Why is Quiet Luxury Failing?

With the recent surge of nostalgia for 2000s fashion and culture, the more niche subcultures of that time have, naturally, also resurfaced, with a highly adored one being the 2000s Tuscan Mom. This aesthetic group is a combination of warm orange lighting, cocoa bean vanilla, and bouncy pin-curls with deep square French tips. This favouring of flashy styles as opposed to the quiet 'no brand' luxury that has been heavily superimposed could highlight a recent shift in public attitudes towards elitism and status.

What makes this resurgence particularly interesting is that it challenges the idea that sophistication must be synonymous with restraint. Quiet luxury relies upon an understanding of wealth as something that should be recognised by those who know where to look, making exclusivity itself part of its appeal. The Tuscan Mom, on the other hand, is not concerned with concealing its glamour. Its appeal lies in the abundance of sensory details, from the warmth of its interiors to the excess of its beauty routines. There is something almost rebellious about this refusal to minimise oneself, particularly in a cultural climate where being effortlessly beautiful, understated and seemingly unbothered has become an aesthetic ideal in its own right.

In recent decades, we had seen a shift in the entertainment cultures, with general publics viewing celebrities and public figures as spectacles as opposed to being the entertainment for those who were rich and bored. This marked a notion that those placed in these higher positions were given the authority, so long as they fulfilled their respective diversionary purposes. We could see this playout clearly in tabloids and magazines of the 90s and early 2000s, where any and all celebrities would be subjected to intense and extensive criticism.

This dynamic also reveals the conditional nature of celebrity admiration. Public figures are expected to embody a desirable lifestyle whilst remaining sufficiently familiar to invite public scrutiny. Their appeal depends upon the illusion that their lives are both extraordinary and recognisable, allowing audiences to participate in their glamour through fashion, beauty and lifestyle consumption. Yet this relationship becomes strained when the distance between celebrity wealth and ordinary experience becomes too apparent. When luxury is presented as something that can only be appreciated through exclusivity, it risks alienating the very audiences whose attention sustains celebrity influence. Nostalgia, therefore, offers a convenient means of restoring this familiarity: it allows the public to revisit an idealised cultural moment in which glamour appeared more playful, expressive and attainable.

And so, when contemporary public figures such as Kendall Jenner and Sofia Richie began acting as the face of a new ideal for aesthetics, all stylists swung back to promoting the 'Old Money' ideal. However, other than the influencers and journalists, it appeared to have been responded to with top-down apathy, and everyone stuck with the maximalist style's of the 2000s. A reason for this indifference could be attributed to the industries' favouring of classist, status signalling aesthetics, over aesthetics that can be widely credited to Black communities. Society is no longer responding obediently to the promotion of aspirational consumption towards fashion choices made by the white elite to erase native cultural expressions of other communities.

Fashion has long operated as a means of establishing social distinction, with certain styles elevated as markers of refinement whilst others are dismissed as excessive or lacking in taste. These distinctions are rarely as objective as they are presented. The cultural origins of a trend, the communities associated with it and the social position of those wearing it can all influence how it is received by mainstream audiences. This becomes especially significant when styles rooted in Black cultural expression are popularised by the wider fashion industry, only to be reframed through the language of luxury once adopted by more privileged groups. The question, then, is not simply which aesthetic is fashionable, but why particular forms of self-expression are granted prestige whilst others must first be legitimised by established institutions.

The Tuscan Mom aesthetic is glamorous, and cozy, with an Italian/Mediterranean touch, signifying a yearning for class comfort and nostalgia. It is representative of the idealized 2000s suburban dream home, that has been lived in and is approachable, all whilst wealthy and luxurious. This is the expectation and social contract that society requires for celebrities and public figures.