Nostalgia vs Newstalgia: When the present gets stuck in the past

When nostalgia becomes detached from memory, what does that mean for brands and culture?

Music alive with warm vinyl crackle drifts from a dorm window. A student dozes at their typewriter, framed beneath a polaroid-studded corkboard tracking a semester of nights out. Are you in 1975? Or 1985?

Nope – welcome to 2025, where nostalgia isn’t just back… it brought snacks.

As someone who’s got a soft spot for everything from Walkmans to Pick ‘n’ Mix, I’ll admit: I’m a total nostalgia fan. (Low-rise jeans, though? They can stay in the past.) Luckily for me, it’s everywhere right now – whether that’s sauntering down catwalks or bubbling up in sodas. Of course, nostalgia kicks are nothing new. But this omnipresent mishmash of retro revivals feels like a departure from standard service.

So what’s happening?

Nostalgia today: Same same, but different 

Every generation has looked back to the past for inspiration. From Victoriana making a comeback in the 1930s to the revival of 80s neon in the 2000s, aesthetics have a way of circling back in areas like fashion and toys.

Yet today, nostalgia has permeated almost every cultural sphere and feels different in both scale and intent. Take Hollywood – in 2024, 14 of the Top 15 highest grossing films were sequels, remakes or adaptations. (The only original work, It Ends With Us, placed 15th.) Around 80-90% of films released now are not original works, compared to only 10-20% in the early 1980s. We’ve seen 19 Disney remakes in the last decade alone. 

Movies are hardly the only example. Pokémon cards: whose ascent from early 2000s kids toy to serious investment has been meteoric. The rarest examples are already approaching the value of holy grail baseball cards, whose value took numerous decades of scarcity to establish. Vintage sneakers, retro games, old school hi-fi too – all have seen a surge in value and interest.

It seems wherever you look, people are indulging in nostalgia more intensely than ever, fueled by social media and content streaming. The result is what some researchers are calling a “nostalgia boom”.

How are brands adapting to this boom?

Brands already love to tap into nostalgia. It offers a shortcut to instant recognition and fuzzy feelings that, when done well, sparks serious consumer engagement. Research shows that this is no coincidence – experiencing nostalgia genuinely elevates mood.

Commonly, you will see brands deploy nostalgia tactically to take advantage of this short-lived spike in positive emotions. Think cashing in on old hits to spark new attention – like FMCG brands relaunching old flavours. This is commodifying that rush of recognition you get from seeing pizza flavour Pringles or Pepsi Blue back on shelves. It’s as much comfort food for the mind as the mouth. 

Such tactical plays are typically short-lived. But in light of this boom, nostalgia is increasingly being harnessed more strategically by remixing the past in unexpected ways – so called ‘newstalgia’. This is where nostalgia incorporates modern twists like updated tech, subverted expectations, or socially progressive undertones – and it can result in enduring relevance for brands.

Take these recent examples, with each showing different ways brands can strategically remix nostalgia:

• The Barbie movie is a visual love letter to the toy’s Dreamhouse heyday, yet its narrative dives into modern questions of gender, agency, and identity – the classic visuals juxtapose with progressive themes that question some of the less palatable implications of the original toys.
  
• Adidas have collaborated with Parley to re-release classic shoes using eco-friendly materials like recycled ocean plastic. In doing so, they combine new material science and green values to update old favourites in ways that connect better to modern audiences.
  
• LEGO’s collaboration with Time Magazine on the Girls of the Year initiative reimagines nostalgic playsets to spotlight girls’ achievements. It turned a brand long associated with boyhood nostalgia into a platform that broadens who gets to be seen as creative in today’s cultural storytelling. 
  

Nostalgia without the memories

So we can agree nostalgia is booming. But why? Some posit that part of it comes from the the fact that nostalgia can serve as a coping mechanism, offering emotional refuge and a sense of control when the present feels unpredictable. And in a world full of political uncertainty and economic instability, the unpredictability is certainly there.

But I suspect something more is going on. Studies measured the effects of nostalgia are based on actual memories. But huge numbers of Gen Z and below are nostalgic for times they never directly experienced. Is it still nostalgia, or something else?

Perhaps they can speak for themselves:

60% of Gen Z adults said that they wished they could return to a time before everyone was “plugged in.” In history, you won’t find many teenagers so enamoured of turning back the clock. There is a generational desire to escape relentless digital churn and reconnect with analogue fulfilment. It is a counter-cultural rejection of the seamless, connected world.

They crave more friction, not less, and look to latch onto things that are – or were – real. This is reflected in the resurgence of analog hobbies like vinyl collecting among digital natives. In 2024, UK vinyl sales reached a new high of 6.7 million units, a 10.5% increase year-on-year. Research by the Vinyl Alliance shows that 76% of Gen Z vinyl fans buy records at least monthly, with this age group accounting for the greatest proportion of physical music listeners in the UK. 

Buying vinyl is more than a posturing gimmick. It represents an intentional, mindful escape from the overload of digital life. And it’s not alone. Handmade zines, developing rolls of film, crochet, sourdough break making – these rituals are seeing cultural revivals because they offer richer, slower, more rewarding experiences – valued precisely because they demand focused engagement.

Success hinges on being a ‘memory architect’

Nostalgia today has evolved beyond just a longing for the past. It is the art of picking and remixing societal memories – even unexperienced ones – into new forms that entertain, foster shared connections, or convey meaning. By understanding this, brands can better use nostalgia as a strategic asset and unlock cultural traction. What from the past speaks to the present moment? How could something old-fashioned be altered to capture a zeitgeist?

The future belongs to brands willing to answer questions like these and act as “memory architects” – curating the familiar, remixing it for modern sensibilities, and empowering consumers to blend the best of then and now to create new meaning. For brands aiming to build lasting relevance, here are some suggestions to help move beyond nostalgia’s surface appeal and embrace it more strategically:

• Remix, don’t replicate: Samsung brought flip phones back. But it was no rehash of old glories – it brought with it an evolution in screen technology, merging the tactile satisfaction of the past with the sleek power and screen real estate expectations of today.

• Layered storytelling: The Barbie movie’s nostalgia-heavy visuals set the scene, but the commentary and themes make it distinctly contemporary. Any meaningful nostalgia play cannot afford to reproduce the past uncritically – it must consider today’s cultural narratives.

• Analogue richness: Brands like Fujifilm (Instax cameras) and companies bringing back vinyl speak to a longing for physicality, creative effort, and ritual in a digital-first world. Don’t focus only on the obstacles you can remove. Consider which to keep, or even to put in place.

• Wellbeing and personalisation: Nostalgia is intertwined with self-care – from retro recipes to “vintage” workouts like Jane Fonda routines. Nostalgia serves as a way to de-stress. Any strategy cannot forget that relaxation, however winding the path, is the ultimate goal.

Some final thoughts to dwell on

As nostalgia becomes an ever more powerful force in culture, it’s worth asking: is there a limit to how often we can remix the past? When today’s aesthetic is just remixes of the past, what will tomorrow’s throwbacks be?

Perhaps, in the future, we’ll find ourselves yearning for the very moment we’re living through now – nostalgic for the chaos and creativity of ‘newstalgia’ itself. A longing, not for a single coherent era, but for the ever-changing present we’re shaping right now.

For brands, it’s hugely important to recognise that nostalgia is becoming increasingly about fulfilment rather than memory. Gen Z especially are questing into the past to find meaning and satisfaction that is intentionally not instant or easy. We’ll be looking closer at what this means for design soon, so watch this space.