Viewing Fashion Through a Phone with 16 Hours of Screentime
Graphic by Alexis Rico
Dusty screens and sticky desks, pocket protectors, and a mother’s looming watch from above the basement where one would lie. To be chronically online once meant to be a reject, a weirdo, a creep even. It meant that one had given up their connection to chirping birds and the warmth of sunlight on the skin in exchange for access to near-infinite entertainment, communication, and subcultures unimaginable to one’s contemporaries. It was not glamorous; it was not accepted; it was not normal. It was a world that stood in stark contrast to the outside, where the oddest corners of the human psyche could run wild, free from the social shock collar that is the opinion of others. Today, that is not the case. Where it was once unfashionable and odd to be chronically online, it is now comedic, niche, and ever so alluring. Ignore that assignment queen, give yourself a 15-minute break to go on TikTok, and never mind the fact that we both know it will inevitably become an hour faster than you can say, “Oh my gyatt”.
Whether it be Alex Consani breaking it down or Balenciaga triggering the old heads for the fourth time this month, to say fashion is increasingly online would be an understatement. Legacy forms of engaging with the fashion world are niche and have been aestheticized to the point of parody (finding a decent magazine stand nowadays is a Sisyphean task few complete). If a new collection is not on Instagram and an ethnically ambiguous college student doesn't make a TikTok about it, does it actually exist? In order to dissect this phenomenon, let us first set the stage for what it meant to be chronically online in days gone.
Due to relatively recent evolutions in tech, I argue that the chronically online are not a small minority but a silent majority. Whether it be on TikTok, Twitter, or LinkedIn, the very act of being perpetually plugged into the online world is not very different from platform to platform. This was not always the case. The internet used to be a place tied down to a room, desk, and chair often shared amongst families. The family computer was a portal to a whole new world, separate from the real one, where subcultures, inside jokes, and communities that simply did not exist in the real world found a home. Anonymity was the standard and as such users had no need to present themselves in a fashionable way. The user in Gucci from head to toe was treated the same as the user in sweatpants and a tank top stained with spaghetti. Anonymity, therefore, made the act of being chronically online unfashionable. Why would one present fashionably and go through all the steps of doing so if they were just going to sit at home? It was not until the early 2000s when high-definition images began to be supported on a wide scale that the internet could begin to do justice to the efforts that being fashionable entails, but that was already over a decade before internet subcultures and stereotypes had manifested themselves amongst the public. In the years before the fear of going viral due to an embarrassing moment at a club existed and where online discourse remained an incredibly niche thing to know about, the fashionable members of society had no choice but to engage in the real world, whether it be within the industry, with their peers or even strangers across the bar. Fashion, simply put, did not need the internet and the internet rejected the primary forms of engaging with fashion.
Yet another incredible graphic by Alexis Rico
That was all in the past; to say that fashion or any industry in that manner does not need the Internet would be unimaginable to most. Whether it be for design or marketing, the internet, social media, and viral stunts are essential tools for any fashion house worth their price tag. Maison Margiela publishes regular documentaries on their design process; Gucci has collaborated with countless musicians and artists; and Balenciaga exists. Yet, works like these are all on the supplier's side of things and are often carefully directed to be provocative but not too provocative in order to maintain investor confidence.
The real brain rot comes from the consumers; those who switch from their laptop to their phone every twenty minutes, hold a vape over their beds like a hamsters water bottle, the ones who have higher numbers on their screen time than their savings account. These people are not the salt of the earth; they are the coke of the bathroom stall. Simultaneously everywhere and nowhere, they know all about the latest “experimental” (read: trash) art show in Bushwick and the male manipulators in Silverlake. When they go out, images, phrases, reaction gifs, and more flash into their heads like images of war do for a veteran. But is this an ambivalent good or a flop in slay’s clothing? For one, I can’t help but defend some of those with screen times north of 16 hours. What other choice do they have? In-person fashion clubs and communities are difficult to come by if you are not young, live in a major city, or go to university. It may be easy for the NYU transplant to curate a roster of fashionable friends and colleagues, but for the community college warriors in Bakersfield, it's damn near impossible. To be chronically online may be the only way to be hooked up to the greater fashion zeitgeist for some, as fashion is not a cut-and-dry art form one can simply pick up and put down like a Taylor Swift record. Additionally, it's fun! I am not immune to the fashion doom scrolling, gay Halloween TikTok, and the buzzword brain rot my phone feeds me. I, and subsequently many others, do not always want to be Anna Wintour with her endless sophistication and razor-sharp eye for what is in or not. Sometimes it's better to be a little piggy at the trough, feeding off of grwm’s, reviews, and videos of Alex Consani blessing the people of New York with her presence.
The grand majority of fashionable people are in the scene to have fun and express themselves, not to write a 30-page thesis on the complexities of skirt length relative to the last thirty years of Gucci’s storied history. On the contrary, there must be an end to being chronically online at some point. Fashion is an art form far too detailed and complex for me to be 30 years old mindlessly scrolling through Instagram with crumbs in my bed. The online world is a young people’s game, plain and simple. Old heads (read: millennials) quake in their boots at the thought of Demna touching another Balenciaga season; the young celebrate it or at least call it mid and move on. When work, relationships, and the general seriousness of life take over, those nights of drunkenly watching runway shows on your TV with your friends will seem alien, leaving a phone-shaped hole in one’s relationship with fashion. Some will continue their online streak but through more serious websites like Vogue, I-D Magazine, and System. Others will fork out the $20+ to buy a magazine. Some will unfortunately fall out of the game and find a new home at J.Crew, Abercrombie, Uniqlo, and other brands made by and for the average Joe or Josephine. To be chronically online means to be young, as doing so past one’s later years is, in simple terms, sad. The thirty-year-old fashionista ought not to doom school; they should read, watch shows, and engage with fashion on appropriate terms. No one likes to see the old try to play a young man’s game; no, you couldn't have gone pro if things were different when you were young; you're just old.
As much as I hate so-called “trend forecasters” on a deeply spiritual level, I believe speculation over where online fashion discourse will go is more than appropriate. For one, fashion will never not be online going forward. TikToks, memes, and viral stunts are here to stay, whether the fussy critics like it or not. When the car was invented, the horse ranchers who bet on it being a fad were left starving. The same will happen to any house that refuses to at least dip its toes into the online swamp. For every gatekept designer trying to keep things on a need-to-know basis, there is an equal number of influencers jumping at the opportunity to make a video titled “the coolest ___ you've never heard of." Not every fashion house is going to be a Vetements or a Balenciaga; legacy houses like Prada, Valentino, and Rick Owens have made sure to steer clear of the virality others have fed into. Rick Ownes stands out in having a uniquely one-sided relationship with his admirers, detractors, and obsessives. Rick has never been shy to talk to the media; he has an entire section on his website dedicated to archiving all the interviews he has done throughout the years, from as early as 2002. He is a breath of fresh air in an industry defined by brevity and seclusion, an open book in a way. Yet he has never fed into the community he has made for himself. The furthest extent of his acknowledgment of his fans was a System magazine piece where he answered questions from a carefully curated selection of longtime fans. Other than that, his words remain strictly tied to himself, and the interviewer lucky enough to talk to him. Because of his measured accessibility, he has garnered a community rabid with collectors and degenerates alike while maintaining the sanctity that his brand has built up over the years. In essence, Rick Owens stands as a name who can effectively ride the online wave without sacrificing the care and detail he puts into each of his collections. Furthermore, those who do bet the farm on the online race rarely reap meaningful outcomes. For every Marc Jacobs, there is an Alexander Wang. Wang scouted every micro-influencer in New York City for the launch of his bodywear line, quite betting the farm on this campaign on the assumption that in going viral people would suddenly forget that he’s a rapist. That was in 2022 today; his name is more than irrelevant; it's tacky, it's tasteless, it's TJ Maxx, and his attempt to wash away his sins by feeding into the TikTok machine rightfully failed.
My message to you dear reader is the following: send that TikTok, record that grwm, call someone’s outfit trash, doom scroll a little, but don't forget about what is outside. Today, being chronically online is fun and quirky; you can be an Opium son, a Brat daughter, and more. I love myself some phone in bed time as much as any other 19-year-old, but touching grass with those who put that shit on in person is far more important. Rot in person, rot together. <3
