Aesthetics Wiki
Advertisement

By Suffix[]

Many aesthetics have suffixes at the end of them as a way to show how the aesthetic is carried out. Visually, the aesthetics often differ greatly from each other and the communities don't interact as much as those in families. Although, unfortunately, how it belongs in a category is determined by name as opposed to actual origin. For more specific ways of knowing how an aesthetic is categorized by it being carried out, see By Category.

Suffix Explanation
Core Suffix The word "core" comes from the French word "coeur", meaning heart. However, the use of core as a suffix comes from the phrase "hardcore," a word from the 1930s meaning "an irreducible nucleus or residuum; also a stubborn or unyielding minority." In those aesthetics that end in -core, the suffix means that the main word is the theme of the entirety of the aesthetic. i.e. all of the images in Lovecore relate to love.
Prep Suffix Even though the word prep derives from 'the alumni of old college preparatory schools', the prep suffix is also used in eutopian and aesthetics based on idealized alternate realities such as Cyberprep. The prep suffix is often associated with enforcement of the status quo, as well as idealized realities where the world advances with the status quo still in play, no matter how fortuitous or detrimental it is.
Punk Suffix Even though the word punk means 'related to punk music', the punk suffix is also used in dystopian and alternate reality aesthetics such as Cyberpunk and Steampunk. The punk suffix can be used in activist aesthetics such as Forestpunk, which is revolved around fighting for the preservation of nature and the environment.
Wave Suffix The wave suffix represents surreal imagery and imagination for aesthetics. These aesthetics usually have bright neon colors and/or show fantastical images that were created through digital illustration and editing. (e.g. Vaporwave and Synthwave)
Kei Kei (系) is a suffix from Japan that means "type" and is used for the purpose of categorization by style or genre. In the context of this Wiki, it usually refers to a "type" of Japanese fashion. These fashion types tend to be alternative, with people in these fashions socializing with each other and creating a very specific aesthetic that deviates from the mainstream, most often with specific brands catering to (and often being the creators of) the certain look.
Girl The "Girl" aesthetics are a recent trend on TikTok and Pinterest that refers to aesthetics centered around an idealized young woman from her late teens to early 20s who lives a fashionable and "aesthetic" lifestyle. The aesthetics included have feminine and aspirational qualities that relate to living spaces, clothing, makeup, personality traits, and habits. The pages in this category must have "girl" as the second part of its name. However, there are many adjacent aesthetics that can be found in each page's "related aesthetics" section.

By Family[]

This section is under construction. Suggestions for other aesthetic families are welcome.

An aesthetic family is the term for the wiki to group together aesthetics that shared a tag/search term and/or originated from a single aesthetic before deviating or evolving into multiple ones. These aesthetics often have common motifs or philosophies despite them being different in subject, time of creation, mode of expression etc.

Family Explanation
Goth Variations The goth suffix comes from the subculture of the same name that originated in the United Kingdom during the early 1980s: the name itself was derived directly from the musical genre of Gothic rock, whose fans made up the subculture. Its imagery and cultural proclivities indicate influences from 19th-century literature of the same name and horror films.


The aesthetic then evolved, with these aesthetics being variations or spin-offs from the original Goth culture, which is still popular.

Academia Academia is a term referring to a group of aesthetics that romanticizes learning, particularly through study, research, and reading. The aesthetics all originated as variations from Dark Academia, with the other aesthetics developed through text posts that described the blogger's ideas on the variations.
Coquette Coquette is a broad tag/search term that includes hyper-feminine aesthetics enjoyed by teenaged girls deviating from the more lighthearted and innocent mainstream. The aesthetic evolved since the mid-2010s on tumblr, where the term originated from a community based on pursuing the persona of the coquette/nymphet- a sexually precocious minor. But because of mass-tagging and the ubiquity of the nymphet community on that site, many photos unrelated to the novel and film were tagged under coquette. It is a mostly tumblr phenomenon that depicts teenaged girls engaged with darker/mature themes, such as mental illness, drugs/alcohol, sexual desire, etc.
Regional Gothic Regional Gothic is a Tumblr trend in the mid-2010s wherein users would write bullet-pointed lists of eerie moments related to the region in which they are familiar with or describing seemingly benign moments in life, such as in college. These texts convey this tone by presenting ominous information and not elaborating on it. Visually, this developed into depicting the darker aspects of a region, often with motifs of religion, folklore, untamed nature, liminal spaces, and treacherous characters.
Frutiger Family The Frutiger Family is a family of design aesthetics that are a subgenre of or otherwise related to Frutiger Aero that were created in the 2000s and coincided with Web 2.0. Frutiger designs are most well known for incorporating reflections and gradients.
Advertisement