Who Is Boring Not Com? Meet Fashion’s New Anonymous Critic.

Does fashion seem kind of boring lately? Each ad campaign and logo hoodie blurs into another. Somehow it’s always Fashion Week somewhere. If you agree, you might feel validated by a new snarky, anonymous Instagram account called @boringnotcom. Its mascot is the yawning emoji, and since June it has called out more than a few brands, trends, and designers its writer finds, well, boring. Including but not limited to: Demna’s latest Balenciaga collections, the word quiet, Burberry (“No one knows what it stands for anymore”), Miu Miu’s prices (£1,150 for a pair of Bermuda shorts), and Prada since Raf Simons arrived (“Miuccia could do no wrong in my eyes — but those days are over”). Back in July, Boring Not Com posted a rumor that Haider Ackermann might join Tom Ford as its new creative director — news that was formally announced last week. “The things you lot tell me are wild” read a post in July, speaking to the followers who send in tips. “You’re literally confessing sins to a green screen.” The account is still nascent: It has only 1,700 followers so far, but that list includes an interesting collection of fashion people: Bryanboy, Katie Grand, Daniel Marks, Anita Bitton, and Michel Gaubert.

Boring Not Com copies its name and text-heavy posting format from Style Not Com, a popular fashion-news account from Beka Gvishiani, who worked in fashion in Georgia until he started his account in 2021. Today, Gvishiani is an established influencer and front-row fixture at fashion shows with 395,000 followers on Instagram. His missives always look the same — short-and-sweet all-caps text in bold white letters against a bright-blue background — and relay the latest appointments and fashion news without any editorial spin. When Gvishiani started posting three years ago, his direct and lighthearted approach was refreshingly different from Diet Prada, the once-anonymous industry watchdog account that gained a following calling out racist advertising campaigns, cultural appropriation, and copycat designs back before fashion brands realized they needed someone on staff who could notice if a balaclava looked like blackface. But fashion’s cancel-culture moment has fizzled. It’s been years since Diet Prada’s incendiary posts have sent brands into crisis management.

Is Boring Not Com trying to bring an insider-y antagonism back to fashion’s social-media feeds? Not quite. Boring, as we’ll call the writer, agreed to an interview as long as we agreed to keep their name, gender, and most of their personal details a secret. Here’s what they do want to share: They say they have worked in fashion for five to ten years and they are “Gen Z–ish.” They say they are based in Europe (when we spoke at the end of August, they said they were in Paris). But, of course, this could all be purposeful misdirection, part of their “experiment,” as Boring calls the account.

Boring says they started their account to see if other people shared their frustrations. They see themselves not as a troll — or as an anonymous vehicle for people’s grudges — but as a renegade consultant delivering hard truths to an industry immune from criticism, even the constructive kind. Because like every other social-media fashion commentator that came before them, Boring thinks mainstream fashion publications are muzzled by the brands that pay their bills. “Advertisers have suppressed the media so much,” they tell me. Boring has faith they’ll be able to resist the same influence. They have posted two sponsored posts so far, however, and plan to keep doing so if there’s interest. (We’ve heard that story before.)

Boring calls their account a Style Not Com parody, even though sometimes their content can look awfully similar. Both accounts, for example, earnestly wish fashion people a happy birthday. (I asked Gvishiani for his thoughts on his upstart copycat, and he responded, “HAVE FUN!”)

The biggest difference, of course, is that, for now, Boring wants to stay anonymous. “A lot of influencers and content creators are judged on their appearance and their skin color today,” they say. Also, they have a real job in fashion, where unfiltered opinions would not be welcome. Boring says their DMs are full of questions about their true identity. I asked around for any compelling theories. Bryanboy has no answers for me but predicts Boring will unveil themselves in a season or two: “We’ve been here many times over … When it’s time to monetize, the identities usually come out.” Pierre M’Pelé, who gained a following for his fashion commentary online under the name Pam Boy, advises Boring to enjoy the anonymity as long as they can. “Once you are outed, the industry swallows you and then spits you out mercilessly,” he says. Cozette McCreery, an outspoken London-based fashion consultant, tells me people often think Boring is her. (It’s not.)

I spoke with Boring about their ambitions, desire to stay anonymous, and Fashion Month plans.

Is Boring an alter ego? Or a way for you to be a truer version of yourself?
To be honest, it’s more of a truer version of myself because I have been in the industry for a long time. And I feel like I’ve had to suppress my voice a lot about certain things, and you can’t have an opinion. And I just needed an outlet. I wanted to find a community of people that were more like me, that think like me.

I didn’t start Boring to troll people; that’s not the case at all. I’m literally just saying things that everyone else is thinking but they can’t say most of the time. And as you can see, I have a balance on my page where I talk about the good and the bad, so it’s not constantly bad all the time, because not everything in fashion is horrible. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be in the industry. But there are things that should be said. I feel like if brands actually listen to certain influencers, or the public, or the people that actually buy their products, I think it could help a lot of brands who are failing. Especially Burberry, which I recently was talking about. 

But what you posted about Burberry, for example, is all very reasonable and not inflammatory. So why is it important for you to be anonymous?Because I’m in the industry. I always have these discussions with my friends and stuff, but publicly I would usually not do it because I know that I would be scolded for it.

You would be scolded?
Yeah, I wouldn’t be booked for certain things. The Cathy Horyn days, when people used to give really honest reviews, do not exist anymore.

Cathy’s still doing it.
She’s still doing it, which is great, but, like, there’s not a lot of people like that who are brave enough to do it. There’s a few Instagrammers — [Boring later tells me Understitch and Fashion Roadman are a few of their favorites, as is Bryanboy] — who I’m loving. But brands don’t like you saying anything else but “I think you’re great.”

I’m actually surprised by the amount of PRs that are following me now. I’m being invited to shows, which I thought I’d be blacklisted from, so that’s a very interesting situation. Obviously, I’m not going to these shows for now.

We as the fashion internet community, so to speak, have seen this time and time again: A spicy online commentator becomes really popular and then they start getting invited to things and they feel a part of that community. And then they are in a similar boat to the magazines that they started out criticizing, because they want to stay a part of that community. 

Exactly. I used to love Diet Prada when it first started. And then I started to slowly not agree with everything. I was like, I don’t agree with this being canceled and that being canceled. And then I noticed his content started to change as he grew in popularity. That’s what happens with any business, right? You need to be very careful to keep what made you who you are in the first place — what made you get these followers in the first place. Otherwise, your engagement starts going.

How do I stop that from happening for me? I don’t know. Hopefully, I keep true to myself and honest with myself. But I will work with brands. Of course I will.

But why? Why work with brands if you have a full-time job?
Well, I won’t only work with megabrands. I will also work with young designers who have no money. The other day, I did a post saying, “I want young designers to reach out to work and promote their stuff as well.”

My account might not even grow. It might not even get more than 2,000 followers. But if it does grow and it becomes a business, of course. If a brand like Prada reaches out to me, I’m not going to say “no” to them. I’m going to work with them because it’s a brand that I love. I love Prada — although I did a recent post about them, which wasn’t very favorable of their recent collections.

Okay, Style Not Com — obviously, you’re playing on the name and the formatting. So what do you think about Style Not Com?
I actually only followed it recently. I didn’t need to follow it because I kept seeing PRs and people in fashion continuously share the same thing over and over. And I’m like, Why are you sharing this? It’s just literally a press release. So that’s why I was like, Okay, let me just start my own thing. Boring Not Com, obviously, is a parody of Style Not Com.

It’s safe to say you’re bored by fashion right now?
I’m very bored, so I’m bringing a bit of excitement to fashion.

Has anyone in your DMs correctly guessed who you are?
No. The funny thing is everyone who messages me, 90 percent of them say, “People think I’m you. Can you confirm I’m not you?” And I’m like, How can I do that? And then I say to them, “I am not you. You show this to your buddy.”

I feel like there are a lot of offices right now that are all trying to speak about who I am and if I’m someone sitting next to them. It’s kind of funny. It’s like an open joke. Apparently, people think I’m a photographer, a stylist, a PR. I get a lot of PR.

And even if they say “Have we met before?,” I just don’t confirm or deny it.

In that situation, has it ever been someone that you had met?
So many times.

Tell me about your plans for the next weeks ahead of Fashion Month. What’s your plan for covering the shows?

I’m going to make sure that I work with people from different cities. I want to champion some students, so I put the word out that any students can have some tickets and cover — be Boring for the day. So take content, take pictures, have fun, and experience their first show. I have someone going to the H&M event for me as well in London, which will be quite fun and interesting to see. I might be there.

How do you go to a fashion show and maintain your anonymity?
Let’s just say sometimes I might be at an event that Boring is at as well.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.