TikTok has a knack for repackaging run-of-the-mill manicures with catchy, cutesy names. Think: "Vanilla French Nails," a French manicure with off-white tips; "Glazed Donut Nails," a nude nail with shimmery top coat; and "Naked Nails," which entails forgoing a manicure all together.
These fads had their moment, but it seems netizens are finally fed up with TikTok's deluge of silly-sounding manicures. Critics are calling out "Blueberry Milk Nails," the latest nail trend to go viral, for attempting to hype up a rather banal product: light blue nail polish.
So, how did Blueberry Milk Nails come to be? In early June, Dua Lipa shared a photo of herself sporting a light blue manicure. Sabrina Carpenter and Sofia Richie Grainge posted shots of themselves wearing similar nail colors, cementing the trend. Somewhere along the way, TikTok coined the term "Blueberry Milk Nails," a nicer- and more delicious-sounding way to describe a baby blue nail manicure — which, at the end of the day, isn't anything new or exciting.
Creators are pointing out the ridiculousness of the trend, as well as TikTok's propensity to put lipstick on a proverbial pig. "I cannot believe we live in a world where we refer to baby blue as blueberry milk," TikToker Macy Thompson posted (the video boasts 140,000 "likes").
Riffing on the phenomenon, another creator posted a shot of her nails, stained crimson after removing red nail polish. "Step aside blueberry milk! Diluted beet juice nails are thee hot girl nails rn."
Caitlyn, whose TikTok bio reads "yes, it really is that deep," took things a step further, proclaiming that the backlash against Blueberry Milk Nails reveals the state of contemporary individuality and sense of self.
"A large portion of our sense of self and our sense of personal identity is constructed by the things that we consume and the way that we relate to them," she says. "These products, who uses them, and even what we call them, like Blueberry Milk Nails, are being predetermined by marketing teams and yet these products and our relationship to them is becoming a kind of proxy for a sense of personality."
Instead of questioning the trend, others are reveling in the its frivolity. "It is simply not that serious ever," one creator commented on a video asking viewers to "Let us have fun."
Whatever your stance on Blueberry Milk Nails, the reaction to it seems to indicate growing distaste for TikTok's stream of novel-sounding trends (which, as Caitlyn points out, do more to monetize the self and sell product than identify anything innovative). We may be in for a new kind of "de-influencing," one that takes down the silliness of TikTok's viral "-cores" and "aesthetics" instead of viral products.
So forget "Tomato Girl Summer" and "Coquette Hair" — eschewing influence is the new influence.
