“Vanilla Girl” Trend: Is it that Neutral?

Advocating naturalness through comfortable materials and a neutral tone palette from the dressing room to the living room, the Vanilla Girl trend TikTok. However, is the “vanilla girl” really that neutral?

Dressed in beige or white, looking good with little makeup and focusing on comfort. This portrait is that of the "vanilla girl". Born on the Chinese social network only a few weeks ago, this trend has now accumulated more than 710 million views, and consists in advocating neutral tones and ease. Soft knits, cashmere cardigans and UGG boots made of turned-up skin are the recipe of the "vanilla look" for the influencers of the movement, like Matilda Djerf or Hailey Bieber. The "all options" version of the Clean Girl - named after this minimalist beauty look for a natural "good look" effect - the vanilla girl extends her field of action to her wardrobe, her interior, her food and sometimes even her family.

Indeed, the trend is already well established in the fields of decoration and childhood. Exit the colored clothes and the plastic toys, the children of the vanilla girl live also nimbés of cameos of brown, of beige or of gray. However, this aesthetics of life "without false note" makes more than one person tick.

"The trend for white girls"

Because behind the apparent harmony of this existence with homogeneous colors, hidden vices arise. Among its detractors, Hayley DeRoche's parody TikTok account calls the phenomenon "sad beige" and mocks it. On a more serious note, media outlets like Popsugar and Slate are concerned about whether neutrality is hindering the development of the smaller ones. If the answer seems to be no, the stereotypes conveyed by this movement are still questionable.

The vanilla girl being characterized by her blondness and her diaphanous skin, those who are neither white nor blond are de facto excluded. This is in any case what some users of TikTok denounce. When some of them say under the countless viral videos that "this trend is for white girls", others comment: "I would like to be a vanilla girl, but I don't have the right skin color". Not as neutral as it seems, the vanilla girl?