick a lane. Be serious or be sexy. Nurturing or ambitious. Disciplined or spontaneous. Practical or romantic. Lindsay has spent much of her life proving that these categories don’t need to be mutually exclusive.
Over the course of sixteen years as a dancer, she became one of the most celebrated strippers in Atlanta, earning the title of Best Stripper in Atlanta in 2015 while simultaneously completing a doctorate in literature. Behind those accomplishments was a young woman navigating profound loss, family challenges and the social consequences of being labelled long before she had the opportunity to define herself. Rather than allowing those experiences to dictate the course of her life, she alchemized them into momentum.
Today, Lindsay is best known as the founder of Stripcraft and StripTrips, where she continues to champion pole culture and community through education, mentorship, sentuality and unforgettable experiences around the world. From academia to the strip club, from viral storytelling to building one of the most recognizable brands in the pole community, her journey is a testament to resilience. We caught up with Lindsay to discuss stripping, stigma, literature, entrepreneurship and why she believes some of life's most meaningful connections can begin in the most unexpected places.
International Sex Workers Day Watchlist: 38 Films Exploring Sex Work On Screen
These stories examine pornography, stripping, escorting and survival sex work through lenses ranging from fantasy and glamour to violence, loneliness and reinvention
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
In honour of International Sex Workers Day (June 2), this watchlist explores the many ways sex work has been portrayed across film and television; from glamour and fantasy to survival, exploitation, performance and economic reality. According to the International Union of Sex Workers, there are 52 million sex workers globally; 41.6 million of which are female. Though, researchers note the true number is likely far higher due to stigma, criminalization and underreporting.
These stories do not present one singular experience. Instead, they reveal how deeply conversations surrounding labour, gender, intimacy, class and power have always been intertwined with the people working at the centre of them.
Laced Up: 18 Iconic Corsets from Film & Television
From Scarlett O'Hara to Xena, these are the underpinnings that stepped beyond the screen and into fashion history
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
Few garments have worked harder in film than the humble corset.
For more than a century, costume designers have used it to communicate everything from power and ambition to romance, rebellion and utter ruin. A single tightening lace can signal the expectations placed upon a young woman. A structured bodice can transform a queen into a monarch of the ages, a vampire into a legend or a showgirl into an icon. Long before a character speaks, the corset often tells us exactly who they are.
Some became inseparable from the stories themselves. Scarlett O'Hara's lacing scene in Gone with the Wind remains one of the most famous moments in Hollywood history while Satine's ruby corset came to define an entire era of fashion when donned by Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge.
From gothic heroines and doomed aristocrats to pirates, vampires and queens, these are a few of our favourites.
Past Issues
About Us
The Lace Ledger is a gothic-inspired digital magazine for romantics, misfits and dark-femmes who live just outside the lines.
It’s a space for style, culture, decor, discourse, the arts, wellness, travel, intentional living and beyond — created for those who never fully saw themselves in mainstream media.
For those seeking a publication that values elegance with attitude, this is for you.
Founded by writer and poet Amanda Albert, The Lace Ledger blends fashion, literature and cultural curation into a digital anthology where depth meets decadence and personal style becomes its own form of storytelling.
Whether you come for the fashion, the poetry or the watch lists, we cordially invite you into a world shaped by dark feminine aesthetic with a splash of defiance.
Here you’ll find:
Style — fashion, accessories, beauty and the gothic archetypes that inspire them.
Literature + the Arts — original and beloved poetry, reading lists, gallery and bookstore recommendations, artist and author features and more.
Culture — music, film, television and fun for the romantic and the restless.
House & Haunt — moody interiors, darkly refined entertaining and decor.
Gift Guides — curated for every occasion and recipient.
Subscribe to receive our monthly edit — a curated delivery of style, culture and quiet luxury.
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Reach out with your latest product launches, brand news story ideas, finished work or pitches. We’re here to create thoughtful partnerships.
We welcome collaborations with brands, creators, artists, writers and experts who share our taste for the uncommon.