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British fast fashion brand PrettyLittleThing, PLT for short, has undergone an overnight rebrand. The website that once sold collabs with Doja Cat now carries a more sober, grown up collection—blazers, bridesmaid-style dresses, and the like. It also has an entirely new look—a more sophisticated typeface for a logo that looks inspired by The Tortured Poets Department, and underneath it, a new slogan that promises “A Legacy in Progress.” The slogan seems pretty revealing of its intentions going forward, but also the fact that the brand doesn’t see itself the way its customers do.
To be honest, I didn’t know much about PLT because I’m lucky enough to live in a big city and have a body size where secondhand shopping ends up being the best option. But this rebrand was on everyone’s lips this morning, and I did some research because my editors informed me that people were calling it “SeriousLittleThing” on X. That appears to be one of the more mild comments on the company’s change.
To say the least, the rebrand appears to be confusing to its audience. This in and of itself seems standard fare for a business choice like this. I mean, rebrands typically are confusing to the public upon first reception. But the rebrand includes both a price increase and a total shift in vibe, making it pretty clear they have no intention of serving whoever was buying from them prior to this. It does make you wonder who exactly the rebrand was for.
PLT seems very much to be trying to tap into that era where we were all wearing business casual to the club (I was in middle school and not at the club, but you know the vibe.) Its fans have noticed that its typical, beloved Euro-trash look is being ditched for something that promises a classier pretense, which perhaps is what the citizens of the Internet will call a recession indicator. But why?
Here are the challenges I think PLT seems to have ahead of them. The “Old Money” look was a very popular trend maybe the last two summers, so who knows how long it has legs for now. People have caught onto the fact that rich people don’t like button down shirts and linen pants for the look, as much as for the quality, and that trying to look rich is actually very hard. It’s very hard to do minimalism on a budget in a way that actually looks expensive from a production standpoint, a problem they didn’t have to face when they were very obviously leaning into the affordable market. And even if that stuff weren’t true, there are already plenty of budget-friendly retailers who serve the consumer audience that wants that look, like Zara, COS, H&M, and literally countless others. They’re going into business in a pretty saturated market.
Customers have doubts about this price change actually affecting the quality or production of the garments, since many have pointed out, the clothes are all still mostly polyester. (Polyester is a misunderstood fabric sometimes—see Issey Miyake. But it’s true that it’s often used to cut costs.)
Something to be optimistic about is that PLT seems to want to veer away from fast fashion, which is a good thing. But I’m not sure how much of that is actually happening because it’s still very much a fast fashion brand, only now there’s a greater markup. Plus, while “office siren” “Old Money” “business chic” micro trends as they’ve existed on TikTok might just be passing fads, the truth is that there is likely some truth to the fact that this look is a business trend more than it’s a fashion trend, and for that reason, PLT probably reasons that a higher earning consumer is more worth chasing after than its party girl counterpart. And furthermore, this is likely a commercial business trend we should be prepared to see going forward. Which is sad depending on what you’re trying to dress for—I mean it seems very apparent that PLT’s audience is upset. But the good news is that when the mall died at the hands of profit, the kids became thrifters, DIYers, and crochet bloggers, and something interesting and wily is always around the corner for the girls trying to get a fit off.