Looking at any short-form content on an average Tuesday night, I come across at least ten different ‘ask your friend which vibe are you’ edits. They usually show drinks of different colours, different kinds of famous sights, and lots and lots of clothes. Another ten videos that follow these edits are: ‘Discover your aesthetic,’ ‘Dress as your Venus sign,’ and ‘How to get the office siren look,’ which is just a hot girl in glasses, so maybe let’s not. And yes, I am entertained and engaged, but at some point, almost on instinct, my finger taps my phone, exiting the app and slowly creeping to a Home Screen folder full of online retailers.

The funny thing is that the more aesthetic videos I watch, the more my bank account empties. Well, not so funny for me, but if you can’t cry, laugh, or whatever. Another funny (but not so funny) thing is that no matter how many items I bought based on different aesthetics carefully curated by the all-seeing algorithm, they have never made me feel any better about myself or my style. Finally, after an embarrassingly long time, I realised one simple truth: style and aesthetics are two different things. I needed to find a style that would make me feel good, confident, and, most importantly, feel like myself, not like a cosplay of a trend I discovered online. So today, I want to discuss how finding my style helped me feel like I no longer need to change my aesthetic every time I start to doubt myself and how edits of different ‘vibes’ are just consumerist traps packaged in a cute and easily digestible package.

Let’s start at the beginning and set the stage. It was the year 2015, and the aesthetic inspiration in question was none other than Miss Kylie Jenner. Because aesthetic mania did not start with TikTok edits, it was made more apparent by the sheer number of videos posted in the years that the platform has been around. Like many other easily influenced teens, I watched the King Kylie aesthetic take over the internet. So, like many others, I took my most cropped top and my most ripped jeans, tied a flannel around my waist, and not going to lie, for a moment, I felt like the coolest bitch in the world. When you just begin and renew your style based on one celebrity or another, you usually feel really good about yourself; you feel like you have finally found something that makes you feel confident. The problem with that is, while the feeling of being one with the trend is fun while it lasts, it does not last long. Soon enough, one aesthetic will be replaced by the other, and you will be left feeling outdated, lost and confused about all the giant holes you have cut out in your jeans. By the time the King Kylie era ended, I was left with items that no longer went together and a question, ‘How did I ever think they went together?’.

For a while after that, feeling disconnected from fashion trends, my style could only be compared to how a 90s high school rom-com protagonist dresses before she gets a fairly problematic makeover sponsored by a captain of some sort of sports team. Unlike that protagonist, though, I didn’t get my prom queen moment; instead, I got a couple of friends with a great sense of style. Instead of trying to get advice and inspiration from them, though, I slowly started to mirror them. That did not end so well either, since even though aesthetic edits were not there, everything around me still heavily influenced me. As I would soon learn again, being influenced by a style without adjusting it to fit yourself never serves you well.

Floating around in the confusion of pairing chunky sneakers with ballerina skirts (and not in a cute way), I found my saving grace: Euphoria Core. It’s fair to say that I was among the confused and disappointed viewers of season 2, but when the show just came on the air, my passion for matching sequin sets and tiny skirts was unmatched. Then, somewhere between the two lockdowns, my friends and I threw a 2000s-themed house party. I entered the 2000s core with some low-rise jeans and a baby tee and never left. I drained my bank account, stopping by every Urban Outfitters store I could find. Yet I still felt lost. I could not understand why, even with all my 2000s mood boards, I could not confidently put a good outfit together.

Finally came the seeming answer to all of my problems: TikTok. After spending a couple of months working closely with my algorithm and putting the words fashion and style in my search bar every week, I was served pretty compilations of aesthetics and fashion styles. I was influenced by every… single.. one. Each time a new fashion girly appeared on my FYP, I immediately began mirroring what she was wearing, and every time there was a new edit of different looks, I was there eating all that shit up.

The story of a young woman being confused about her style isn’t surprising. We are all out here trying to figure ourselves out, and I was also going to. The problem was that every time I changed my style to match one trend or another, I would be compelled to purchase items associated with all these trends and trust me, there were a lot of items. Items were worn for a few months until the trend passed, my confidence returned to zero, and the clothes ended up in the back of my closet. So two years later, all I had to show for my style exploration was a very well-rounded Depop account and the realisation that I was contributing to the socioeconomic issue of overconsumption.

After reaching the point where choosing what to wear became a two-hour struggle that usually ended with me not wanting to even leave the house, I decided to strip myself of the belief that fashion starter packs could ever help me figure myself out. Of course, I still needed help. I scoured social media for influencers whose style I genuinely admired, not just those I followed for trends. I read books and articles on fashion history and building your style. I browsed Pinterest and TikTok for essential wardrobe items to lay the foundation. Little by little, I formed my closet. I sold and donated items I knew I could never wear and limited my purchasing habits to clothes I would wear for a long time. I also contacted companies that recycle clothing to ensure that most of my items will not go to waste. I began to appreciate quality over trendiness. That is not to say that I am not still a part of the all-powerful beast of consumerism; I think we all are. However, the decision to be guided by comfort and timelessness instead of creating a never-ending rotation of cyclical items also helped me change my consumption habits. I realised that to invest in my future self and be responsible, I must research trends and companies, quality, fabrics, and price comparisons.

One could argue that I shouldn’t have gotten rid of all my clothes since fashion is, in fact, cyclical. And to that, I say I didn’t; I kept staple pieces and items I know can come back in the future. However, when it comes to fast fashion, the argument of storing your items for future use becomes redundant. This argument directly depends on longevity, and fast fashion items in their simple form are unreliable and short-lived. If you break it down, fast fashion is also unethical and downright destructive. It contributes to numerous social and environmental issues and fosters the delusion that you can build a new wardrobe every three months with cheap, accessible items. In addition to that, every starter pack collage I saw only had the trendy items, those that have been replicated and rereleased to death by everyone from high and high street fashion brands to Zara and H&M. These items are guaranteed to become obsolete with the current speed of trend turnaround. And for those telling me that fast fashion is often the most affordable fashion, I will say maybe. I will leave a further discussion of the most ecological, responsible and inexpensive way to purchase clothing to the experts. And I will be right there with you, reading or listening to their findings. One thing I don’t claim is to know better.

Before concluding, I want to acknowledge that I had the means to buy trendy items and later invest in long-lasting clothes, which is a privilege. I understand the public frustration with people who have the financial ability to purchase numerous items going on and on about changing their wardrobe and investing in their style. I hope that amid all the talk of new clothes and chasing trends, I conveyed the overwhelming feeling of being lost in the world of fashion and how it truly harmed my self-esteem. I hope this story shows that not knowing is normal and that personal style should be explored and studied, not rushed. I still struggle putting together outfits or styling them properly sometimes.

That being said, I don’t think the style that I have come to is anything groundbreaking. It’s tamer than some of my previous experiments. But it works for me. It makes me feel more confident and comfortable with myself, which is exactly what it should do.