Tom Holland, and by extension, his girlfriend Zendaya, likely knows that one of the hardest things to market around sober culture is a sense of indulgence. There are obvious benefits to ordering an adaptogenic soda in lieu of a crisp and amberous Negroni in a low-lit restaurant, but it’s not seen as a traditionally sensual thing to do. Don Draper did not brood into a tumblr of peach-flavored Betty Buzz, and The Sex and the City girls did not set the world to rights over cans of Kin Euphorics’s Picklesecco. It hasn’t, until recently, felt decadent, let alone romantic.
Holland—who has spoken candidly about his fraught relationship with alcohol and the freedom he has experienced since stopping drinking—is seeking to change that. He last night inaugurated a premium line of low-alcohol beers, branded around a sophisticated New England aesthetic with images of beautiful people lounging poolside and playing cards. He arrived at Bero’s launch event in Manhattan with Zendaya. She looked like a tall glass of Merlot Edge Hill Hazy IPA containing less than 0.5 per cent alcohol in a spaghetti-strapped Louis Vuitton column cut from burgundy leather with vertiginous So Kate Louboutins and one cylindrical Bulgari pendant dangling from an attenuated necklace. The hair and the face and the poise unscathed from the nefarious effects of alcohol.
James Devaney
