T: The NYTimes Style Magazine

For over 150 years, Coney Island has been a beloved summer refuge for New Yorkers looking to escape the heat — and eat the season’s best snacks. A few minutes’ walk south from the Coney Island subway stop, Nathan’s Famous remains at the corner of Stillwell and Surf Avenues, where it’s been since it opened in 1916 and sold hot dogs for a nickel each. The building is a lot bigger now — it takes up nearly a whole city block — but its shed-like structure is still topped by a sign with the original, iconic green logo. And the dogs are still made with the special seasoning mix that founder Nathan Handwerker’s wife, Ida Handwerker, dreamed up in 1916. At the link in our bio, @reggienadelson looks back at the origin of Nathan’s and its place in Coney Island history. Photos by @danielterna .

In Hawaii, shops that serve shave ice — domes of pillowy-soft ice slivers doused in colorful syrups — vie for ubiquity with other local staples like poke places or lei stands. Over the years, the dessert has taken on decadent, sundae-like proportions. Mammoth mounds of featherweight ice can sit atop a bowl of adzuki beans and be smothered in condensed milk and topped with five flavors of syrup, from calamansi to root beer, as well as mochi balls and tangy rust-colored li hing mui powder, made of ground plum skins. Ask a longtime island dweller to recommend a spot, though, and the reasons for their choice tend to go beyond flavors and toppings. The shop’s age, its location and the childhood memories it conjures all carry weight. At the link in our bio, a few creative locals share their favorite places to get shave ice in Hawaii. Written by Matthew Dekneef (@mattdknf ). Photos by Tim Huynh (@th__street ).

For the playwright Michael R. Jackson, the year he turned 30 was “a very lonely, angsty period.” It was 2011. He was living in New York City, working a full-time job at an advertising agency while also creating musical theater projects — and trying to date. “It felt like I was constantly auditioning for these white gay men,” he says. At the link in our bio, @thelivingmichaeljackson — along with 29 other L.G.B.T.Q. artists — recounts more formative memories from his 30th year. Interview by Juan A. Ramírez (@itsnumberjuan ). Video by Justin French (@frenchgold ).

This Pride Month, T asked 30 L.G.B.T.Q. people about the year they turned 30. For the artist Catherine Opie, it was 1991, and she was living in an eight-unit building on the edge of Koreatown in Los Angeles. “We called the place Casa de Estrogen because it was known for housing famous lesbians within the community,” @csopie says. “At one point, [the poet] Eileen Myles lived there; [the model and actress] Jenny Shimizu lived above me. Everybody had motorcycles and went out in leather. We’d ride in a line with fake mustaches on, and that wasn’t something you saw in L.A. in 1991. We were fighting for our ability to play with masculinity, with being feminists, with our sexuality — with everything. It felt like freedom.” Tap the link in our bio to hear more queer artists reflect on their lives at 30. Interview by Nicole Acheampong (@nicole_akosua ). Pictured here: An undated photograph Opie took of her friend Ian in Los Angeles’s Casa de Estrogen. © Catherine Opie, courtesy of Regen Projects, Los Angeles and Lehmann Maupin, New York, Hong Kong and Seoul.

What’s it like to be 30 and queer and an artist? To try to put something meaningful into the world while simultaneously figuring out who you are? This Pride Month, T asked 30 Americans to look back on that age, and the responses constitute both a chronology and a group portrait. Our oldest participant, the novelist John Rechy, turned 30 in 1961, before “gay pride” was a phrase, a concept or much of a possibility. He lived on Hope Street in Downtown Los Angeles, next door to the YMCA. “There was a roof where I could sunbathe and sometimes there were men who sent signals through the windows to arrange meetings for later — part of the whole choreography,” Rechy remembers. “It was also blocks from the headquarters of gay activity, Pershing Square, where you’d find the really fabulous queens. At the time, drag was an arrestable offense, so it was subtle: blush, lipstick, collars up.” Tap the link in our bio to read Rechy’s full story. Interview by Michael Snyder. Photo courtesy of John Rechy.

What does Lady Bunny remember about age 30? “The group Masters at Work put out ‘I Can’t Get No Sleep,’ featuring the singer India, six months after my 30th birthday [in 1993],” she says. “We’d hear it every night, if not twice a night. We’d lip-sync every word. Masters at Work became the soundtrack to my entire 30s.” Six months after the song was released, Little Louie Vega, who’s one half of Masters at Work, and India performed the song at Wigstock, the drag music festival @official_lady_bunny cocreated in the mid-80s. “At the time, ACT UP was demanding better drugs for AIDS patients, and while I didn’t become a politically minded person for another 10 years, it was such a dark time that I felt [Wigstock] could lighten everyone’s load,” she says. “You have to make demands, but you also need a day to remind yourself of what you’re fighting for, of great dance music and silly things and the way it feels to sashay over to the park with a wig on.” For Pride Month, T asked L.G.B.T.Q. artists to look back on their lives at age 30. Tap the link in our bio for more of their stories. Interview by Kate Guadagnino (@k_guad ). Video by Justin French (@frenchgold ).

In honor of Pride Month, T asked 30 creative people to share an indelible memory from the year they turned 30. For the rapper @bigfreedia , it was 2008 and she was performing bounce music — a heavy bass, call-and-response style of hip-hop — at Club Caesar’s in New Orleans. “When I was on the microphone, it was like I had an auditorium of choir members, and everyone was repeating after the pastor. Bounce had been spreading because we as performers were displaced by [Hurricane] Katrina. But it was [also] the perfect way to rebuild the city and recruit people to New Orleans. I could be on the mic in Houston or Atlanta and say to [the audience], ‘It’s time to come home.’” Tap the link in our bio to hear more L.G.B.T.Q. artists reflect on their lives at 30. Interview by Max Berlinger (@isuredontknow ). Photo: @lyleashtonharris .

The fashion designer Willie Norris (@willieherself ) turned 30 in 2020. “My friend, the performer and artist West Dakota, was organizing the first Brooklyn Liberation March [to protest police violence against Black trans people] in June and united a huge group to help — my role was to source and create Black Trans Lives Matter shirts,” she remembers. “I still see those everywhere.” The march changed Norris’s understanding of community. “Until then, I hadn’t been public about my gender,” she says. “This group gave me the self-assuredness to know that what I was feeling was real. It wasn’t a delusion: I had to make that jump [to transition], which at the time seemed huge. It felt like life or death, but now it feels almost negligible.” For Pride Month, T asked 30 L.G.B.T.Q. artists to look back on their lives at age 30. Tap the link in our bio to read all the stories. Interview by Colleen Hamilton (@colleenrhl ). Photo: Courtesy of @yael_malka . Video: Tomas Abad/Getty Images.

When the actor and director BD Wong turned 30, in 1990, he began singing for a cause. “We were in this terribly despairing state of loss from AIDS, but there was something very special happening in the theater community, which was openhearted and fearless,” he says. He began performing at concert benefits for the nonprofit organization Broadway Cares, raising money for AIDS-related causes. “No one in the government was going to lift a finger, and homophobia was all around us, so you had to do it. Even today, you can’t just think, ‘We’ve done it now,’” @wongbd says. “We have to remind ourselves that nothing is guaranteed.” For Pride Month, T interviewed 30 L.G.B.T.Q. subjects about their 30th year. Tap the link in our bio to read all the stories. Interview by John Wogan (@johnnywogan ). Video by Justin French (@frenchgold ).

For Pride Month, we asked L.G.B.T.Q. artists ranging in age from 34 to 93 to share an indelible memory from when they were 30. For most people, it’s a pivotal year — a time when you start to know yourself with greater clarity and to understand what you want and how you want to pursue it. But beyond that, there are as many answers as there are people to ask. Tap the link in our bio to read all the stories. Introduction written by @markharrisnyc . Interviews by Nicole Acheampong (@nicole_akosua ), Max Berlinger (@isuredontknow ), Jason Chen (@chen_jason ), Kate Guadagnino (@k_guad ), Colleen Hamilton (@colleenrhl ), Juan A. Ramírez (@itsnumberjuan ), @cocoromack , Michael Snyder and John Wogan (@johnnywogan ). Video by Justin French (@frenchgold ).

What’s it like to be 30 and queer and an artist? To try to put something meaningful into the world while simultaneously figuring out who you are? This Pride Month, T asked 30 Americans to look back on that age, creating a collection of memories that also serves as a multivalent gay history from almost a decade before Stonewall to the day before yesterday. Tap the link in our bio to hear more L.G.B.T.Q. artists reflect on their lives at 30. Introduction written by @markharrisnyc . Interviews by Nicole Acheampong (@nicole_akosua ), Max Berlinger (@isuredontknow ), Jason Chen (@chen_jason ), Kate Guadagnino (@k_guad ), Colleen Hamilton (@colleenrhl ), Juan A. Ramírez (@itsnumberjuan ), @cocoromack , Michael Snyder and John Wogan (@johnnywogan ). Pictured here: The actor and director Joe Mantello (in blue sweatshirt) with his “Angels in America” cast on a float in the 1993 New York City Pride Parade. Photo courtesy of Joe Mantello. A still from a 2024 video portrait made by T of the artist and writer @julianahuxtable . Video by Justin French (@frenchgold ). The creative director and designer @jennalyonsnyc (left) with a friend in 1998. Photo courtesy of Jenna Lyons. The choreographer Bill T. Jones (@billtjonesarniezaneco ) with his partner Arnie Zane in 1984. Photo: Jack Mitchell/Getty Images The actor and director BD Wong (@wongbd ) in his “M Butterfly” dressing room at New York's Eugene O'Neill Theatre in 1988. Courtesy of BD Wong. A still from a 2024 video portrait made by T of the multimedia and performance artist Pat Oleszko. Video by Justin French.

Matariki, the Maori New Year, will be officially observed in New Zealand on June 28. Ahead of the holiday, we asked Maori creatives how they mark the occasion. The choreographer @mosspatterson , artistic director of the New Zealand Dance Company (@nzdanceco ), travels home to the country’s central North Island, where he blesses his greenstone adornments known as taonga (precious objects) at Lake Taupō. “I sit silently beside our sacred lakes to celebrate and reflect on Matariki and the year that’s been,” he says. The chef Kia Kanuta (@th.bro.kia ), who runs the restaurant Ada (@ada_akl ) in Auckland, will be making the Maori dish Toroi, made of pickled mussels and fermented watercress. “In this particular batch I used charcoal oil, shallot and white balsamic to elevate a very traditional dish my late father would eat,” Kanuta says. He also plans to invite friends and family to sing waiata (songs) at the restaurant “as a blessing of good fortune to our guests.” Monique Fiso (@chefmomofiso ), a chef and author whose book, “Hiakai,” highlights the history of Maori cuisine alongside recipes and foraging notes, honors Matariki with a hākari, or celebratory feast. Pictured here are dishes of hers with ingredients prominent in Maori food, such as harakeke (New Zealand flax) seed focaccia and marinated tuangi (a mollusk) with endive and oil from the kawakawa plant. #TRituals