2023 will be the year we enter #VanillaGirl Era?

Past aesthetic references belonging to one generation are the treasure of the future one, that's why seeing the hashtag #VanillaGirl reach 92.8 million views on TikTok, we get curious even if we don't breathe in the scent of novelty. The aesthetic that has gained great popularity in the recent period is based on the 'image of an ideal vanilla-haired girl who constantly wears soft and extremely cozy clothes. Her closet cannot lack tees by Subdued, striped shirts stolen from the closet of her boyfriend who probably works in finance, Mini Uggs on her feet, and mega wireless headphones worn almost as an extension of her head, while her beauty case is dominated by high-end lip balms and body creams with the warm scent of vanilla and/or cashmere, the same notes that predominate Victoria's Secret's new fragrance, Bare Vanilla, which is obviously a must-have for TikTok's Vanilla Girls. Now that we have all the elements to figure out who a Vanilla Girl is, doesn't it feel like you've seen her before?

The aesthetic is nothing more than the evolution of the Tumblr Girls who today are referred to as "basic," but in the first decade of the 2000s were the poster girls for Brandy & Melville and American Apparel, always dressed in simple and timeless garments, with an aesthetic as comforting and sweet as the clothes we wear in the winter time and the features of their faces as little girls who grew up. If the dominant aesthetic of 2022 was the "Dark Feminine Aesthetic," which hymns to taking back control of one's femininity and that it is possible to enforce one's opinions even in a miniskirt, in 2023 we may see a split being created between the authoritarian figure of a mysterious femme fatale and to a softer aesthetic femininity that still inspires an allure of elitist wealth. The reason for not heralding a "vanillification" of current aesthetics is that like the much-talked-about Clean Girls, the Vanilla Girls share only a list of garments and products to achieve an ideal aesthetic, not values and thoughts with social adherence that can create meaningful discourse for some community. The Vanilla Girls are destined to remain an idea to create catchy-like content on TikTok and buy products that can make one's aesthetic "sweeter" with milky, vanilla colors, but not to fundamentally change the way someone dresses and wears makeup, because the trend lacks substance. Another slightly controversial aspect of the trend is that the Vanilla imagery represents predominantly white girls of high social status, with access to premium products or otherwise directed toward a luxury aesthetic, on par with Sporty & Rich to be clear.

If we think that "vanilla " is also used to express a concept in a sweetened way according to Urban Dictionary, the term has always taken on a reductive hint that classifies the object associated with it as trivial and simple as vanilla ice cream. In web culture - or perhaps it would be better to say porn culture -"vanilla sex" is in fact the label used to describe normal sexual approaches without any particular kink. The latter had been denigrated on TikTok with the phenomenon of vanilla shaming, in which e-girls and e-boys pointed out as boring those who did not have a fun sex life, turning the tables on the stigmatization of BSDM practices. Although in the aesthetic that echoes at Old Money, based on warm colors and the softness of the materials worn, there is no mention of sex, the Vanilla Girl Aesthetic is the fashion response that fully embraces the BSDM imagery. Those who do not like to wear studs and latex, however, do not communicate values of a subculture that aims to be recognized and normalized, and is therefore more content-free. Is the aesthetic destined to be tucked away in the trend closet at the first warm weather? For the time being, it is embraced as a hot cover by celebrities such as Gigi Hadid and Emily Ratajkowski, who favor the butter color and brown palette this winter season.