Long Live the Vampyre: Alexis Pharae, Steward of Old-World Decadence
When folklore becomes culture, somebody had to build the ballroom
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
In 2026, the concept of a grand ball seems like something borrowed from the pages of a storybook. We imagine gowns sweeping across polished floors beneath the glitter of chandeliers, every guest dressed magnificently for the occasion. An extravagance from another age, preserved in old novels and period films, but absent from modern day life.
And yet, once a year, such a night awaits those fortunate enough to cross the threshold of Endless Night New England.
Several hundred guests arrive having spent months preparing for the occasion. Corsets are laced. Fangs catch the low light. Music spills across a ballroom transformed so completely that, until morning, the outside world feels centuries away.
An initiated Vampyre Priestess and the co-producer of the iconic Endless Night New England Vampire Ball, Alexis Pharae spends much of the year creating the elaborate gatherings that bring this international subculture together. In Salem, she and business partner Benjamin Addam are also proprietors of Vampfangs, the storied and beloved Salem institution that has been fitting fangs since 1993, now serving a broader culture through fashion and events.
We has the pleasure of speaking with Pharae about finding her place within Vampire culture and the role she now plays in shaping its future.
Top of the Class: Dark Academia on Screen
Where intellectual obsession meets a wardrobe worthy of study
By: The Lace Ledger Staff
September has a habit of making students of us all. As classrooms fill again and the leaves begin to turn, old academic daydreams begin their annual return too. There are books to be carried, corridors to disappear down and an entire wardrobe waiting for colder weather.
In the world of fashion, Dark Academia is often sharply defined by a predictable uniform of dark tweed and severe pleated skirts against a backdrop of antique libraries. Fair play. Thankfully, cinema offers a broader education, showcasing how the aesthetic can belong to the brilliant professor coming apart at the seams or the young writer determined to put something incendiary on the page. It can be romantic, decadent or dressed in candy colours designed to disarm you.
In the right hands, a sharply tailored suit can suggest a lifetime spent collecting knowledge—and deciding exactly what to do with it. The final cut proves just how far that visual language can travel, from Mary Shelley and The Imitation Game to the pastel vengeance of Do Revenge.
So, in the spirit of back-to-school season, we went back to film school. The syllabus spans centuries and several highly questionable educational environments, studying the characters who have given Dark Academia its many cinematic lives.
Class is in session.