Imagine this, you wake up and the world seems to be tinted differently- as if a sunset has illuminated everything you can see. Maybe you’re just too used to the Instagram Rio De Janeiro filter to be able to differentiate it from real life. You roll out of bed and drive to Starbucks before school- what do you order? A Unicorn Frappuccino of course. Life is fun, it’s carefree, it’s colorful. The year is, naturally, 2016.
Of course, it isn’t really. We’ve just entered 2026 but last year was exhausting. People are tired of expectations and formalities. They crave fun and freedom. 2025 was a year of hard work and high effort, but maybe in an excessive amount. Every little thing seemed to be performative, Instagram posts were meticulously curated, outfits were chosen with the idea of being perceived a specific way, and Spotify was streaming on mute for hours just to wrack up minutes for the yearly Wrapped. A break is desperately needed. It’s time to return to the best parts of 2016.
2026 calls for casual, laid-back good times. It calls for simply living in the moment and creating nostalgic memories for the future, and honestly, the best reference point for that belongs to a decade ago. Sometimes referred to as the last golden year, 2016 practically invented nostalgia. Tiktok has blown up over the idea of carrying the vibes of the well-loved year into 2026. Thanks largely in part to Zara Larson’s Symphony Dolphin and more recently her Lush Life Dance. The internet seems set on embracing this vibe, but will 2016 really insert itself into our day to day life?
Junior Elise Buban seems to think so. She says, “It’s just the same vibe in the air. Let’s bring back Vine, the Unicorn Frappuccino, cute ugly outfits, I don’t even care, everything 2016.”
With Starbucks teasing the drop of a Unicorn Frappuccino in February, people are already anticipating their first sip in a decade. The colorful concoction is quintessential 2016 and the people are ready to embrace it.
Another student who’s excited about 2016’s comeback is junior Isha Chauhan. She explains, “All the popular trends are coming back, like Zara Larson and all the outfit styles everyone’s wearing.”
Zara Larson deserves a huge shoutout for 2016’s reemergence. With her rebrand which rivals and closely resembles Addison Rae’s in 2025. She is arguably the face of the 2016 rebrand. With the stunning costumes and phenomenal makeup looks of her Midnight Sun tour, she has singlehandedly inspired Gen Z to embrace what the Millennials fully owned.
Senior Mark Torres also describes how he sees 2016 leaving its impression on 2026. He sums it up perfectly as he described each trend. In his words, “The filters are back, the energy is back, the vibes are really thriving right now. Unicorn Frappucinos are back, everyone’s craving nostalgia, the style is back, the drops at Hollister are crazy.”
On the other end, there are some things that need to stay a decade away. For one, skinny jeans. Although this was a major part of 2016, they definitely were not the most comfortable. In recent years, the much baggier fitting jeans have thankfully been the trend. Another trend that hopefully remains in the past is hoverboards. As fun as they were, they had a horrible tendency to explode or cause serious injury and that is not the vibe of 2026.
Despite some of the more unfortunate trends, the positives certainly outweigh them. So, as said by Buban, “Let’s live it up like it’s 2016.”