Is The Cornerstore the New It Girl Restaurant?
Only in New York will you find a $24 chocolate chip cookie. And don't forget–that's without tip and tax! The total cost came up to exactly $31.36. Is it in my top three cookies I've ever tried? Yes. But that's besides the point. The hype behind a $24 dollar cookie is something I will never understand but leads me into further discussion about hype culture.
As I’m sure you all are aware, there’s always a constant desire for the next big thing. Whether or not you admit it to yourself, we all succumb to the latest “drops” from our favorite stores and the new (or old) hot restaurant that just went viral on TikTok… like Jeans or The Corner Store. If you have TikTok and are a junkie like me, besides viewing a $24 cookie, I know you've seen those sour cream and onion martinis. It doesn't sound very appetizing yet we still gawk at the idea and decide to show up at 5pm in hopes of a seat. When you tell people you’ve been to a restaurant they’ve seen go viral on TikTok they ask you for the details on how you managed to do it as if I’m the Samantha (from SATC) of restaurant reservations–fabulous, effortless, and somehow always on the list!
Besides restaurants, the fashion world is just as equally flooded with hype culture. Any time I see someone walk past in Travis Scott Air Jordans I question two things: are they real and how did you manage to get them? The moment I saw a picture of the Military Black Air Jordan 4s, I knew I'd be setting my alarm for 8 AM the next day to try and secure them for my collection. Just like waiting for a viral restaurant to open at 5pm in an attempt to secure a reservation, Nike has sneaker drops at 9am in the morning that's almost never guaranteed–it's like playing the lottery.
You might think hype culture is a new topic of discussion, it's actually quite the opposite. Hype culture has been around forever. Even in my young days (I'm only 21) I remember visiting Serendipity and feeling like I had stepped into a fairytale. The Frozen Hot Chocolate? Magical. The over-the-top desserts? Even better. Then as time passed, you suddenly had to book a reservation a year in advance unless you knew somebody because of how viral it became. Once a place becomes something people force it to be, it loses its magic and it turns into just another commercial money-making machine. Even in Sex And The City (my favorite New York show), Carrie and her friends were constantly chasing the newest “it” bars and clubs that were “in” one week and “out” the next. They even went to a bar that was named Bed, “since people often go to bars to try to get someone into bed, it was only a matter of time ‘til someone cut out the middleman and put the beds in bars” (Carrie). It's like when guys think the Hawaiian shirt they wear once a year is the coolest thing ever until enough people yuck their yum, and they decide to retire it for another year, hoping the tides turn in their favor. Just so you know in advance, the opinion never changes. The same thing happened with the whole skinny jeans are out discourse that flooded the internet. Like, okay, we get it. How many times can you repeat the same thing before it just becomes noise? And that's what social media has fabricated–clutter. Constantly being bombarded with the next best thing, the coolest place to eat, or the most fabulous thing to wear. It's never-ending!
Every day, we feed into hype culture while spending mindless hours scrolling on TikTok, the app that quite literally rules our lives. At least I'm not afraid to admit it! Some of you are still in denial about how often you use TikTok. Whether it's a tutorial on healing an infected piercing (saltwater doesn't work by the way) or watching organizing videos in hopes you'll be inspired to do the same. TikTok isn’t just an app for silly dance videos anymore. It’s educational (sometimes), inspirational, and recreational. We find ourselves on TikTok looking at places like The Corner Store, and suddenly we need a sour cream onion martini… THAT DOESN'T EVEN SOUND APPETIZING. Yet we buy into it anyway because of the hype surrounding it. Because if you can tell someone you got into The Corner Store, people assume you either know people or are the person to know.
