If you look up the word ‘hobby’ online, chances are, you’ll be met with an outdated definition. Hobbies are, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, activities that ‘someone does for pleasure’; yet, with the rising commodification and trend cycles associated with certain hobbies, this meaning no longer encapsulates their essential modern and social significance.
I recently came across a video entitled ‘Is Having Hobbies the New Commodity/Fashion Trend?’, where Katie Robinson discusses the growing online presence of ‘hobby-core’. She notes that, through platforms such as TikTok, hobbies have shifted from purely pleasurable activities to status symbols to be bought, advertised, and performed. She argues that in a world of micro-trends and fast-fashion, people have latched on to hobbies and their concurrent ‘aesthetics’ as a last-ditch attempt to establish individuality and personal style—the problem being that this pursuit of uniqueness is paradoxically defined by the very trend culture it seeks to resist.
The Hobby Aesthetic
So, when we see ‘BookTok’ hashtags appearing on our Instagram feeds, it’s sensible to question whether creators are genuinely interested in reading, or whether they are using trending hashtags to construct a carefully curated self-image. Eva Marsden addresses this tension in her piece ‘Is BookTok Ruining Literature’, asking whether online literary discourse functions as ‘an essential encouragement to read’ or rather ‘witless pseudo-intellectualism’. The aesthetic value attached to reading as a hobby—cosy jumpers, dark academia, and copious cups of black coffee—arguably becomes more prominent than the literature itself. As Marsden contends, BookTok ‘heavily promotes overconsumption’, instilling a desire in viewers not only to own ‘every popular book’ but, I would argue, to possess every accompanying aesthetic accessory. As such, reading has become increasingly performative, no longer for enjoyment or pleasure, but for external or viewer gratification.
Reading isn’t the only hobby to face such treatment. Consider the ‘Pilates-princess’ aesthetic, complete with Alo Yoga sets and £300 CryoGlow facemasks, or ‘cottage-core’ videos which have become associated with gardening, knitting, and baking. These are hobbies that, according to the influencers who pursue them, must be undertaken while wearing long, flowing, pseudo-vintage dresses purchased via a monetised TikTok Shop link. Long gone are the days when one could simply bake bread over the weekend or learn to play guitar in their free time; now, such activities must align with—and effectively feed—your desired self-image.
The Hobby Paradox
What I am calling the ‘hobby paradox’ also faces another internal contradiction. Activities such as reading, Pilates, and baking, as well as more creative pursuits such as painting, music, and learning another language, were once valued for their deeply internal and fulfilling potential. They have now become a means to an end. These activities—marketed and sold as methods of escaping the ‘hustle’ or ‘productivity-culture’—have, ironically, become void of personal value. It is not enough to pursue extracurricular activities on weekends; if you wish to share them online, you are expected to be the best.
So… what is the solution here?
In a world where hobbies are reduced to trends, exploited for their aesthetic and marketable value, and the emotional enrichment has itself become a performance, how are we expected to reclaim hobbies as activities of pure, unmotivated enjoyment? I like to reflect on what I enjoyed as a child. Before aesthetics became part of the equation, I painted, crafted, sewed, baked, and wrote stories. It didn’t matter that I wasn’t very good or that I didn’t own the latest trending KitchenAid, because these hobbies provided me with pleasure and joy. Perhaps reclaiming hobbies requires a similar shift (or even backtrack) in perspective: an engagement in activities for simple, personal enjoyment, rather than for surface-level performance or validation.