In my twee era (again)
Wherever I look (and yes, I mostly look into lifestyle media), people are talking about 2013. Some are declaring the death of millennial aesthetics and making fun of early 2010s fashion, while others are trying to bring indie sleaze back.
There are so many takes on that era online — you've probably seen too many. Unfortunately, I ALSO feel uniquely equipped to say things about 2013, twee revival, and the aftermath of hipster culture. I spent that year having one of the most quintessentially millennial experiences possible — working at a clickbait farm and reporting on art, design, and tech. This online publication had all the trappings of a typical hip media enterprise, including eccentric editors, Bacardi-sponsored parties, and a grueling schedule that enabled our collective chase for eyeballs.
I don't feel particularly nostalgic for that time. The pay was low, and we haven't figured out that one could have work-life balance or care for one's mental health yet. It took me and many colleagues several years to process what happened. We all found out that being terminally online and growing up in public isn't good for one's psyche (surprise!). BUT I don't feel any contempt towards 2013 either. Narrowing down all the conversations about millennials to the criticism of Harry Potter fans, skinny jeans, and mockery of words like "adulting" doesn't seem particularly smart.
I decided to review some of the books and articles that offer a more nuanced analysis of millennial culture and what we can make of 2013 a decade later.
Twee by Marc Spitz
A good book that goes into great detail describing the main cultural influences that shaped twee/hipster sensibility. Spitz does a great job of explaining how certain postwar influences, such as Sylvia Plath's prose, The Smiths' albums, and Maurice Sendak's books, shaped an "ever-gentler boys and girls with epicurean taste.”
I love how concise and accurate this description of twee sensibility is:
Beauty over ugliness.
A sharp, almost incapacitating awareness of darkness, death, and cruelty, which clashes with a steadfast focus on our essential goodness.
A tether to childhood and its attendant innocence and lack of greed.
The utter dispensing with of "cool" as it's conventionally known, often in favor of a kind of fetishization of the nerd, the geek, the dork, the virgin.
A healthy suspicion of adulthood.
An interest in sex but a wariness and shyness when it comes to the deed.
A lust for knowledge, whether it's the sequence of an al-bum, the supporting players in an old Hal Ashby or Robert Altman film, the lesser-known Judy Blume books, or how to grow the perfect purple, Italian, or Chinese eggplant of orange cauliflower.
The cultivation of a passion project, whether it's a band, a zine, an Indie film, a website, or a food or clothing company. Whatever it is, in the eye of the Twee it is a force of good and something to live for.
Lizzie Fitch & Ryan Trecartin: Whether Line by Francesco Spampinato
A beautiful art book dedicated to one of the largest projects created by Ryan Trecartin — a 32-acre "queer playground" in Athens, Ohio. I discovered Trecartin's work around 2012. A decade ago, his videos and collaborations with his fellow artists, designers, and actors felt like the most interesting commentary on the life we live on social media. A decade later, they still seem as powerful — a premonition of video-centric social platforms like TikTok, modern celebrity and the early 2020s fashion.
I remember interviewing (now well-known) fashion mogul Telfar Clemens in 2013, a year before he released his famous handbag, the "Bushwick Birkin." At the time, he was working as a costume designer for Trecartin's movies — both their early 2010s works and large-scale Whether Line inspired a whole generation of millennial and Gen Z artists and their self-aware, zany, highly referential aesthetics.
The Premium Mediocre Life of Maya Millennial by
An influential essay by an independent researcher and consultant, Venkatesh Rao, that explores the connection between millennial lifestyle choices (that are so often mocked by Gen Z) and the economic conditions of the past 15 years:
Premium mediocre is the finest bottle of wine at Olive Garden. Premium mediocre is cupcakes and froyo. Premium mediocre is “truffle” oil on anything (no actual truffles are harmed in the making of “truffle” oil), and extra-leg-room seats in Economy. Premium mediocre is cruise ships, artisan pizza, Game of Thrones, and The Bellagio.Premium mediocre is food that Instagrams better than it tastes.
[...] In a world where actual mobility is both difficult and strongly dependent on luck, but there is a widely performed (but not widely believed) false narrative of pure meritocracy, it pays to signal apparent control over your destiny, while actually playing by the speculation rules of a casino economy.
Mercury Retrograde by Emily Segal and Sleeveless: Fashion, Image, Media, New York 2011–2019 by
Two books that compliment each other really well. Segal, a co-founder of the influential trend forecasting group K-HOLE, crafted a fictionalized narrative set in early 2010s New York City, while Stagg offers a non-fiction interpretation of the same period. Both books are coming-of-age stories that explore a common driving force among millennial protagonists — a desire to be upwardly mobile AND creative, “make big money writing poems,” work for a tech giant and win. Segal writes:
What made me feel the worst was that I had opted in: I was there of my own free will. There being eXe, that epoch, that period of my life and career. And once in, I really wanted to win. Yeah, that’s the part that made me feel the worst. Then the barnacle on top of it: I had some deep competitive need to make it “count” as an artwork, which I ended up not even understanding myself. Why did my art have to win before it even existed? What was the point of organizing your whole life around an art gesture that not even your closest friends and family understand? Why spend your time driven witless and tormented by confusion at somebody else’s job? It had been a grave conflation of the theoretical and the everyday.
Please, share your book recommendations, favorite nostalgic indie sleaze accounts, and favorite Telfar bag colorways in the comments. See you next week!