Soft Hermitting and Surveillance Panic

monday long read

Welcome back to After School Monday Edition, a not-so-brief trends debrief for paid subscribers. 🫶

In today’s letter:

• I read 2,500 comments on viral back-to-school TikToks to figure out which shoes are actually cool this year

• Scent stacking, mist mania, and what Gap got wrong

• Generational illiteracy and the world’s first AI-penned bestseller

• The it-girl drink of the summer (it’s not a matcha)

• Gen Z is “Emeril-maxxing” and “nonna-maxxing” (and yet we as a nation are terrified of aging!)

• Yuppie tastes, precariat salaries

• The masstige fragheads Ulta is chasing

• Kids’ birthday tip jars and crowdfunded weddings

• Corporate retreats designed by 10-year-olds

And so, so much more, plus everything I’m buying, reading, and listening to. But first, my favorite TikTok of the week:

@jordanleecormanwe’re going to be having a long conversation on this one #brandymelville #clothinghaul #shoppinghaul #poppunk #punkmusic

Tiktok failed to load.

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WHAT ARE THOSE?!

The back-to-school shoe report

I read every comment — all 2,500 of them — on these two viral back-to-school TikToks to figure out which shoes are actually cool this year.