Angela Gil
The Hydro Flask water bottle brand has skyrocketed in popularity over the past year, especially among the so-called “VSCO girl” crowd. Nicholas “Nick” Pranger explained that a VSCO girl is someone that “wears scrunchies, has a messy bun in her hair, has a Hydro Flask and wears birkenstocks.” He made it clear that it’s more of a general aesthetic than anything else, and that VSCO girls are especially prevalent on music-centric social media app Tik-Tok, where they can be found exclaiming “And I oop” and “Sksksks.” 
For those of you who haven’t heard about Tik-Tok, it’s a new social media platform populated almost entirely by high school & middle school students. The app actually started off as musical.ly, where it gained a reputation for being cringy. Once the app rebranded, however, young people everywhere forgot about its ugly past and it rapidly regained popularity. Now, the platform is a hub of Gen Z internet culture, which now happens to include Hydro Flasks.
At first glance, a water bottle may appear to have little to do with aesthetic, but Hydro Flasks’ beautiful matte surface comes in plenty of vibrant colors and patterns. Even better, the bottles are reusable, so you’re “saving the turtles” while simultaneously looking stylish. 
The state-of-the-art temperature technology is unlike anything anyone’s ever seen before – as Ella Reese-Clausion ‘22 put so eloquently, “they do a good job of keeping your water cold.” 
The only downfall, it turns out, is how dentable the gorgeous bottles can be: “If you’re clumsy like me, you can expect a couple of dents on your bottle” stated Lily Ruiz, class of 2022. Thankfully, most of the Latin School of Chicago is carpeted, so any Hydro Flask dropped on school grounds will likely be fine. 
Furthermore, the 32-ounce bottles are the perfect size to fit scrunchies around, and the handle is sturdy enough to carry millions of half-finished friendship bracelets. At a mere $32.95, the 21 oz “Standard Mouth” bottle is a total steal. 
Latin students claim that they’re “cute” (Lily Ruiz ‘22), “absolutely massive” (Elro Starr ‘23), and that they “hold a lot of water” while being “fun to drink out of” (Ava Tortorello ‘21). 
What else could you possibly want from a water bottle? It’s a wonder Hydro Flasks haven’t been a major part of an internet trend before 2019.