2010s Fashion Blogs and (before) the end of the World

The first blog I ever loved was College Fashion. I was 17, 6 months away from starting college, furiously googling how to dress like I was on Gossip Girl. My high school wardrobe was quite frankly, a mess. I was into experimentation, but I also had little money, lots of hand me downs, and lots of Pacsun and American Eagle from birthdays and back to school mall trips. The combinations I came up with sometimes worked out-like the cute hand me down plaid jumper paired with an AE white polo and my moms boots. But mostly they didn’t. Nothing worked together. I had no basics, nothing that fit me as I tried to shove juniors clothing on my curvy body. But I loved clothes, fashion, aesthetics etc. I loved the Gossip Girl books (and they  are still responsible for my extensive knowledge of couture). When Gossip Girl premiered in 2007 I was enamored with the clothes. I loved Blair and Jenny and even Vanessa.  A weird combination, I know, but I loved the bright elements of Blair’s wardrobe and accessories, but i knew I would never be that proper. Blair’s wardrobe would never be enough to contain my messiness, my obsessions, my love of vintage and weird. 

But still, I googled furiously ,researching dupes of their clothes. Landing on an article about how to dress like Blair from College Fashion. I quickly read all of their articles, obsessing over a huge post called “Wardrobe Essentials for College Girls.” I was obsessed-if I had every item on that list, maybe I could dress in ways that suited my image of myself as a college girl. I bought basic tanks that I had written off as boring, jeans that actually fit, and a few fun scarves and accessories to give my outfits a little bit of personality. I checked every item off that list the summer before college, hoping I would have enough basics to make my wardrobe of weird stuff and high school mall finds work. I convinced my mom to bid on an Andy Warhol tote bag on ebay. I bought a few pairs of skinny jeans (from Pacsun and F21 natch) and cut all of my well worn light washed flairs into cut offs. I bought some basic tees (hanes), plain black tights, and a couple cardigans. And I bought a slouchy beret, a beret that led my crush to declare on the first day of orientation that “you must be a democrat, wearing a hat like that”

College Fashion was the first fashion blog I read and if I am being honest, I still check it occasionally. Every Thursday, I would return to my dorm room after Italian with a muffin and latte and read through “Haute Links,” their weekly roundup. BUt CF led me to other blogs, more personal teen bloggers, girls in their bedrooms and dorm rooms taking photos of their clothes. 

I was still in awe. Of course, my friends at home liked shopping and mall trips were an integral part of hanging out with my grandmother. But I hadn’t known anyone who loved clothes like I did. Blogs were transformative. People liked clothes? And wrote about it online? 

Through CF I discovered teen fashion bloggers like Noel Duan (formerly of Miss Counturable) and Casey Lewis (Teen Fashionista) and Tavi Gevinson (Style Rookie) and Sea of Shoes, who is still posting! I also loved non-teen fashion blogs, by people like Liz Morrow (Delightfully Tacky) and A Clothes Horse. Though they have long since left their teen blogging days behind, I have been following their careers and reading their writing ever since. Duan has created a lifestyle brand for people and their dogs (Artos and Artemis) and after working for Teen Vogue and MTV and creating Clover Letter, Lewis is now giving the world a daily dose of fashion nostalgia via her instagram @thankyouatoosa. And of course, Tavi is still Tavi, even after shutting down Rookie mag at the end of last year. Even more than finding other people who loved clothes and fashion and the O.C. as much as I did, teen fashion blogs introduced me to brilliant teen girls who were great writers, students, bloggers, and interesting people. I watched them grow up as I was growing up too, in awe of their work, of their brains, and of course, of their wardrobes. 

I still have pieces they inspired me to get too: The Cambridge Satchel I bought after seeing Noel Duan post about hers, the Modcloth Traveling cupcake dress I wore at graduation after seeing it featured on Delightfully Tacky. These women don’t know I exist but they became an almost tangible part of my life.

And even though I still follow their writing and their work, I miss them, as they once were,  every single day. 

These blogs were often filled with mirror selfies or awkward outfit pics, details about school or work or boyfriends, and fashion that was still aspirational for my teenage self but not unattainable in the way that fashion had always seemed before, something only the real life Blair Waldorf’s and Serena Van Der Woodson’s could afford.

I’m glad that young women are paid for the content they build on the internet, but I can’t say I don’t miss not knowing what an influencer was. When the most sponsored content my favorite blogs featured involved picking out a cute dress from Modcloth.

The internet is ephemeral and it is hard to get that dose of nostalgia, the reminder that these blogs existed and people read them and loved them and all the girls really did stand like this. I’m devastated by the lack of teen magazines in circulation. But @thankyouatoosa and the internet archive and libraries and pack rats everywhere have back issues. I probably have some in a storage tote somewhere. But blogs disappear. The quick captures on Internet Archive cannot quite revive the magic, though it is still quite fun to glance through them. What’s more, its purely nostalgia filled, like watching Looking for Alaska or reading Again, but Better and getting that tear inducing, heart racing desire for the “lost years” on your Ipod classic, the beginning of so much-writing and blogging and art and laughter-when now it feels like everything is ending, gobbled up into an entire internet of commercials and #sponcon and nobody left standing pigeon toed in a dress with an ipod classic. I’m nostalgic for a time that I shouldn’t be nostalgic for, that was just here a second ago, that seemed fake and commercialized and tech filled even though only nerds had IPhones and IPads were for business men and I stayed up all night on my computer waiting for the Rodarte for Target drop, texting away on the last non-smart phone I had, wearing a scarf and a cardigan and a dress and tights in a way that only a girl in 2010 could wear. 

I’m a millennial, drifting towards thirty, having gone through adolescence with social media, jumping from Xanga to Live Journal to Myspace, crying over my top 8 and picking the perfect emo song to complement my crushes. But by 2010, we had arrived, us millennials, with tumblr and fashion blogs and lookbook and shitty colored tights ripping immediately. 

The internet was a smaller, weirder, better place. 2011 gave us Rookie and The Hairpin and Barack Obama showed a Lion King clip to mock Trump at the Correspondents Dinner. The end of the world was coming, of course, but we couldn’t see it back then. We had no idea.