☆ introducing trendfriends ☆
a new newsletter uncovering cultural trends by Sara Radin & Maria Santa Poggi
Hello all!
Welcome to ☆ trendfriends ☆ a new newsletter all about uncovering cultural trends and spotlighting the under-the-radar creatives shaping the zeitgeist, written by two friends—Maria Santa Poggi and Sara Radin—who are utterly obsessed with culture and, well, trends.
Thank you for subscribing and supporting us on this new venture! Right now, you can expect us in your inbox every Friday but our hope is to ramp this up as we go. We’ll also be posting over on Instagram and TikTok.
After the Fourth of July, summer is fully underway and with it comes a unique set of viral trends that are only set to grow as the humidity rises. We’ve rounded up some of the biggest on our radar right now. Of course, brat summer is taking over everything but we’re here to uncover lesser known trends that are making just as big of an impact.
Here’s what we’re seeing:
Orchids, lilies, and hibiscus flowers are all seemingly everywhere right now. From hair styles and jewelry to cell phone cases and clothes, these delicate flowers are appearing—or ornamenting everything. An evolution from the rosette, we’ve seen these flowers on Blake Lively, who is set to star in the film adaptation of It Ends With Us in which main character Lily Bloom owns a flower shop. The flowers seem to represent feminine power, fertility, and renewal.
The tomato fashion motif is fully underway this summer, in part thanks to the “Loewe tomato meme” that recently went viral, solidifying tomatoes as the latest must-have fruit emblem. Examples include Tyler McGillivary’s tomato tee, Staud’s beaded tomato Tommy bag, Miaou’s Figaro print, seen on Billie Eilish and Emily Ratajkowski and Lisa Says Gah’s Buon Appetito collection.
Since 2023, Tomato Girl Summer has been a TikTok trend playing off of Megan Thee Stallion’s “Hot Girl Summer,” but the trend was a state of mind rather than a clothing aesthetic. The pop of red trend we saw late last year particularly on socks and tights was a precursor to the motif we are seeing now.
Earlier this summer, “Sex and the City” began streaming on Netflix, which sparked a revival of Carrie Bradshaw-inspired outfits. Carrie’s carefree attitude of mixing disparate pieces in one outfit is now inspiring a younger generation to dress however they so please.
As writer Viv Chen pointed out, #satc and #carriebradshaw are popping up all over Depop and being used to describe pieces that embody Carrie as the poster child for “a dramatized version of designer-y girly y2k fashion.” However, as Chen states there’s a difference between dressing like Carrie and looking like Carrie and when they get conflated they can “perpetuate the glorification of whiteness as the aesthetic ideal.” Read her piece on the topic here.
View some of our favorite Carrie videos here, here, and here.
The flip flop debate is scorching hot this summer. Recently, Davis Burleson, host of @siriusxm TikTok Radio Channel 4 and @whatspoppin, stated online, “Fuck it, I’m letting the dogs be free this summer.” In the video, he talks about the debate around wearing flip flops around NYC in the summer and how this year, he’s all for baring his toes. InStyle posted a video about whether open toe shoes are ok in the office. Videos are surfacing online in which folks are reclaiming flip flops as luxury footwear (a la The Row) while others state that they’re “chic.” Maria is team flip flop in the city if the shoe is heeled and Sara is utterly against them no matter the environment.
Women are rocking men’s boxers and sexy lingerie this summer. As jorts continue to reign as the jean trend over denim short-shorts, and bloke-inspired fashion is finding it’s end in the trend cycle; it’s clear the fashion girlies are hellbent on wearing garments, mixing and matching clothing beyond their initial intent. Negligee slips are being worn as summer day dresses and men’s boxers are being worn as trendy day shorts.
The boxer trend is a second wind of the itty-bitty track short craze. Some online are sharing how they source boxers affordably from Old Navy and Uniqlo. Dauan Jacari even collaborated with Berriez on skirts made from boxer shorts. While emerging designer Charlie Beads is making boxer bloomers all the it girls are wearing. Here’s her take on why they’re hot right now:
☆ Shit we love: Rhino piercing has arrived via Annie Blay for Allure; Maybelle Morgan investigated how the body rejects a romantic partner for Dazed; style and cooking creator Kit Keenan baked a cookie using a vintage Easy Bake Oven; Abercrombie unbranded itself and won by Chantal Fernandez for The Cut; Walker Ward made a GRWM and used an inhaler as perfume; Madeline Howard explored how authors are utilizing fragrance to promote upcoming book releases for Coveteur; creator Harry Hill sported archival Vera Bradley at the pool; beauty writer Jessica DeFino says boyhood is trending.
P.S. Did you see Maria’s latest article about outfit tracking for Vogue Business? In it, she discusses how the Notes app became Gen Z’s Clueless outfit generator. Sara also published a story with Teen Vogue about Parson’s new disabled fashion program.
Yours,
☆ trendfriends ☆
Congratulations on the launch of Trendfriends! 💥