Unless you’ve found yourself living under a rock for the past couple of months, you’ll know that the scrunchie trend is here, and it’s taking Grayslake Central students by storm. Scrunchies have been around since the 80’s and are one of the many retro trends that have resurfaced in our generation. Now, it’s nearly as common for someone to have a scrunchie as it is for them to be wearing a bracelet, or a belt.
Not just the girls, but the boys too can be seen flaunting them on their wrists while walking down the hallway, breaking boundaries between what accessories would normally be seen as more ‘feminine’ or ‘masculine.’ Some of the boys even wear multiple at once, stacking three or four (or 50) on their wrists at the same time. It’s like overnight, everybody has hopped on the bandwagon, and it just continues to pick up steam.
Not every scrunchie-wearing student follows the trend for the same reason; there are many individual reasons as to why people wear them. While speaking with Ethan Strong, a senior who has begun to follow the trend, we learned a bit about how it originated. Although he himself wears it as a sort of fashion statement, he mentioned that many boys will wear their girlfriend’s scrunchies as a sign of commitment to their significant other. So, in a way, wearing a scrunchie on your wrist is kind of like holding a big sign over your head that states “Hey! By the way, I have a girlfriend!”
So, where in the world did this trend come from? If you had asked the boys a year ago if they would wear scrunchies, chances are you would get some weird looks. Even at a point not too long ago, if a girl was wearing a scrunchie, they likely would be laughed at, as trends phase in and out throughout the years. But now all of a sudden, it’s cool?

The internet is to blame, and the rise of the ‘VSCO Girls.’
If you’re not sure what a VSCO Girl is, it’s actually rather likely you’ve met one before. They’re notorious for always having their hydroflasks (likely with a save the turtles sticker on it), big baggy tee shirts, birkenstock sandals and puka shell necklaces. But, one of the most notable accessories that these internet spawned girls always have are-you guessed it-scrunchies. Whether they wear them on their wrists, in their hair, and whether they have one or 15 of them, a scrunchie is always a necessary part of a VSCO girls’ outfit.
As we’ve often seen happen on the internet, VSCO Girls became the subject of nearly everybody’s jokes for at least a few solid months. If you remember, on Wacky Wednesday during homecoming week, there were countless boys walking around with their short-shorts and long t-shirts, with their hair and wrists embellished with scrunchies. And after this day, no scrunchie- wearing boy was ever the same.
Keep in mind, there were girls out there that were mad about the jokes being made about VSCO Girls. But now, it seems as if they have become fashion icons for the boys walking around sporting a million scrunchies on their wrists. Oh, the irony of this situation-it’s almost too much.
For those who wear the scrunchies to signify their relationships, it’s an adorable way to symbolize being taken. In fact, one could say many people probably prefer it over some of the over the top PDA that we’ve all witnessed in the hallways (Because, EW).
It’s a rather common thing for trends to begin as jokes before becoming something that people take seriously. Remember when Airpods first came out, and everybody was laughing at the people who bought them? If you look around now, nearly everybody has Airpods-likely more than those with regular, cord-bearing headphones.
In a world with trends that only continue to get weirder and weirder, boys wearing scrunchies is a rather tame one compared to some that have arisen throughout 2019. At this rate, we can only guess what the next trend might be. Wearing your clothes inside out? Going everywhere barefoot? Only time will tell, and all we can do is sit idly by with our scrunchies on our wrists.