The new social artifact of the post-00 generation, everyone has a "street stall"?
“Bracelet” is now popular among HE Tuber the post-00s generation. Why are “bracelets” so popular? They are pouring their hearts into each other, they are looking for similar people, and they are seeking something. Let’s follow the author to analyze this craze!
As night fell, Wu Shan walked into the Jewelry Building of China University of Geosciences.
In the circle of college students in Wuhan, this place is regarded as a shopping mall for high-quality and low-priced trinkets. Jewelry design is one of the flagship majors of China University of Geosciences, and Wu Shan believes in the students’ professional abilities and “special paths.”
When she walked out of the jewelry city, she had a bracelet on her wrist made of Hetian jade, southern red agate, and turquoise. The three colors complemented each other. The stall owner quoted 247 yuan, which is expensive considering the consumption level of college students, but Wu Shan expressed satisfaction: "I picked these beads one by one, and they have personal characteristics."
Represented by Wu Shan and her friends, a "bracelet craze"
is quietly emerging among the post-90s and post-00s generations. Compared with the wooden bracelets worn by the older generation, these colorful bead strings have lost their deep Zen feel and "value-preserving" cultural toy attributes, and have returned to their original intention as decorations.
But for young people, the meaning of bracelets goes beyond that. Just like figurines, glue, and rubber stamps, bracelets are hobbies, and they are also a symbol of identity among Generation Z to sniff out each other's scents and divide territories. As the pearls flowed, it no longer mattered whether the bracelet was valuable or not. Even if it was the cheapest ore and wood, players still poured their hearts into it.
1. Elsewhere
Generation Z’s preference for “hand-crossing strings” is different from that of middle-aged and elderly people.
As a kind of cultural toy, the traditional bracelet has a hidden chain of contempt for its material. At the bottom are bodhi seeds, horns, etc., with unit prices usually less than 100 yuan; at the level of sandalwood and huanghuali wood, the price rises to hundreds or even thousands of yuan depending on the wood and pattern; as for top-grade agarwood, raw ore Turquoise bracelets can easily sell for more than 10,000 yuan.
The joining of young people has opened cracks in this hierarchical value system. They not only like mid-to-high-end materials such as mammoth ivory and amber beeswax, but they also have a special liking for cheap Hericium walnuts and artificial crystals. In their view, these materials have a fresh literary style and are not too expensive, making them suitable for novice enthusiasts.
"The wooden bracelets (color) are not that bright and don't look good." Wu Shan said bluntly.
Wu Shan’s bracelets photographed at the jewelry market (photo provided by interviewee)
Compared with wooden bracelets with single colors, young people have created more ways to play with colorful bracelets. In Cheche's memory, more than a year ago, bracelets made of bodhi root dyed pink suddenly became popular around her, which opened the door for many people to wear bracelets.
"Most of what young people wear on their plates is Bodhi, crystal, agate, as well as precious and semi-precious stones." Cheche was born in Chifeng, Inner Mongolia, which is the origin of "Balin Stone", one of China's four famous stones. She has been fascinated by gem crafts since she was a child. , knowing that a piece of "good material" is usually cut directly into bracelets, and the remaining scraps are turned into loose beads and then woven into bracelets.
Therefore, the superstition of expensive bracelets does not exist here in Cheche. She feels that bracelets are just a type of handicraft, just like glue and rubber stamps. Whenever she needs to give a gift, Cheche will choose the corresponding "birthstone" according to her friend's birthday, or find loose beads of the corresponding color according to the other person's favorite two-dimensional character, and weave them into an "impression bracelet" to give to her friend.
On e-commerce platforms, the prices of such "impression bracelets" are mostly less than 100 yuan, and the IPs they cover include novels such as "Tomb Raiders" and "The Strange Fairy", and games such as "Genshin" and "Arknights". The main colors of the two-dimensional characters were extracted and woven into a unique bracelet, which is more like a fan peripheral used to identify fans than an ornament.
What exactly is a bracelet? First of all, it is not a literary toy, this concept is too boring; it is not entirely a decoration, it is also endowed with more value. Young people’s definition of kebab falls elsewhere
