WEEKLY TRENDS REPORT
14 November 2025
Pictured: iStock
THIS WEEK’S FORECAST
FOR YOUR INFO This week’s dates
& microtrends
TikTok trends
Are you reading this as a LTN or an HTN?
The Zen-do. Touching moss while sipping sangria sounds much more fun.
ICYMI
Mason Thames, an actor, starred in three No.1 movies in one year. The first since Jim Carrey.
Don’t need to ask Grandpa for his collection anymore. Playboy makes a return to print.
Phrase of the week
“The forehead kiss of doom and despair”. This display of intimacy is now seen as a sign of incoming ghosting/breakup.
Digi update
The vibes are AI. Vibe coding was chosen as Collins Dictionary Word of the Year.
What we’re loving
Putting the EAT in Death. Ignacia Fernández won Miss World Chile with her death metal performance.
Our dream weekend. Faye Webster’s weekend invitational of tennis, chess, yoyos and music.
Established trends
Gen-Z are romanticising cigarettes again. What happened to wellness?
Stop trying to understand teen slang. There’s nothing wrong with being out of touch!
Insights of the week
Vicarious leisure, young people are cutting back on daily indulgences to afford big statement pieces. We are starving for Miu Miu.
The literary world is having a major fashion moment Being called a book nerd is no longer an insult.
On our radar
Wicked: For Good – 21 November
Kirby Air Riders – 20 November
De La Soul: Cabin in the Sky – 21 November
Stray Kids: SKZ IT TAPE: DO IT – 21 November
Tea of the week
Shay Mitchell’s controversial skin care for kids. What’s next? Doing taxes at 5? Ferraris for tots?
Weekly doses of cute
Paddington dog dramatic cat, and Carrot the cat
Rising trends
The hot new job? Working for a billionaire. There are plenty to work for.
Easter came early. Religion is infiltrating pop culture with faith-based music and “in” ironic fashion
The future
Will AI ever be able to manage e-mails? Who else is going to read and reply to our unread 648 e-mails?
Stat of the week
43% of Gen Z opt for YouTube and TikTok for their media and news consumption.
Ones to (hopefully) watch
An agonising wait. KPop Demon Hunters 2 to release in 2029 and GTA 6 got delayed again!
Two icons. A Miss Piggy movie and Roblox’s Grow A Garden movie is in the works.
TREND TRACKING
How some of the trends we’ve identified have evolved in recent months
Ascension pop Collectible chaos Womanosphere
Ascension pop is the uprising against the machine we didn’t know we needed. While AI cranks out soulless sludge, the pop girls are responding with divine drama and human chaos. With Charli XCX stating that her next album will be stripped back, possibly include strings and will be ‘inherently different to ‘Brat’ and Rosalía describing ‘Lux’ as a ‘human album that rejects the use of AI (or digital production at all). They have either created or are creating music that unapologetically gives us goosebumps through the use of classical techniques, a human talent that AI cannot do.
Who knew capitalism could be this cute? Fans queued at dawn and resale prices soared like our heartrate after too many espressos. From $30 to $500 on eBay collectible culture has reached peak terrifying with Starbucks Bearista. Who needs a Birkin Bag when a cutie with a beanie is available at your local coffee shop? Customers were breaking mugs to reach them, and employees were hiding them to cop one themselves. Apparently, the hottest commodity isn’t coffee, it’s a bear cup with a tiny beanie.
It starts with a skincare routine and ends with a worldview. Beauty and lifestyle influencers are quietly layering politics onto selfcare, beauty, fashion and interiors. While outwardly apolitical, many subtly reinforce ideas about traditional gender roles, distrust of government, anti-“woke” sentiment, or conservative values. Turning teenagers scrolls into a soft entry towards an alt-right pipeline. The more interaction, the more the TikTok algorithm amplifies it, proving that influencer culture is as much about shaping beliefs as it is about likes and engagement.
Trend: Modern classics
Trend: Not so wellness
Trend: Collecting buzz or collecting dust
Image: Pexels
Image: @Starbucks
Image: @Rosalia.VT
Weber Forecast Insight
Consumers are rejecting performative, productheavy content. Brands should consider subtlety, vulnerability and letting users narrate experiences for themselves. Embrace humanity, and they’ll want to hug you right back.
This week’s long read
CONSUMERS AGAINST CONSUMERISM
We’ve entered our
‘The Truman Show’ era
Remember when consuming was for fun, not funnels?
These days, every social post, TV show and even movie is wrapped in a brand deal. Bots, burnout and boredom have exposed the hollowness of performative culture. The Truman Show has become real life.
Deinfluencing has been around for a while, but mentions are up 79% this year mirrored by the collective eye rolls at the product placement in Nobody Wants This Audiences are growing tired of the algorithmic sameness of scrolling through feeds and being pummelled with product placement, it’s leaving them hungry for something messy and genuinely human. The lo-fi internet of the 2010s is back because it feels grimy and real (we’re currently panicking that we can’t remember our Tumblr password). Brands are picking up on this cultural itch,
including Hinge’s quiet approach to social (absent from feeds but paying their community to do the storytelling) by embracing humanity, with all our quirks and imperfections.
The reaction? Suddenly, the new status symbol isn’t how many followers you have, it’s cultivating a real audience and not creating something because it will please others, or brands, but because it will please yourself.
From recording your niche hobbies to hap dash carousels that make you smile, we’re seeing culture stepping back from curation and leaning into what’s real Audiences want emotion, not optimisation or spectacle. But, of course, even being antiperformative can become performative… and the trend cycle starts all over again.
Image: @justjoeleee
Image: @dr.ems
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Pictured: iStock