did anyone "stay weird"?

a sartorial inquiry into "weirdness" from brandy melville to rick owens

A survey of the most prolific images from my tumblr era: the celine micro luggage bag, liam & miley paparazzi photos and the brandy melville “stay weird” shirt. The early 2010s were the cara delevigne golden era of weirdness: a bit off-kilter but still palatable to luxury brands and suburban teenagers looking to be edgy.

Weirdness is an american ideal in theory. That was my prevailing thought while watching Wicked with my parents a few weekends ago. In the same way courage and loyalty are virtues that are extolled in coming-of-age movies, embracing your inner misfit is a celebrated hollywood trope. From Harry Potter and Matilda to The Devil Wears Prada and Mean Girls — individualism reigns as the new western religion.

the backbone of my tumblr days

The idea of embracing your weirdness is relatable because of course, everyone thinks that they’re a little weird. But in practice, it’s more and more difficult to stay connected to our inner weirdos in a world that is algorithmically reduced to the lowest common denominator.

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A few weeks ago, the New York Times published an article profiling kiko kostavinov proclaiming “fashion’s last great weirdo”. The crux of the article is the constant pull for independent designers between art and commerce — specifically with building a commercially successful brand while creating clothes that push the envelope of design.

The brands appeal is its uncompromising vision of whimsy and weird while maintaining a keen eye for technical details. But even for Kiko, it would be insincere and impractical to completely deride financial aspirations. After all, he’s a man of ambition with employees to pay.

But there is something to be said about the desire to build something decidedly weird and innovative and enduring in a world of quiet luxury and neutral-colored minimalism.

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An easy answer to conformity is rebellion. Vivian Westwood is the embodiment of this — I saw a clip on tiktok from an interview with VW where she states simply, that she doesn’t believe that popular culture exists — nothing can add to culture if it’s popular: anything worthwhile can only be known and appreciated by a minority.

Vivienne Westwood SS94

On the other hand, I recently heard rick owens describe his philosophy on aesthetic choice. Much of the appeal of his brand is the creation of clothing that are outside the standard aesthetics of “airport beauty / perfume isles”.

But in the past 40 years his own style has evolved from grungy adolescent rebellion to a more gentle approach. His early fashion choices were fueled by an underlying contempt towards conservative values — a feeling he’s been more disconnected from as he’s aged. And now, in his 60s, his mindset has shifted to present in a more “respectful, polite manner” towards the world.

rick owens on fashion neurosis

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If I were to have written this essay in my tumblr days, I would be proclaiming in my brandy melville shirt for everyone to stay weird!!! Embrace your inner misfit, rebel against conformity, fight the man. Unfortunately, while I admire Kiko, Westwood and Rick Owens, it would be intellectually dishonest to say my life is an embodiment of the counter-cultural or avant-garde.

But as someone who creates content on the internet, I do think there are implications to quelling your inner weirdness. Sometimes I question if what I put into the world can have value and impact if I’m consuming the same things as everyone else.

As I look towards this year, one of my intentions is to be more anti-algorithm. I oftentimes look for new ideas by scrolling, which in my mind is the lowest form of inspiration. We naively believe that our algorithms are tailored for us, when in fact, the algorithms are flattening our minds to be more homogenous.

In 2024, I made the decision to only read books that were personally recommended to me by someone I know in real life. I spent the month of may suffering through hyper-intellectualized non-fiction but learned the difficult joy of reading something that fundamentally changed my perspective.

I want 2025 to be about creative expansiveness — doing things to expand my horizons, notice greater detail, look for weirder inspiration, dig beyond the surface level.

A few weeks ago, I was raving to a co-worker, K, about the current MoMA exhibit, The Clock — a 24 hour montage of clocks, watches and time in film all synced chronologically to the local time. Christine and I entered the exhibit around 4:50pm and sat for over an hour to see Troy from High School Musical running down the hall at 5:15pm, a man scrambling to catch a train at 5:58pm, a cuckoo clock striking at precisely 6pm.

There is something captivating about watching a compilation without a narrative — clips of inane daily tasks like commuting and suppertime tied together with no curation outside of the time.

K says it reminds him of a website he once read about that surfaces youtube videos with almost zero views and titles like “IMG_0596” or “DISC 003”. I look it up a few days later and sit for a few minutes watching a backyard webcam recording deer walking gingerly, shaky footage of a train in Japan, a home video of a boy talking about his favorite wrestlers.

The website is called Astronaut.io, imagining the feeling of floating in space 100 miles above earth watching the uncurated, prosaic day to day below. But rather than being boring, it evokes a sweet nostalgia — intimate and weird and familiar and sublime. ✧✦✦