Cigarettes return to the runway

During New York Fashion Week fall/winter 2024, Christian Cowan and LaQuan Smith sent models down runways holding lit cigarettes. Charli xcx defined "brat" culture as cigarettes and a strappy white top, while Addison Rae smoked two cigarettes simultaneously in her music video.

What is heroin chic exactly

The aesthetic emerged in the early 1990s as a counterculture rebellion against the excess of the 1980s. It celebrated cigarettes, cynicism, and concerningly slim bodies, becoming shorthand for cool.

The term was born from tragedy

Fashion photographer Davide Sorrenti died of a heroin overdose at age 20 in 1997. Interview editor Ingrid Sischy condemned the aesthetic at his wake, saying "This is heroin; this isn't chic. This has got to stop."

“This is heroin; this isn't chic. This has got to stop, this heroin chic.”

Kate Moss became the icon

A 2007 photo of Kate Moss in a fur coat with cigarettes, spindly legs, and sucked-in cheekbones became the definitive image of heroin chic cool. She later said "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels."

“Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.”

Young people absorbed the message

At 15, the author created a Pinterest board of waif-like models with sunken eyes and cigarettes. She'd never smoked but found the aesthetic appealing, treating the images as low-stakes rebellion.

Tobacco companies exploited the link

In the 1920s, Lucky Strike marketed cigarettes as appetite suppressants with "Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet." By the 1990s, fashion shoots featured skeletal models smoking, reinforcing the message: to be thin is to smoke.

The images shaped her worldview

Models with sunken cheeks and prominent collarbones seemed to say that appearing unwell was cool and sexy. The author believed them, later developing anorexia in college.

She shifted to wellness culture

After her anorexia diagnosis and antidepressants, the author replaced thin-spiration with fitness culture. She lifted weights and added protein powder to smoothies, though she later recognized this fitspo phase wasn't healthier.

Wellness culture briefly dominated

By the 2010s, plus-size model Tess Holliday was signed to major agencies, Ronda Rousey graced magazine covers, and Khloé Kardashian launched size-inclusive denim. Anti-cigarette campaigns were everywhere.

The pandemic changed everything

When the world shut down and Trump began his second term, the cultural mood shifted. The It Girls decided: no more green juice, no more Spin class. The world is burning, so the coolest thing is to care less and weigh less.

Extreme thinness is back in 2026

Pop stars are shrinking, jeans are lower rise, and injectable weight-loss medications are ubiquitous. Everyone from Hailey Bieber to Kylie Jenner appears on magazine covers with performative cigarettes.

Comments reveal the harm

Under celebrity videos, comments like "Why is no one eating?" and "I can hear someone's hunger in their voice" show how young people are absorbing these images as aspirational rather than alarming.

“Why is no one eating?”

We can't diagnose but we see the pattern

While magazines can't diagnose eating disorders, we can't ignore the effect these images have on people. What one person finds alarming, another finds aspirational, especially if they're young and impressionable.

The cycle continues at fashion week

New York Fashion Week for spring/summer 2027 showed the trend persisting: models were still louche, smoking, and skinny. The question remains whether this is homage to Old Hollywood or a genuine return of wasting away.

This has got to stop

The author, now 34, wishes for true body neutrality for her daughters. She echoes Ingrid Sischy's words from 1997: "This has got to stop, this heroin chic." Some things do taste better than skinny feels.

“This has got to stop, this heroin chic.”