So, This Is What TikTok Smells Like
Addison Rae is launching a fragrance collection on TikTok, a win for the video platform's shopping feature and a "why though?" moment for everyone else.
Rae, whose renditions of popular TikTok dances catapulted her to online fame, partnered with Hampton Beauty to produce the AF Collection, a "science-based" line of fragrances that tap into different emotions.
The brand's three launch scents — Chill AF, Happy AF, and Hyped AF — make that pretty clear, to say the least.
According to Lori Mariano, managing partner at Hampton Beauty, the products were developed with a test audience.
"The ingredients were put in front of respondents, and they read the reaction to the scent, and it affects the part of the brain that has to do with emotion," Mariano vaguely explained to WWD.
"If the calming part of the brain was affected, those ingredients became [Chill AF]. It’s completely science-based," she purported. Does anyone else want more details?
As much as TikTok influencers are mocked for the outrageousness of their content (see: bizarre and dangerous trends including the Benadryl challenge and the mole removal challenge), they represent a powerful new breed of tastemakers.
Rae, for example, has had a particularly successful year.
Last summer, she launched her own makeup brand and was named the highest-earning TikToker by Forbes.
In March, she made her musical debut with "Obsessed," an auto-tuned but unavoidably catchy single. Months later, she made her acting debut in He's All That, a gender-swapped remake of 1999's She's All That.
And last month, she attended the Met Gala alongside fellow TikTok powerhouses Charli and Dixie D'Amelio.
TikTok's trend-setting content creators have clearly transcended a mere in-app experience and are infiltrating nearly all facets of pop culture. Now, they're coming for our noses.
