What is the ‘Gen X Soft Club’ aesthetic, and is Gen Z reviving the look?
These days, it feels almost impossible to scroll through social media without seeing a photo or video that features a nod to the Y2K or McBling aesthetics. It could be a frosty eyeshadow, dangerously low-rise pants, a bedazzled flip phone or even velour track suits.
While these looks are mostly dominating in Gen Z spaces, there’s another that’s also vying for attention, albeit on a smaller scale — Gen X Soft Club.
The aesthetic, according to the Consumer Aesthetics Research Institute, had its heyday from the early ’90s to the mid ’00s. Unlike its gaudier counterparts, Gen X Soft Club took a turn for the more minimalistic. It was a time characterized by nude lips, middle-parted hair and a paler color palette. It concerned itself more with conveying futurism in a sophisticated way. If Y2K is the most popular girl in school, then Gen X Soft Club is her more obscure, alternative younger sister.
The TikTok account of the Digital Fairy, a U.K.-based creative agency, recently shared a video discussing this aesthetic in more detail.
“It’s defined by cool and muted colors, especially blues, greens and grays. Often combined with elements of tech or other references to futurism, and design choices like typefaces and cityscapes. Along with blurred and bleached image effects,” one of the agency’s creators said on Oct. 10. Given that Y2K and McBling are more “artificial and exaggerated,” the embrace of Gen X Soft Club could signal a shift back to a more minimalist design taste.
While the “Gen X” part of the label pertains to the people of this generation who were in their 20s at the time, “Soft Club” speaks to “certain club cultures” that were steadily becoming more mainstream, per the Digital Fairy. For reference, Generation X includes anyone who was born between 1965 and 1980.
In popular culture, Trainspotting and Requiem for a Dream were seen as films that visually encompassed the aesthetic, while artists like Moby, DJ Sammy, Björk and Radiohead spoke to Gen X Soft Club’s gravitation toward electronica, trip hop and alternative rock, according to the Aesthetics Wiki page. And with the popularity of streaming and digital music services, mainstream media from this time is not only easily accessible, but easily consumable as well.
On this subreddit, a Gen Z Radiohead fan discusses what they describe as a “revival” of the Thom Yorke-led band thanks to TikTok.
Similarly, Buffy the Vampire Slayer debuted in 1997, and the show’s run intersected with Soft Club’s prominence. And while Buffy Summers, as a character, is actually a millennial (she was born in 1981), the series isn’t without its references to the futuristic Gen X-driven movement.
In the opening scene of the Season 3 episode titled “When She Was Bad” which premiered in 1997, for instance, the song “Sugar Water” by the band Cibo Matto plays. Cibo Matto, which was fronted by Gen Xers Yuka Honda and Miho Hatori, was known for its sultry alternative rock and trip hop sound — two genres that are synonymous with Soft Club. And, as i-d put it, there’s been a steady “Buffynaisance” among Gen Zers.
Sartorially speaking, the influence of Gen X Soft Club as an aesthetic with Gen Z marketability can currently be seen in high fashion. Take, for example, Coperni’s 3D-printed CD-PLAYER Swipe Bag that made waves on Instagram a couple of weeks ago or the boxy, futuristic silhouette of Bottega Veneta’s Cangi Wraparound Injected sunglasses. And while fashion’s return to Soft Club as a source of inspiration may not be explicit, it’s certainly there.
This isn’t the first time that fashion houses have capitalized on the nostalgic appeal of older technology to inform their silhouettes. As Glossy reports, Louis Vuitton found its way onto fashion girlies’ radars with its viral Horizon Speaker bag in 2021, while Balenciaga, in 2022, collaborated with the electronics brand Bang & Olufsen to produce a limited amount of purses that also functioned as boom boxes. Given Gen Z’s obsession with digital cameras and their fascination with the “once-futuristic pieces of plastic” known as CDs, the glorification of retro music formats feels specific to Gen Z culture.
There are also hints of Soft Club in popular TikTok trends — like the push for more minimal, natural makeup and hairstyles with the “clean girl” aesthetic or the icy, metallic blue eyeshadow encouraged by mermaidcore. Gen X Soft Club can even be seen in the dark leathers, knee-high boots and long duster jackets that make up this season’s coveted ’90s NYC fall girlie aesthetic.
While Y2K and McBling looks are still dominating TikTok feeds, Gen X Soft Club is showing up in spaces like Pinterest, Tumblr and Are.na. With Gen Z embracing its fashion and musical elements, the Gen X Soft Club look could be one to keep an eye on.
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