Taylor Swift, trad wives, and Kaia Gerber's lit girl nightgown
How cottagecore fueled the latest lit-fashion collab
In the summer of 2020, Taylor Swift dropped folklore and made cottagecore mainstream. Suddenly, our feeds were bombarded with photos of blondie frolicking through the woods in braids and cotton dresses. But she didn't just popularize cottagecore; her quasi-folk-indie album planted the seeds for storytelling to become (more) cool. Because songs like Betty and Illicit Affairs weren't about Taylor's personal life, people diseccted them in the same way they would a piece of literature. We were going through a pandemic and there was great comfort in escapism. In December of that year, I bought a milkmaid dress from the Reformation sale—completely influenced by Taylor's Folklore aesthetic. At 70% off, I thought it was a steal. I ended up wearing it twice before selling it on Depop.
In 2024, Taylor Swift released The Tortured Poets Department. This time, her aesthetic was unabashedly literary—filled with typewriters, Victorian collars, and sepia. It wasn't far off from Folklore. Lit girls everywhere (myself included) swooned.
This year, we also observed the rise of the trad wife. Think Nara Smith and Hannah Neeleman—women who document their child-rearing and extravagant cooking methods via social media while looking glamorous and kneading dough without denting their perfectly manicured fingernails. Personally, I find the trad wife label inaccurate. These women are moguls who bring home way more bacon than their critics, but that's a digression. My point is that the trad wife aesthetic overlaps with cottagecore and Tortured Poets; it's all coming from the same place.
This year, we have also seen the rise of DÔEN, a brand that peddled milkmaid dresses before it was cool. Over the past few years, DÔEN has undergone meteoric growth. DÔEN clothes are worn by fashion editors, celebrities, and everyday people who feel like dropping $300+ on a sundress. The progression of 2020's pop culture has swayed in the brand's favor.
Last week, Kaia Gerber, the Internet's cool girl librarian, launched a collab with DÔEN: a white cotton nightgown retailing for $248. On DÔEN's website, it's described as being "inspired by our shared love of escaping into the pages of a really good book." I've seen Library Science, Kaia Gerber's book club, launch merch before, but nothing as fashionable as a nightgown. Before this, they sold highlighters, t-shirts, and baseball caps. The nightgown is cute, albeit impractical. It's too revealing to wear outside and the material isn't exactly forgiving to a drop of your morning coffee.
But perhaps that's the appeal of books and high-end cotton nighties. It's a form of escapism. And if collaborations like this are getting more people to read books, then I'm all for it.