Users have searched the phrase “clean girl aesthetic” across all databases 33,100 times globally as of Aug. 26, 2024, with a clear peak in popularity in the summer of 2022. While the origins of the clean girl aesthetic are unclear, the leading theories are either the popularization of minimalist beauty brands like Glossier or a pendulum swing away from mid-2010s full glam looks.
It’s no secret that more young people are on social media now than ever before, a 17% increase in the last two years alone. The drastic increase in the presence of young people online poses a unique threat. As adults, we know that any photo that looks too good to be true probably is. We can see through the inauthenticity because we’ve been around on the internet for a long time, having grown up seeing PicsArt and FaceTune developed in real-time, but what about the people who logged on a little bit later?
Young people are confusing social media for real life, but can we blame them? If social media is constantly bombarding young people with the idea that they must be clean and coquette all the time, we cannot fault them for manifesting that ideology. I feel for all of these young people — burning their skin, bleaching their clothes and destroying their hair all to fit the standard they’re seeing online: something that isn’t even real or achievable outside of a screen.
Now, it seems the clean girls’ days are numbered.
In June, Charli XCX released her album “brat” — and it took the world by storm. The album explores Charli’s early days as an artist producing electro-pop music and the lyrics are reflective of her struggles with social expectations. Chalri sings about what it was like being a part of the illegal London clubbing scene as a young adult and offers a raw glimpse into the messy world that is the rave scene. Her album can be boiled down into one general idea — authenticity.
These juxtaposing aesthetics are more than just a fashion trend, although that is part of what makes their grip on social media so powerful.
Where the clean girl wears lightweight, dewy makeup looks featuring rosy cheeks, feathered eyebrows, glossy lips and clear brow gel, brat summer embraces bold, slept-in makeup looks with dark eyeliner and glittery powders.
Everything is “just-so” with a clean girl, from her slicked back hair and gold earring stacks to her minimalistic outfits. Brat summer turns that on its head, firing back with messy hair, wired headphones, thrifted outfits and bold accessories.
Most bold of all is the brat green (hex #8ACE00), which ties the purpose of the movement together — it is cool to be your messy, dirty, sweaty and authentic self.
Brat summer needed to happen right when it did. I couldn’t be more grateful for this culture shift from having to be perfectly presentable all the time to it’s perfectly okay to not fit in and just be you. If young people are going to be online, they should absolutely be exposed to the people they look up to being more comfortable sharing the less-clean aspects of themselves. Whether that’s actually showing them that you have pores in your skin and wrinkles in your clothes or making them feel like it’s okay to not look like everyone else, and that it’s infinitely cooler to be authentic, despite it coming with awkward, embarrassing and gross moments. Who wants to win the Clean Girl World Cup by pretending to be something that fundamentally, no one ever can be?