Ever find yourself wondering what this season’s trend is? Having lunch in Hyde Park, strolling through Oxford Street or just being a present member of Instagram is where you’ll find the answers just as easily. Instagram is the de facto tool for women and men to share their new purchases, their trophy pieces, and their “candid” shots of carefully composed outfits (not to mention what they’re eating for dinner or where they’re sailing in Italy). The collective mind-set feels akin to that old adage about a tree falling in the forest: If you don’t share it on Instagram, did it even happen? And if you invest in that enormous Jacquemus sun hat and don’t post a photo with it, are you just missing the entire point?
It brings us onto the question of whether we’re (consciously or subconsciously) shopping and styling ourselves with Instagram in mind. The platform has afforded us radical transparency in a lot of ways—with a few taps, you can voice your opinion, see what celebrities are commenting on others’ posts, and learn about virtually anything, from manatees to ketogenic dieting—but when it comes to fashion, it does get a bit muddled. Is that photo Facetuned, or does she really have perfect skin? Oh, wait, she’s an avatar. And are people really wearing these wildly impractical trends IRL, or is it all just for the ’gram?
The trends we’re seeing most on Instagram this summer seem to walk the line between the two camps. Yes, we’ve actually seen girls wearing bike shorts, wedges, and beaded bags on the streets of New York, but we’re not sold on the staying power of heart-shaped sunglasses or ’80s bikinis. Below, we’ve gathered all of the top Instagram trends of summer 2018—so far—and how they differ from what we wore this time last year.
Did Diana start the whole trend? Picture evidence suggests yes! 2018 – The year when wearing shapewear as outterwear is a trend! Want to brave the trend? Find your perfect piece here.
