The children yearn for anonymity
If the digital apocalypse came and the internet vanished forever, what would you be wearing?
I'm gonna get real clichéd here. The cycle of wanting 15 minutes of fame to 15 minutes of privacy is now complete.
The good that legacy social media has provided us has been overwhelmingly outweighed by the bad. What was once sold as platforms to stay connected with loved ones or meet new people and share pictures of cats, outfits, and holidays has been weaponized to run smear campaigns, manipulate false information as fact, and become a breeding ground for hate.
The online realm now feels like a digital medieval town square to throw rotten fruit at anyone who doesn't agree with an opinion or fit into societal beauty and body standards. Meanwhile, keyboard warriors using free speech as a free pass to peddle gross bullshit can waltz by unregulated and unscathed.
Unplugging from traditional social media has become viewed as a luxury and an act of self-care. As we know, these legacy platforms can really do a number on your mental health. Sure, Substack is still a form of social media, though it is seen as more of a safe space that people are flocking to in droves over Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, or the other one previously known as Twitter.
As we start to place more value in our offline lives, I'm curious how that will impact the way we dress.
Offline dressing online
Candid-style content has long been the favored aesthetic, as anything too staged feels unnatural in the already unnatural setting. See how Google searches for selfies have nosedived since 2015-16.
Celebrities on their days off, incognito, and going about their daily activities have taken up prime real estate on our mood boards filed under effortless style. Think Princess Di’s bike shorts and sweatshirt formula and Jeremy Allen White cradling flowers at farmer’s markets. Unassuming settings like bodegas, grocery stores, magazine stands, laundromats, and airports have served as contrasting backdrops to high fashion editorials and OOTD posts.
Further romanticizing low-profile dressing, Bottega Veneta licensed paparazzi shots of A$AP Rocky jogging and Kendall Jenner at a gas station for its Pre-Spring 2024 campaign. Since everything needs to have a name in the 2020s, the term Errandcore found its way into our vocabs following Balenciaga’s FW24 show featuring branded paper bags and keep cups in collaboration with Erewhon.
These examples also feed into our obsession with off-duty looks. On TikTok, this has been distilled into “how to dress like a 90s supermodel on her day off” tutorials or the Hailey Bieber playbook of light-wash denim, white tees and oversized leather jackets. I’m sure the irony that we’re posting outfits for offline errands online isn’t lost on anyone.
Tech regression
At the same time, we’re digitally fatigued and struggling to keep up with new tech advances. The algorithm is becoming the dictator of taste, and instead of the promise of AI making our lives easier, it’s hindering creatives’ ability to create.
Coming of age in the backdrop of the Lucy/Drew/Cameron Charlie’s Angels reboot, I still yearn for a flip phone. And I’m not the only one - Zoë Bernard reported for Vox the resurgence of analog tech, with sales of “dumb phones” without social media or internet access on the rise alongside CDs, vinyl, old cameras and cassette players.
We’re witnessing the second coming of print media. Digital detox retreats are now luxury getaways. The Flinders Street Station photo booth has become Melbourne’s hottest hangout, despite it being there since 1961 (*Stephon voiceover* - “this place has everything, black and white photos, discarded Hungry Jacks wrappers, piss all over the walls…”).
In response to digital saturation, we’ve seen aesthetics and campaigns also taking inspiration from the golden age of the internet, a time when we were hopeful that technology would deliver a better way of life instead of constant surveillance and connectivity.
at Style Analytics found Pinterest searches for “wired headphones outfit” were up over 200% for the past year in the US and UK, while Google searches for iPod Nanos noted an increase in search volume for the first time since 2006.In the Fashion Tingz article, Why Is Fashion So Lo-fi?,
referenced the grainy imagery dominating fashion, from Eckhaus Latta’s FW17 show on VHS to the more recent Addison Rae’s im sorry by Petra Collins campaign for SSENSE.Lo-fi’s dominance is taking it back, way back. Back to the early days of the internet and a time when dial-up tones were the soundtrack of our lives and the biggest social flex was passing notes in class and getting away with it. The lo-fi aesthetic taps into this deep-seated yearning for a simpler era, rejecting today’s hyper-polished digitalness in favour of something more human and gloriously imperfect. - J'Nae Phillips, Why Is Fashion So Lo-fi?, Fashion Tingz
Is a genuine shift away from AI afoot, or is the resurgence of analog tech all just for the aesthetic?
Dressing for anonymity
As we’ve established, being online too much can make you feel like poo. The cult of celebrity is becoming less appealing as we witness the rise and fall of influencers who can’t seem to behave (the latest being Matilda Djerf), while in contrast, the elusiveness of figures like Martin Margiela remains enduring.
Our culture has evolved so that we instantly reach for our camera phones as soon as we see something aesthetically pleasing. Strangers being recorded on the street for content is now the norm in our feeds. While I don’t expect anyone to abandon fantastically eye-popping outfits, will there be a greater desire to dress for 15 minutes of privacy rather than fame?
It could be that I’m reading too much into it, or it could be because it’s winter (in the NH), but I’m seeing commotion around items that can offer a degree of anonymity. Balaclavas to act as face coverings to restore some privacy granted by pandemic-era face masks. Coats with in-built scarves and capes to cocoon yourself in. Oversized sunglasses and XXL bags to hide behind. Maybe Paris Hilton’s anti-paparazzi scarf will see a comeback.
Following an age of oversharing, perhaps the biggest change for emerging fashion influencers will be presenting themselves as faceless online. Hiding behind objects and cropping heads out of photos to shield themselves from the internet’s critiques and paraosical behavior, not just to strike a pose.
Offline dressing automatically conjures up images of the aforementioned Errandcore and off-duty styling rooted in elevated basics, which, to some, are a total snoozefest. I hope that the term evolves and that we start to see less interest in products that purely photograph well online and then serve no other purpose. Replaced instead by demand for fashion that satisfies touch as well as sight and withstands long periods of wear.
Hautties, I’d love to know, if the internet disappeared tomorrow, would you find more freedom in your wardrobe? Would you feel like dressing up at all? Let me know what you’d be wearing in the comments.
Cover image: Jessi Regina, Valeria Sobalera, Chloë Sevigny, Ayo Edebiri, Choux and Julia Fox.
Really enjoyed this article. Thinking along those lines of wanting anonymity, it's one of the reasons Reels can't substitute for Tik Tok. You can build a TT following without knowing anyone from your life, whereas on Instagram, most people have a following with people from their real life. To build a following on Reels risks exposure to those in your real life
The rebellion is here. The internet in its current state of algorithm fate ruined personal style, homogenized cities, and has made the world a lot less interesting. Time to go back outside.