25.2 OFFLINE ESCAPE
The desperation-fueled return to real life
The second key trend1 emerging as a potent shift defining 2025, and years ahead, is the yearning for Offline Escape. It’s clear that we’ve reached peak digital content, and there’s a sense of growing discontent with the current online-centered social landscape. People are desperate to escape the algorithm. I like how
articulated this in her piece The Feed is Full — “Maybe we're all just tired. While the internet is forever, forever is exhausting. Sometimes you want your content to end. Sometimes you want to hold something real.”I’m not going to repeat my spiel about newness in trends. But once again, though various versions of Offline Escape have shown up in almost every trend report published over the past couple months, it’s not new. The desire to appreciate a slower pace of life can be traced back to the macrotrend Analog Soul. Here’s where it shows up in the my framework and a snapshot of what the trend looked like in 2022:
In 2019, a friend told me about Manual NYC, which offers both disposable and reusable film cameras and develops your photos for you. The same year, I attended a kitsungi workshop in Brooklyn, hosted by ceramicist Minh Singer, who often employs the traditional Japanese practice (wherein broken porcelain vessels are visibly repaired with golden epoxy). Later, at an art fair in 2021, I encountered Yeesookyung’s gorgeous sculptural interpretations using the same technique. Craft-related hobbies exploded in popularity when the pandemic confined us to our homes in 2020, and menswear designer Reese Cooper came out with a DIY kit to create your own chore coat. I’d been attending drink & draw events since 2017, so was an early fan of Happy Medium Art Cafe when it came on the scene in 2021, offering figure drawing sessions and painting classes.
The original manifestations of this trend can be traced to a combination of drivers rooted in relationships and wellbeing, like delayed adulthood, the reframing of age, the rise of intentional solo living, and a push for more work-life balance. In recent years, this has intersected with even stronger and more ominous cultural forces as technology became all-consuming. The rising velocity of digital content feels overwhelming, and Gen Z young adults are glamorizing pre-digital lifestyles that they never had a chance to experience. These developments give the trend more weight, contributing to significant mainstream momentum and more follow-on impact. As
writes, “it’s usually the slower-moving shifts that have more value and sustained energy.”I don’t think the Analog Soul trend has changed much conceptually since I first began tracking it in 2019 — but the tenor has shifted, with offline sentiment evolving beyond lighthearted fun and towards somewhat desperate escapism. And brands are realizing that trying to capture consumer attention online is essentially pointless, so they’re beginning to explore the offline arena. Perhaps the biggest recent shift is the emergence of a literary revival and print media boom as a massive subtrend:
Offline Escape: As consumers feel overloaded with digital fatigue, there is a growing desire to slow down and engage in analog entertainment, with a rapid revival of long-form text and printed formats.
Branded Books & Zines: Visual burnout has fueled a ‘printaissance’ with the resurgence of text media as a desirable format.
, , and have documented how, along with the growth of indie magazines and niche zines, brands have begun tapping into this shift. Over the summer, the dating app Hinge produced a zine of unlikely app-meet-cute love stories as told by acclaimed writers like Roxane Gay. Through the fall and winter, brands like Flamingo Estate and Merit announced launching their own coffee table books. The trend was perhaps cemented by J.Crew announcing the return of their print catalog, which notes will “read more like an editorial magazine” and brand-building exercise rather than a sales tool.Community Collabs: Shared reading communities have gained significant momentum in recent years, reflecting consumer desires to slow down. And now, brands are exploring the space. In April 2024, Miu Miu launched an inaugural edition of its Literary Club with a two-day event in Milan open to the public. After its overwhelming success, the brand followed up with a global Summer Reads program, working with local newstands across global cities to gift visitors curated books by female authors. This December, skincare brand Salt & Stone partnered with Jordan Santos’ Seen Library book club for a holiday popup, where customers could shop a curated selection of books wrapped in paper with clues written atop a custom library card, so that they could choose a book by its content, not its cover. Meanwhile, fashion brand Doen worked with Kaia Gerber’s Library Science book club to create a limited-edition nightgown. Vogue Business suggests, “There’s an air of luxury around the act of reading: it takes time to get through a book…When a fashion brand aligns with literature, they are making an allusion to quality and permanence and, in many ways, delayed gratification.”
Brands as Libraries: This holiday season, Bella Hadid’s fragrance brand Orabella hosted a library-themed pop-up shop, whereas last spring, luxury brand Saint Laurent opened its own bookstore in Paris. In a more emergent exploration of brands as libraries, streetwear label Vowels created a dedicated reading room space in its first retail store with a rotating collection of rare design books and magazines available for customers to freely peruse. The brand even makes scanners available so visitors can make digital copies of materials they want to keep and reference. This leans into consumers' desire for ‘third spaces,’ with brand libraries situated as the latest evolution of brand cafes.
Hobby Hubs: I’d mentioned being an early fan of Happy Medium, but I have to admit I never expected it to become such a massive sensation — all the drawing sessions were soon constantly sold out, and in the last year they opened a second location and executed several brand collaborations. Beyond accessible arts and crafting communities, analog games have emerged as another microtrend. Chess clubs have become cool-kid hotspots and speed dating venues, and brands are taking note, like Soft Services and Happier Grocery collaborating with Pawn Chess Club and Margiela and Highsnobiety collaborating with Club Chess. And everything above is being documented on film or Y2K-era digital cameras, which
reported as the #1 holiday gift among Gen Z this year.
The Offline Escape trend is no longer niche, but representative of a mass craving to return to IRL experiences. Unlike the hyper-sensory experiences previously popular, which required high production value and major financial investment all for the benefit of creating social content, the desire here is rooted in simplicity, personal interaction, and being present in the moment. And there’s a wide range of implications beyond just experiences, too. A key aspect of the examples above is the focus on niche interests and micro-communities, with first-mover brands illustrating how to harness cultural fragmentation as a strength rather than an obstacle. And the broader rise of the Analog Soul macrotrend suggests the follow-on influence on design, as backlash against AI aesthetics results in a reverence for handmade qualities, human imperfection, and tactility as key differentiators.
Finally, while all of the above unlocks an array of opportunities for brands and creators to build more engaging relationships with consumers, it’s critical to remember that the current drivers of this trend are not positive. Escapism is only necessary when there’s something you need to escape from. I’ve mentioned negative sentiment several times throughout this piece — discontent, exhaustion, desperation, overload, fatigue. Offline Escape is rooted in deeper sociocultural shifts and will be relevant for several years ahead, since this is our new reality.
If you missed the first trend, read about Chaos Culture here
great work!! I think this is the first piece I see saying something I’ve been thinking as well: the design trends you mention as going strong at the moment (offset, tactile imperfection, human error, etc) are a desperate response to AI / the enshittified internet, not just a cute vibe that happens to be in right now.
Great piece! Thank you for the shoutout :)