Joshua Rosenblatt makes a (fashion) statement.
MONDAY PUZZLE — In 2019, there were 32 constructors who made their New York Times Crossword debuts. In 2020, this more than doubled to 64 new constructors. And with today’s debut by Joshua Rosenblatt, we have 58 debuts for 2021, with nearly four months left to go in the year.
Constructor debuts certainly appear to be on the up-and-up (-and-up-and-up!) this year, and it’s no wonder why. A quick perusal of the Constructor Notes sections for many of the debuts this year, including today’s from Mr. Rosenblatt, reveals that crossword construction is a hobby many people took up during the Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in an astronomical increase in the number of new constructors since 2019.
Another contributing factor, according to Joel Fagliano, a senior puzzle editor, is the editorial team’s decision to workshop promising ideas with newer constructors in order to get more debuts through to publication. As Mr. Rosenblatt mentions in his notes, this puzzle went through several iterations with Mr. Fagliano’s help before arriving at the final version.
Publishing new constructors isn’t just good for them (although it certainly is! Congratulations, Mr. Rosenblatt, on this considerable achievement!). It’s also a huge boon to solvers, who get to experience fresh voices, new ideas and exciting innovations on this little word game we’ve all been playing for the last century. So congratulations to us solvers as well, and cheers to more debuts!
Tricky Clues
14A. Despite my misuse of the phrase “On the up-and-up” above to mean “increasing,” it is actually slang that means “above board,” or LEGIT. The slanginess of the clue can mean that the entry will also be slang, which explains why there is no indicator in the clue to tell you that LEGIT is shortened (from LEGITimate).
64A. I can never remember if a “Bishop’s hat” is spelled “mitre” or MITER, but Google tells me both are acceptable. Apparently the latter is the American spelling, while the former is British. MITER suspicious, if you ask me.
7D. RIATA shows up in crossword puzzles more often than “lasso,” the word you probably think will be the 5-letter “Cowboy’s rope,” likely because of its useful vowel-to-consonant ratio.
12D. This clue/answer pair is a good illustration of the use of parentheses in crossword puzzles. The word in parentheses needs to be appended to both the word in the clue (“Ache”) and the entry (YEARN) in order for them to mean the same thing — “YEARN for” and “Ache for” are synonymous, but “YEARN” and “Ache” by themselves are not.
32D. I enjoyed the gentle, Monday-level misdirect of the clue “Something to throw on a fire,” which might lead you to think of something you throw on a fire to put it out. Instead, we’re looking for LOG, which is something to throw on a fire to keep it going.
33D. This was an interesting one! In my experience, people (including Americans) use AGGRO as an adjective that is a synonym of aggressive or belligerent, which tracks with the clue, “Belligerent, in London.” But! It seems that British people also use AGGRO as a noun that is a synonym of aggression or belligerence. The more you know!
62D. The clue “Some movie f/x” contains a shortening of the word “effects,” which lets you know that the entry will also be shortened in some way. In this case, “f/x” tells you that the movie effects in question are computer-generated imagery, or CGI.
Today’s Theme
This puzzle features the names of four people whose first names are also the names of luxury fashion brands one might find IN (the pages of) VOGUE, the magazine. Because I am not a particularly fashionable person, I didn’t recognize two of the brands, including the first one, CHLOÉ, which is embedded in the name of Academy Award-winning director CHLOÉ ZHAO. I did recognize the second brand, CHANEL, in the name of supermodel CHANEL IMAN. The other two brands were embedded in the names of a Canadian pop diva and an Atlanta rapper featured on a song by Lizzo.
My favorite thing about this theme is how snazzy and descriptive the revealer is. The revealer, located smack-dab in the middle of the puzzle at 38A, is “Fashionable … or where you might find the starts of the answers to the starred clues.” IN VOGUE certainly means “fashionable,” but what really elevates this revealer and theme is the way it relies on a literal interpretation of the phrase, shifting the meaning from “fashionable” to literally “contained withIN VOGUE.” I can just imagine flipping through the pages of Vogue and seeing editorial shots of models in CHANEL clothing or holding CHLOÉ bags. It’s so vivid!
Let’s hear what our fashionable constructor has to say.
Constructor Notes
Publishing my first puzzle in The New York Times is a real pinch-me moment! I’ve been puzzling my whole life, but I only really got into crossword puzzles during medical school. I started constructing after the pandemic hit while I was completing my fellowship in infectious diseases. I currently live with my partner in N.Y.C., where I recently started my first job out of training.
The theme for this puzzle came to me while watching “The September Issue,” the not-to-be-missed 2009 documentary about the making of Vogue. This puzzle was the first one I submitted, and not surprisingly, it has since gone through many iterations. A huge thank you to Joel for his help reworking the grid, and to the editing team for making some of the clues more Monday-friendly.
I’m thrilled to see the puzzle run during New York Fashion Week. Happy solving, everyone!
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