Picture this: the floor is covered in clothes that once built an internet icon’s wardrobe — denim stacked like Jenga towers, jackets forming textile mountains, shoes lined up like they’re awaiting judgment. And right in the centre of the chaos sits Emma Chamberlain, sorting, letting go, moving on… except for one small, colourful, scrunched-up detail. The scrunchies stay.
There’s a certain charm in the way she treats them. Not as accessory, but as artifact. While statement pieces and “It-girl” staples are tagged for new owners, the scrunchies are scooped up with both hands — guarded with the same instinct someone might reserve for journals or love letters. They’re not on trend; they’re hers.
Scrunchies have had a rollercoaster legacy — from ‘90s suburban bedrooms to the wrists of teens on the internet, reborn through trend cycles and aesthetics. But Emma’s attachment transcends nostalgia-for-aesthetic’s-sake. These little loops of fabric mark chapters: school years, first videos filmed in her bedroom, the dizzy rise to cultural “It-ness,” the shift into refined minimalism, and every reinvention in between. They’re the thread connecting the versions of her she hasn’t fully outgrown — and doesn’t want to.
Her style journey has never been linear. One day she’s wrapped in thrift-store comfort, the next she’s leaning into structured, clean silhouettes that whisper “grown.” But scan any photo long enough — a ponytail, a wrist, a bathroom shelf — and the scrunchie reveals itself like an Easter egg for fans who know. A signature. A wink.
What makes this detail so compelling isn’t the object — it’s the intimacy. Scrunchies are the kind of thing we keep without thinking, until one day we realise: oh… this is part of me. They’re the opposite of a statement piece — they’re the quiet things with loud meaning. The things that don’t need an audience to matter.
Fashion loves to tell us to move on, upgrade, evolve or donate. Reinvention is currency. But Emma reminds us that identity isn’t built only by what we collect — it’s built by what we protect. The scrunchies act like emotional glue between past and present. And in a landscape where personal branding often replaces personality, holding onto something soft, silly and sincere feels almost radical.
For anyone who’s ever kept a chipped mug, a stretched t-shirt, a concert wristband, a necklace from someone who once mattered — Emma’s scrunchies make perfect sense. They validate the sentimental without making it cheesy. They say: style can grow up, but it doesn’t have to forget where it started.
So while the resale listings refresh and wardrobes transform, that small elastic ring remains looped around her story, not just her hair. Proof that sometimes the smallest accessory can guard the strongest sense of self.
Photo: Instagram
