Hi People!!!!!
Welcome back to the newsletter! One of my friends complained about its absence over the last few weeks, so I will take that to mean my hiatus has left a gaping hole in each and every one of your lives. But I’m back! For those of you who don’t know, I started a new job at Betches in March and moved to NYC two weeks ago. It has been a very busy, very nerve-wracking, but very exciting period that I’m sure I will over-analyze in a later essay. Now that I finally feel sane enough to sit still and write for more than five minutes at a time, I’m sharing what I’ve observed about TikTok since I joined the app for my new job.
The problem with fashiontok
When TikTok first rose in popularity at the beginning of the pandemic, I was one of those people who stubbornly refused to join. I was sure it was full of dancing and lip syncing thirst traps by people who made my ripe, young 23-year-old self feel like an octogenarian. But when the job application for my new role at Betches required a proficiency in the app, I swallowed my pride, downloaded it, and ate my words within about 10 minutes of scrolling through my “For You” page. Simply put, TikTok is fucking fun. And it’s not just teenagers gazing longingly into the camera while they barely move their mouths to the words of Dua Lipa’s latest song. The vast amount of content and creators and the range they possess is a little bit mind blowing.
If you’ve spent any time on the app, you know it has a terrifyingly impressive algorithm that figures out what types of content you want to see extremely quickly. The app learned that jokes about dating and relationships (for U Up?’s Instagram account), videos about New York City, and fashion-related content are the main themes I’m interested in. Despite being very creepy, this does make the app super entertaining, if not addictive. I could go on and on lamenting the algorithms and the drawbacks of social media as a whole, but for today’s purposes, I’m specifically interested in the types of fashion content that show up in my feed.
The first type of fashion video to start popping up on my feed was the classic haul/unboxing videos you see from a lot of influencers on Instagram and YouTube. Fortunately, these were pretty quickly phased out as I swiped by them without a second thought. As someone who loves shopping, I can see how these types of videos could be entertaining, but this blatant promotion of over-consumption feels very icky to me, especially when most of the video’s commentary just displays each item they bought without any real analysis of why it was purchased or why it’s an interesting/useful/stylish garment. Or maybe I just resent that they either have enough money to buy all this stuff or get it sent to them for free. Regardless, TikTok knows I don’t like them, and for that I am grateful.
The second type of fashion video I’ve noticed on my feed is the OOTD category. Some are obviously better than others depending on the personality and fashion sense of the creator, but they essentially serve the same purpose as my mirror pics on @paulvsthepeople. In the same vein are the “help me get ready for ____” videos which I don’t fully understand because I assume they don’t sit around waiting on comments to come in telling them what to wear. Don’t you have somewhere to be? And who puts on three completely different outfits as options for the day? Seems like a lot of work to me, but like the OOTD videos, they’re just a simple display of the person’s style which I can appreciate. As uncomplicated as they are, and despite the fact that I haven’t found anyone whose style I really love yet, these are probably my favorite types of video on “fashiontok” for reasons that will become clear very soon.
The third category, and the one I’ve clearly been spending way too much time thinking about, is trend videos. These also fall into two different categories. The first is a natural offshoot of the ever-popular listicle where the creator simply lists trends they either love or hate or are tired of seeing with said trend displayed in the background. While these are also entertaining at times (especially the more negative ones that make fun of certain trends opposed to the positive ones that just say each thing is cute over and over), they also get into trouble with the promotion of over-consumption. I know it’s not fun to rail against over-consumption constantly. It’s obviously a big part of fashion, and I’m definitely guilty of it myself. Trends are also just a fact of life. No matter how unique we think we are, we’re going to get inspired by other people, so even if they become less prominent, they will always exist. And I like discussing them! I’ve even written about them on this very newsletter!
The problem with the TikTok trends, however, is their specificity. Often it’s not silhouettes or colors or general vibes they’re listing off as trends; it’s specific items (or copies of that specific item) that they’re deeming in or out. I like to think the bigger trends or the overarching themes of a season are a little more user-friendly. There are ways to work with what you already own and still make it feel fresh and of the moment. But if every influencer on your timeline is wearing/pushing the same Cult Gaia or House of Sunny dress, what’s in style seems much more limited. And while it’s easy enough to write off one person’s opinion of a trend without much thought, the context of TikTok makes a few people’s opinions feel much bigger and more widely-shared than they actually are. Social media algorithms all have the problem of creating echo chambers that reinforce the opinions you already lean toward, and while this is a much bigger problem for political misinformation, it’s also relevant in fashion. The platforms quickly learn which types of style you’re drawn to and feed you more of that content, slowly giving the impression that it’s the only aesthetic in style because (assuming you get most of your style inspiration from social media as I believe many of us do these days) it’s the only one you’re seeing. Of course the goal of these algorithms is to perfectly tailor content to your likes and dislikes, so in some ways it’s nice. Maybe you’ll never have to scroll past an outfit you don’t like again. But it also severely narrows the scope of what you might perceive as fashionable or acceptable, heightening the pressure to fit into this group that feels like the entire internet because of the way algorithms limit your visibility but is actually a very small number of people.
While this narrowing effect is a problem on all social media platforms, at least Instagram and Pinterest give you some illusion of choice. On their Explore pages, you see many different posts at once, and you can choose which ones you want to scroll further on. On TikTok, it’s one long stream of videos that you either watch to the end or don’t. This limits your peripheral vision to what else is out there on the platform and probably makes the number of people whose social media bubbles look like yours even smaller. And when trends rise and fall within a very small subset of the population, the trend cycle accelerates, increasing consumerism, wastefulness, and continual dissatisfaction with your style. Basically, the smaller the in-group, the faster everyone hops on a trend, and the sooner it feels dated and people on TikTok start calling it cheugy. It’d be one thing if one set of trends was speeding up, but because each of our social media bubbles has a different aesthetic, they each give more weight to what could potentially be an entirely different set of trends, infinitely increasing the pressure for consumption.
That was all very meta and rant-y so here’s a real-world example. If you’ve spoken to me for even five minutes you probably know that I went to summer camp every June for ten years straight. Each year, there were new camp trends that caught on rapidly, and because it was such a small group that was completely isolated from the outside world, it felt very important to be in on all of them. The size of the group also meant that something that was in one summer would be out the next, but if you looked at the summer attire of young girls as a whole, these trends probably took years to rise and fall. Plus, there were probably entirely different trends at other summer camps that girls begged and pleaded with their parents to buy them. But for the month of June, Camp Mystic was my world and the only place I cared about fitting in, much like our social media feeds can feel like the whole world when they’re actually only a very small slice of it. Does that make sense? Do I sound like a complete lunatic? I hope you get the point because now I’m off to the other side of trend TikTok...
Across the aisle, there are the creators who are very aware of the over-consumption promoted by TikTok’s obsession with trends and spend a lot of time talking about the harm it causes (much like I have just done above). Which is great! I think opening people’s eyes to how trends affect our style and purchases is an important first step in the journey, but I think they miss the solution a lot of the time which is, of course, to discover your personal style and stop leaning on trends as a coolness crutch. Instead they’ll tell you which trends are worth investing in, which items are trend-less, how to thrift certain trends, etc. These are all great videos, but they’re still pursuing the wrong goal, still serving the master that is the fashion cycle. Occasionally I’ll hear mentions of personal style, but no one’s really deep diving into it the way Amy Smilovic or Leandra Medine do, and without that in-depth conversation, it can be an intimidating idea.
While I wait on the Man Repeller of TikTok to emerge, I have a couple pieces of advice. First, I’d recommend following accounts that post a variety of different styles and aesthetics, so that at least you’re getting regular reminders that not everyone on the planet owns that one top. My personal favorites are @watchingnewyork, @newyorkersinthecity, @parisiensinparis, @romans.in.rome, @milanesiamilano, and @londonersinlondon_ (pretty sure there’s one for every major city at this point), all of which post street style photos of normal people going about their days. They aren’t performing style for social media like so many influencers and celebrities, they’re just existing in it. This is what style should be, expressing yourself through fashion regardless of the audience, and I think you’ll begin to notice that how you feel about someone’s outfit has little to nothing to do with how “on trend” it is.
My second, more annoying suggestion is to just get off the freaking internet for a bit. Look up from your phone and pay attention to what the people around you are actually wearing. I just moved to New York a few weeks ago, and I’ve already been so inspired by people watching. The sheer variety of style you see walking the streets is incredible and looks nothing like scrolling through my For You page on TikTok where it can feel like I’m seeing the same outfit over and over again. If you’re saying to yourself, “well I don’t live in a cool city like New York, the people here dress like shit,” that’s fine too! You should still take it in. Hopefully, if you’re feeling pressure to keep up with the trendsetters, you can look around and see that those trends aren’t as pervasive or important as they may feel online. Chances are, the people around you won’t know the difference if you’re “on trend” or not, so you might as well dress for your damn self.
P.S. I’m painfully aware of the irony that this essay is entirely based on my own experience on TikTok and therefore completely shaped by my own social media bubble, but I still think it’s sound advice even if you’re For You page looks completely different from mine. And if that’s the case, I’d love for you to tell me what yours looks like in the comments!!!!!
Questions of the week
How to add personality/interest to a summer outfit when its 100 degrees in texas and all you wanna wear is 2 oz of clothing!!
I will give a short answer to this now and maybe provide a longer answer as I start to melt with the rising temperatures in NYC. My maybe sort of chaotic strategy for getting dressed in the summer is to pick two seemingly random items of clothing, preferably shorts and a tank top for temperature purposes, and simply force them to work together through will power and a ton of accessories. I am completely convinced that if you add enough jewelry/hats/scarves/etc. and the right shoes and bag, you can make any two items work together. This is obviously much more interesting than focusing on what “matches,” and it greatly increases your number of outfit possibilities. Would you want to see some examples of this?? LMK.
My questions for you
Are you on TikTok? What does your For You page look like? Have you found fashion creators you love on the app? If so, who are they? Let me know any or all of this in the comments!
Recs of the week
This beautiful rack that my lovely boyfriend installed for me. Without it, I would simply drown in the clothes spilling out from my NYC closet. I seriously can’t stop admiring it.
I have only watched the first three episodes of Hacks but am thoroughly enjoying it so far. (Available on HBO.)
If you’re staying the night in Knoxville, TN as I did on my drive from Texas to New York, the rooms at the Residence Inn on Langley Place are bigger than my new apartment, and ours even had a fireplace! 10/10.
Haley Nahman’s recent newsletter on Instagram which sums up many of my other issues with social media not listed above. I recommend a piece of her writing every other newsletter, so if you haven’t started following her yet, I don’t know what you’re doing.
That’s all for me this week folks! Like I said before, I’m finally feeling settled in enough to start writing regularly, so I’m hoping to have this newsletter out weekly again. Expect it in your inbox sometime between Tuesday nights and Wednesday mornings. As always, thank you so much for reading. It means the world to me! It would mean even more if you shared it with a friend, please and thank you. See you next week!
Cheers,
Maddy
TikTok’s obsession with trends
Was just wishing to hear your “voice!” Thanks for all the great advice and wise beyond your years counsel!