Who Is Gabbriette Bechtel?

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Gabbriette Bechtel is a model, influencer and ex-musician who goes by first name only on TikTok. It’s a name with 8.4 million views and counting on the platform, and her mononymous status immediately aligns her with the greats. Rihanna, Madonna, Beyoncé… Gabbriette? If you know, you know.

In 2022, indie sleaze shafted clean girl beauty, in what was heralded a the great “vibe shift“. Come 2023, this grungy zeitgeist is “shifting” more than how we dress. According to IBISWorld, following $40 billion peak in 2021, the vitamins and supplements market dipped by a modest 1 billion in 2022, and hasn’t shot back up. After the green juices, at-home workouts and mindfulness meditations of the pandemic, it’s looking like we may have a case of wellness fatigue.

But what do influencers like Gabbriette Bechtel have to do with it?

Dazed recently described Gabbriette’s aesthetic as “succubus chic,” and she’s exerting a simmering influence on beauty and fashion.

She’s netted collaborations and campaigns with high fashion houses Balenciaga, Isabel Marant, Diesel and Kiko Kostadinov x Heaven by Marc Jacobs. She’s also lent her vampiric cool to Skims and Juicy Couture, (a brand doubling down on a comeback). Even UGG, the Uggboot brand now on a campaign to be edgy, have cashed in on the Gabbriette brand.

@dazed @gabbriettebb takes us through her go-to beat for her #DazedBeauty DIY tutorial ? #DBDIY #Gabbriette #Dazed ♬ Lofi, a soft Japanese-style lofi(1229138) – G-axis sound music

Gabbriette rocks pallid skin, Depop threads, dark circles and gritty eyeliner. Her razor-thin brows put Julia Fox and Pamela Anderson to shame. In one wince-inducing beauty tutorial with Dazed (her greatest supporters), she notes her brows are “kind of thick right now,” as she tweezes one of possibly two rows of hair. They are not.

Kylie Jenner has even picked up her look, proving that Gabbriette’s officially hit the mainstream.

Why Is Gabbriette Popping Off Right Now? 

Gabbriette’s origin story lies in the Charli XCX-mentored girl band Nasty Cherry. She was the group’s lead singer, alongside drummer Debbie Knox-Hewson, guitarist Chloe Chaidez, and bassist Georgia Somary.

Although the group never officially announced their breakup, they have been inactive on social media since mid-2021. In 2022, Georgia wrote that “the pandemic hit [them] incredibly hard”, but that the band “never officially split”.

Still, it would appear that Gabbriette’s meteoric rise was only just beginning. Soon enough, Gabriette found a new audience on TikTok. She shared her mother’s Mexican recipes in soothing and surreal AMSR-inducing cooking tutorials, and the rest is history.

Gabbriette’s appeal lies in her bad-girl-next-door aesthetic. She’s not as kooky as Julia Fox, but like Fox, she’s accessible. Watching, she could be your intimidating next-door neighbour who turns out to be nice when you lose your house keys.

Is Gabbriette’s Burn-Out Chic Good For Us?  

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Gabbriette and her buccal-fat-removed ilk are riding a dark, chaotic, post-wellness wave. Unlike the polished fitness influencers of the pandemic, her look and vibe is achievable — it’s sleeping in your makeup, leaning into exhaustion, forgetting to wash your hair and serving generally unpolished, grumpy vibes. So far, so explicable given the current global mood, but, as with every trend, there’s a flipside.

In an interview with The Face last year, Gabbriette described her beauty routine as replete with five skincare products (Osea, Youth to the People, Belif and Supergoop!). Unsurprisingly, sunscreen was her beauty essential. Somewhat surprisingly, “cigarettes” were her beauty vice.

This is a big beauty taboo with celebs. When asked for their biggest beauty vices, celebs will usually list sleeping in their makeup or “too much coffee”. Not Gabbriette, who smokes cigs as openly as the Olsens. In an Instagram post republished by Dazed, Gabbriette poses in an (admittedly cute) Stella McCartney cropped cardigan, cigarette hanging from her Makeup Forever-pencilled pout.

In an age when we’re still trying to get tanning videos banned on TikTok, the open celebration of gaunt, ciggie-touting models and influencers seems odd. But she’s generating headlines, and it seems our appetite for the burnout aesthetic is going nowhere.