Clean girl goes sleaze
A fashion forecast for 2024?
Having gained insurmountable momentum over the past three years, trend cycles are travelling at a new speed. Gone are the days of decade-defining fashion, for how can a period be definitive of something when we are in different “eras” almost every other week? As a result, trend predictions have become a rather challenging – and dare I say, redundant – endeavour as we begin to phase out of trends faster than Shein can make the clothes for them.
Nonetheless, I will be attempting to do exactly that in today’s newsletter. Based on my observations (spending way too much time on the internet) and logic (pure intuition), I think the indie sleaze is coming back this year.
Before you groan and hover to close the tab, let me be clear that I am not inferring a full revival of the beloved era. There is a twist to mine. Stick around to find out.
The past three years
Let us reflect for a moment on the fashion scene of the 2020s thus far. While we may have gone through almost every trend in existence, at its core lies the “clean girl aesthetic”, which centres around looking neat and, well, clean. It is best represented by doodahs like slicked-back buns, dewy and light makeup, Glossier, Replica’s Bubble Bath, minimalistic gold jewellery, and some green drink.
Every trend that came and went has been contorted to fit this aesthetic. Even those which at its very nature should be messy and grimy (like blokecore and the rockstar GF) has been refined with a touch of clean girl to it. If we were to truly embrace those “aesthetics”, we wouldn’t have looked like we showered.
Someway, somehow, I think covid is responsible for this. I know we blame covid for everything, but I have observed a direct correlation between the rise of the clean girl aesthetic and the height of covid. One obvious reason is that we were feared into being clean and forced to stay inside. And because “everyone was staying inside and not getting ready beyond some brow gel, mascara and moisturiser for a long time”, so begins our obsession with cleanliness, neatness, and order.
Where we’re heading
But a couple of years have passed since the pandemic. Those “stand 1.5 meters apart” posters are no longer directives, only half torn remnants of a horrific past. People are not as neurotic about cleanliness anymore, just itching to get out and live again.
However, instead of moving forward, I feel like we are regressing as life before the pandemic becomes a constant point of reference. Not only has there been a surge in media about the early 2000s and the 2010s, but we are also actively yearning for it (read Halima Jibril’s article on this here) and trying desperately to reconstruct the lifestyles we had then.
This eagerness to go out and be a little hedonistic, mixed with a longing for a bygone era has led me to believe that the indie sleaze is coming back, because no period is more chaotic and messy than the indie sleaze.
The evidence
Ok, you caught me, I am not basing my claim purely off intuition – to do so would be an offence to my education. So, here are some evidence to support my claim.
As mentioned earlier, the media has taken quite a liking towards the early 2000s and 2010s. One piece of media that has been taking the film and fashion world by storm is Emerald Fennel’s sexy and twisted, Saltburn. While it being set in 2006 is enough proof that we are heading towards the sleaze, one character in particular cements it: Venetia Catton.
Venetia (played by Alison Oliver) is the embodiment of the indie sleaze, from her smudgy eyeliner and grown out roots to her party girl personality. She has become a fixture on the internet with social media users posting Venetia from Saltburn makeup tutorials and photo slides of outfits inspired by her. This fascination with the character and her style proves that we are ready to embrace the sleaze again.
Other evidence pointing towards a return of the indie sleaze includes:
The resurgence of digicams and flash photography.
Alexa Chung being the internet’s It girl again (though I don’t think she ever stopped, she has and always will be THAT girl).
The Strokes, Arctic Monkeys, MGMT, self-titled era The 1975 trending on TikTok.
Ballet flats are back.
Ok, but, what is “indie sleaze”?
I’ve talked a lot about the indie sleaze without ever actually explaining it to you. And honestly, I might have a difficult time trying to do so because I never actually lived it – I was in primary school at the height of it all. Everything I know about the indie sleaze, I know from observing my sisters, and what I know was that there were a lot of graphic tees, side-swept bangs, headbands across the forehead, moustache imagery, dirty Converse, and beat-up ballet flats involved.
To me, this era is as much an essence – an idea in my head – as it is a tangible cultural movement. Even Vice, a publication that has captured much of the indie sleaze scene as it was happening, had a difficult time coming up with a definitive understanding of this era. Nonetheless, I will try.
Influenced heavily by the fashion of indie rock bands like The Strokes and Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the indie sleaze can be “characterised by an affordable, messy and lethargic take on vintage fashion styles”. It was popular around 2006 to 2012, and is often tied to the hipster subculture, which was also rife at the time. As such, you would find people sporting headbands à la Richie Tenenbaum, non-prescription glasses, grunge-esque outfits often purchased from Topshop or the thrift, wrists stacked with silicone bracelets and festival passes, shorts over tights, unwashed, greasy hair, and messy make-up.
Very grimy, very unpolished, yet effortlessly cool.
People also looked perpetually sweaty during this time. My sisters and I have deduced that it’s probably because underground concerts (and parties) were huge then, so people would often emerge from these cramped, poorly-ventilated spaces drenched in sweat. Then there’s the flash photography, which I believe enhances the shine of the sweat.
Most importantly, there was no formula to dressing, you simply threw on whatever it was you could find on your bedroom floor. There was no such thing as dressing your “visual weight” (whatever that means), and no such thing as the sandwich method. In the words of indie sleaze icon, Alexa Chung, it was “like a fancy-dress party where the theme was drugs”.
Key figures
Influencer culture was pretty much non-existent. The closest thing you had to an influencer back in the 2010s were bloggers and even then, they weren’t as ubiquitous as influencers today. So, to become an It girl/boy you had to actually earn it (except for the nepo babies, some things just don’t change). Many were rockstars, models, and actresses/actors, some were DJs and bloggers.
Here are some key figures of the indie sleaze:
Not to be mistaken with the Tumblr era
After the end of the indie sleaze came the Tumblr era. As the immediate successor, it carries with it many elements of the indie sleaze, thus it can be quite easy to mix up the two.
However, as someone who did grow up in the Tumblr era, I am here to tell you that they are not the same thing. Besides the music (which was dominated by artists like The 1975, Lorde, Lana Del Rey, The Neighbourhood, Sky Ferreira, Frank Ocean and later, Brockhampton, Rex Orange County, etc.), its sartorial aesthetic was also quite different from that of the indie sleaze.
It was more moody. The soft grunge aesthetic was huge and teens dressed themselves primarily in hues of black, grey, and white. American Apparel’s tennis skirt, flower crowns, chokers, jelly shoes, Doc Martens, Maybelline Baby Lips, and that one alien ringer tee were highly sought after items. Fashion was becoming homogenous.
An image that best represents the fashion of 2014 Tumblr is this:
I genuinely want to know what these kids are up to now. Maybe, like me, they cry to Ribs every birthday, trudging through the tumult of their early 20s and longing for days spent reblogging photos of Alexa Chung and The 1975 lyrics on Tumblr. Unlike the hedonistic indie sleaze, the Tumblr era was rather bound by melancholia.
Verdict
Chronologically, it makes sense that after the revival of the Y2K aesthetic, we would want to bring back the indie sleaze. However, I don’t think a full on revival would be possible. And this is because we lack one thing that was quintessential to that era: unabashed hedonism.
One cannot truly indulge in hedonistic endeavours if one is constantly worried about the watchful gaze of Big Brother. As we become more and more of a surveillance state thanks to our obsession with documenting everything and everyone (yes, even random people for some reason), it is near impossible to truly have fun and be carefree.
But, in terms of fashion, yes, maybe we can emulate the styles of the indie sleaze, but not without making it fit the neatness and order of the clean girl aesthetic. We have become sooooo refined, remember? Either way, I look forward to seeing this generation’s interpretation of a celebrated era.
Time to go snoop in my sister’s closet for her band tees and moustache ring.
yeah it's never actually coming back - the hedonism is gone but so is the music (the 'indie' in 'indie sleaze'), without those it's just a costume party calling itself a hashtag.
Having lived through those years, they were also pretty grungy, I can't imagine any of those 00s hipster girls seeing the idea of a Tiktok 'clean girl' or the slicked-back bun crowd as anything other than virtuous killjoy hell lol.