I was Rockabilly against my will

An audit of when bad taste becomes good.

2026 is the new 2016! We are wading through dangerously nostalgic waters…but isn’t it fun? #Yolo #Swag

I was woken out of my apparent amnesia recently by Picnic at Hanging Rock. What cervine girlhood it offered up! What frocks and ribbons!

Naturally I related most to Edith Horton, one of those wonderful characters with a name that tells you immediately how annoying she’s going to be. Edith is somehow spared from being sucked into the rock or timewarping or dying of who-knows-what by virtue of being really irritating and pathetic. I too emerged from childhood unscathed thanks to a protective bubble of my own unpleasantness, bypassing the beautiful frippery of girlhood.

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Generally, I feel like I have a pretty white knuckle grip on the present. Maybe that’s because the dominant aesthetic of my adolescence was Rockabilly!!!! Oh, Rockabilly, my foul frenemy. Were you a zaftig teenager between 2009 and 2017? Did you “develop early”? Do the words “fit and flair” or “tea-length dress” send a cold chill down your spine? Do you think you ought to receive financial compensation from Modcloth? Lauren Servideo, comedian, amigo and fellow former rockabilly, and I texted about it:

Nicolaia: So… Why were we made to wear Rockabilly?

Lauren: My best guess is that the silhouette accounted for well-endowed women? But truly it is a mystery. And maybe this is a me problem, but even the genuine ’50s clothes—not the mod cloth replicas—were SO TINY.

Nicolaia: I don’t think I ever knowingly was like deliberately buying rockabilly. I feel like older women in my life were insistent that I wear tea length dresses. Do you have any memories of any specific items?

Lauren: YEP!!!! Esther Williams bathing suits. Ring a bell? Nowhere in person sold big- boob bathing suits so we had to turn to the web and order it from her directly? Like possibly send a check. I remember the bright red polka dot suit arriving with IMPOSSIBLY high waisted bottoms and being like welp…this is it. It might as well have been a one piece. It’s also weird because Rockabilly is a sound too, so to some it’s signaling that you’re into the music and the lifestyle (old cars lmfao). I only got the Rockabilly bangs when I went through my intense second wave feminism era in college. I had already won the superlative of “born in the wrong decade,” which I assumed was for my mature thoughts about culture but I think it was the clothes.

Nicolaia: I can’t believe you did a second Rockabilly moment!? The first wasn’t enough?

Lauren: The second moment was rooted in Janeane Garofalo in Reality Bites. And Traci Lords in Cry-Baby. I think I have a few years on you so this was like 2009, and I had survived the early-’00s body image moment. This was on the heels of Rookie Mag. It wasn’t rockabilly, it was riot grrl—but still bangs. But back to the body image thing: Y2K is low-cut in every way, super thin, sexy, all things that just weren’t me anymore (I went from being super underweight my whole life to being busty and kind of thicc in what felt like overnight). Rockabilly seemed to present a wholesomeness I had been looking for and something that would actually fit/look good. I haven’t thought about this in so long. I’m also trying to dig out pictures. Why do you think it happened? And when was your phase?

Nicolaia: For me, there was this element of “dressing for your body type” and “flattering.” I was also not comfortable in my body, but looking like a 30-year-old Williamsburg dweller at 16 was not helping things! With all the nostalgia, do we think we’ll see a Rockabilly revival? And do we feel like trad wife edges on Rockabilly?

Lauren: I kind of feel like Lana tapped into it a bit back then…siphoning from the fountain of trad which seems never ending??? Rockabilly is fake ’50s and we are living in a fake world obviously: fake president, fake images, fake lips. When these things circle back, we take less and less each time so they work. The way Gen Z did Y2K this time was WAY better than when we had it initially.

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On the topic of nostalgia, Beata Rydbacken is taking it to new and bold proportions. There’s a massive barrette that looks like a fastener. A hat pouf so large it basically has its own moon. And of course…the schairf, a scarf made of thick plaits of hair. She gave me the 411

Age: 25

Profession: Fashion designer and marketing lead at Gustaf Westman

Nicolaia: How did you get started designing? I know you work at Gustaf Westman!

Beata Rydbacken: I’ve been sewing since I was little, but I started designing and selling my work in 2020. That’s when I also got really into SoMe marketing, and the importance and power of it. Doing the instagram thing led me to meeting Gustaf, and then to us working together!

Tell me about the inspiration behind the Schairf.

I saw a girl with two long braids and thought wow that’s so beautiful it almost looks like a scarf, and then…..the idea just struck me.

What currently brings you inspiration?

Being online and hanging out with my very creative friends. Shared pinterest boards and living life <3

Who would you like to see wear one?

I think Adéla or Pinkpantheress or Rosalia.

I love the Tumblr-ness of the Schairf and the Beanie Bun. On your website you also reimagined the classic Abercrombie/Hollister bag with your logo…What do you think is so appealing about mid-aughts culture right now?

It’s a style so many of us genuinely had and loved. I think as the cycle comes back around, a simple Abercrombie shopping bag just carries so much nostalgia, and makes us feel so good and young and free.

Were you an active Tumblr girl? What was your first username?

Yes! My first username on everything was LiljaEva2001, a mix of my middle name and my hamster’s name, and the year I was born. I still think it’s a very strong username and might actually go back to that soon.

What would you say your design philosophy is?

I think “simple but genius” is what I strive for.

What other things do you want to enlarge?

OMG so many things. My friend Frida recently came up with the idea of a giant pin, like those flat plastic badge pins, so I think we might make that soon.