Pink car, pink shifters, pink makeup and even pink house. For the past few weeks, Barbie’s emblem color has been repainting the Web. At the origin of this craze, the next film, which is scheduled for release on July 19, by American director Greta Gerwig, which propels the famous doll into the real world. In the casting, actress Margot Robbie plays Barbie, accompanied by Ryan Gosling in the role of Ken. The trailer alone has 34 million views on the YouTube channel of Warner Bros, one of the film’s producers.
Since these first images, social networks have been impregnated with the “Barbie aesthetic” also called “Barbie Core”. In concrete terms, Internet users decorate their interiors, wear make-up or dress like Barbie. And filters allow users to see their face transformed into that of a plastic doll or to integrate one of their selfies into the glittery poster of the film, as on the barbieselfie.ai site.
Barbie herself is becoming an influencer, with an Instagram account at over 2.5 million subscribers. The flagship toy from Mattel, marketed for the first time in 1959, sees its symbol completely dusted off. “Barbie is transformed into a feminist icon to counter ‘slut shaming’, the fact of stigmatizing a woman because her outfit or her attitude are deemed too provocative,” notes Stéphanie Laporte, founder of the Otta agency. “Her universe becomes a state of mind: that of assuming herself with outfits and showy makeup,” she continues.
“From the 80s and for several decades, we tended to consider dark outfits as a mark of intelligence and elegance against the ‘rednecks’ dressed in flashy colors”, adds Hayley Edwards-Dujardin, historian of art and fashion specialist. But, in 2023, the paradigm seems to be reversed: icons like hit singer Harry Styles and fashion designer Jacquemus often put color in the spotlight and Barbie is the subject of an astronomical amount of publications. .
On TikTok for example, the hashtag “Barbie” reaches 41 billion views, that “BarbieMovie” and “Barbie challenge” nearly a billion. More than 12 million posts are also devoted to him on Instagram. A trend that has not escaped brands. As the release date approaches, exclusive products related to the film are multiplying. Thus, Xbox has unveiled a console in the colors of Barbie and the latter’s cars will be integrated into the racing game Forza Horizon 5. The Aldo Shoes brand has adapted its shoe boxes, now painted with the white and pink logo of the famous doll .
The ready-to-wear and accessories collections on the same theme are also flooding the shelves, such as at Forever 21 and Claire’s, where young models now pose with yellow, purple and pink skirts or bodysuits. “We are going to witness a pink tide and a return to 1970s fashion,” jokes Stéphanie Laporte about this commercial phenomenon. “The film already looks like a blockbuster with a very mainstream cast, so it’s perfectly suited to such a mass marketing strategy,” she says.
So much so that the world of Barbie really invites itself into the real world this time. In Malibu, a life-size pink house was unveiled to Internet users by Airbnb. On the occasion of the release of the film, in fact, fans of the universe will be able to reserve “Ken’s Dream House” on the site, on Monday July 17. The fastest will have the opportunity to obtain one of the two free one-night stays in said house, which are scheduled for July 21 and 22.
“In a context that is not very happy on a collective scale, there is this desire to live in a lighter and superficial world”, notes historian Hayley Edwards-Dujardin, about this successful aesthetic. Barbie is not the only film whose release has caused a flood of content on the internet. The production of The Little Mermaid, currently in theaters, has seen similar enthusiasm. On social networks, alongside Barbie aficionados, videos have started to bloom with ideas for outfits or makeup in blue and green colors, to imitate the famous Ariel.
