12 Things That Delighted Us Last Week: From Josh Hart’s Wine to Doll Coats

Just in time for the first flurries of the season, it was Coat Week at the Strategist. The outerwear extravaganza began with a survey of the puffers, parkas, and peacoats New Yorkers are wearing today. Among the sea of North Face Nuptses and a couple of Rachel Antonoff Parkers is this double-faced wool coat from Cos that interior designer Tenlie Mourning finds herself wearing again and again. “Someone once told me I looked ‘like I belonged in the city,’ which felt like the highest praise. This coat has that effect — it makes you feel at home in New York,” she adds.

’Tis the season for battles with your children about whether or not it’s cold enough to warrant a winter coat. (Spoiler alert: It almost always is.) To help make the struggle easier, the Strategist parents caucused about the coats their kids actually like (and that keep them warm). This one from Mini Rodini, which comes recommended by senior writer Lauren Ro, is unique enough that your little one won’t come home in someone else’s jacket.

As a kid, Strategist writer Ambar Pardilla coveted a Samantha Parkington American Girl doll — and years later, she’s still thinking about her outerwear, specifically a velveteen coat with the frog closures. And so, she set out on a hunt for a Samantha Parkington–ish coat — that is, one with a traditional pattern (like houndstooth) or a bold color with details like a martingale and cuff tabs. Her search led her to this option from Sanoë. “I know, I know: $1,095,” she writes. “But I felt like the little girl who wanted to be Samantha Parkington when I put it on for the first time — and that’ll apparently cost $1,095 (which might be less than what some end up spending during an afternoon at the American Girl store).”

While it took our senior kitchen and dining writer Emma Wartzman “quite a long time to figure out how to dress for winter in New York City” after moving from Los Angeles, she’s got it down now — largely thanks to this compact puffer from Uniqlo. “I wouldn’t call the Pufftech supremely stylish, but it’s entirely inoffensive, and therefore can be worn on its own,” she writes. “But most crucially, it turns my two favorite fall coats — extremely cute, cover-my-butt-but-not-lined coats — into viable options on nights when it dips into the high 40s.”

The inaugural guest in our new “How I Gift” series was Kate Berlant, who shared some advice for bad gift givers hoping to get better: “Don’t make it about you.” But, how, exactly, do you do that if you got someone you have truly never met for Secret Santa? Get them a nice pocket knife, she says. “I was at a stationery store recently and they had these little Higonokami Japanese pocket knives and I was like, Well what’s that going to run you, $75? But then it was only 30 bucks. And I thought that would be a nice gift.”

To say that Knicks player Josh Hart knows his wine would be an understatement. (In fact, last year, he told us he can’t live without an $1,800 bottle of red.) So, when we asked him what present he’d give to everyone for the rest of his life, his answer just made sense: “Whatever that current vintage of Heitz is, I probably would give them that,” he says. “That’s one of my go-to good wines. A lot of people my age or older either like wine or are getting into wine. So you can’t miss with that.”

When Strategist writer Brenley Goertzen first heard about heated coats, she thought they sounded dorky and probably unfashionable. But after fighting to stay warm in the three frigid cities (Minneapolis, Toronto, and now Pittsburgh) she’s lived in over the past few years, she decided to give an Ororo heated jacket a chance — and hasn’t looked back. “When the coat is on, it feels like you’re wearing a warm piece of clothing straight out of the dryer,” she writes, adding, “On mornings when I walk my dog at sunrise, it’s the perfect warm hug to get me out the door.”

“Everyone’s always like, ‘What’s that lipstick?’ And it’s always Baby Lips,” says Alison Roman who counts the throwback lip balm among the things she can’t live without. “This is the holy grail to me of lip stuff because it is hydrating, it’s super sheer, it’s glossy,” she writes. And perhaps best of all, she says, “It smells like a teenager. It reminds me of having a crush.”

If you’d rather a highbrow option, though, we recommend this French lip balm that joins personalized LEGO mini-figures and monogrammed Hedley & Bennett aprons in our new guide to personalized gifts. As Strategist writer Kitty Guo says, “[You can] level up their Chapstick with shea-butter- and sesame-oil-infused lip balm from Officine Universelle Buly, which comes in a beautifully elegant case that you can monogram with their initials.”

While Ro is almost always wearing a chunky sweater in the winter, she finds bulky knits look, well, particularly bulbous under certain coats. But there’s always an exception to the rule, so she went on a hunt for a roomy but not shapeless mostly wool coat and landed on this one from Aligne that checked every box. “It feels like a very luxurious bathrobe — but one you wear outside,” she reports. “For its price and the amount of coat that you get for it, it’s by far one of the best coats you can get for the money.”

Good news for dog lovers: It’s easier than ever to match your coat with your dog’s. There are mini-and-me versions of popular styles from Barbour, Carhartt, Ralph Lauren, and Moncler along with Aritzia’s recently relaunched Ruff Puff for dogs — essentially a canine-size Super Puff. “Ellie and I can’t recommend the Aritzia Super Puff and Super Ruff Puff coats enough,” says Toronto-based occupational therapist (and owner of Ellie), Julia Crawford. “Ellie’s coat is quick and simple to put on, which makes leaving the house way easier. We always get so many compliments when we’re out matching.”

Here’s a fun fact straight from senior writer Michael Zhao’s “Strategist Brain”: Did you know the Scottish government maintains an online database of tartans? “I recently learned of it when Scottish menswear brand Kestin registered its own plaid, in honor of its tenth anniversary,” he reports. The design, which is available on this lambswool scarf, was inspired by a Gordon tartan kilt, owned by creative director Kestin Hare’s father.