Vintage is on the rise with Gen Z. Teens and young adults are falling in love with vintage styles. Pinterest even predicted “vintage” to be one of the hot trends of 2025, already seeing a 260% increase in searches for “Vintage maximalism.” People are falling back in love with styles from the 70s, 80s, and 2000s. But what about the 90s?
The 1990s were a pivotal time for fashion, with a significant shift in what was considered fashionable. Before the 90s, casual clothes like sweatpants and sweaters outside were a sign you’d let yourself go. The 90s changed it all. In the 1990s, big, comfy pants, sweaters, flannels, and all sorts of casual wear boomed in popularity, but what about now? Newspapers and fashion magazines have been publishing about how the 90s are back all year, but is this true for Horizon? Horizon teachers who lived through the 90s and Horizon teens alike gave their opinions on the hot trends of 2025.
The Profile conducted a poll on what type of fashion students were wearing, and overwhelmingly, the students said they did wear staples of 90s fashion like babydoll tops, baggy jeans, graphic tees, and flannels.
Horizon student Reid Welch, claims that the 90s are definitely back in. When asked what specific 90s fashion is in they said, “probably grunge [fashion].”
But opinions are split. Teenagers like Amara Anyanwu-Ebo, a junior at Horizon disagree with the idea that the 90s have come back. When asked what she thought of when she thought of 90s fashion, she said “flared jeans, frizzy hair, neon colors.” she claims to not have seen this trending among teens. The divide on 90s fashion is stark within the student body. This can be for multiple reasons, like social group, a misunderstanding of 90s fashion, not caring for fashion, or not knowing trends. Let’s go to the experts, the people who lived through the 90s.
Horizon teacher Blair Mason, who was a student in the 90s, says “yes, like the jankos, the wide-legged pants are back in.” Another teacher who wishes to remain anonymous says “yes [it] sure has. I see kids at school,[or] when I’m shopping for clothes, it brings back memories.”
The 90s experts claim that the 90s are back! But why? Out of all the trends of the past and all the new emerging trends of the future, why have we picked the 90s? There isn’t one single answer to this question. There could be a number of factors in this fashion equation that equal the 1990s. Like the emerging love for vintage or a romanticization of the period. One of the big ones is the nostalgia factor. Most people in high school right now have parents who were in high school in the 90s. While no current teens lived through the 90s, it’s a well-known decade via the parents and could be nostalgic for some. “I think I’ve been seeing more because people look back at [what] their parents [wore] and want to implement [it] in their [own] style,” Welch claims in response when asked why they think the 90s are on the rise.
Everyone at school has their own personal style and tastes in fashion that make it hard to find what’s trending, and many people may absolutely hate the style of the 90s. However, the majority has ruled that the 90s are back in style at Horizon.
