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Gen Z or millennial? How you wear your cardigan reveals your age

30/1/2025

Translation: machine translated

Generation Y and Generation Z don't see eye to eye on many things. For example, when it comes to fashion. One finds the other silly, the other finds the other boring. Exhibit A: the cardigan.

The difference is small, but crucial. Which buttons you fasten - or don't fasten - on your cardigan immediately reveals whether you were born before or after 1995. To put it nastily: older or younger. You're already at a loss, because how many options are there? Pull it over, button it up or leave it open, that's it. Well, then you were probably born between 1981 and 1995 (or earlier) and are therefore at least a millennial. Accordingly, your cardigan look could look something like this:

Buttoned up = stuffy?
Source: Instagram @lucywilliams02

A classic Gen Y look: cardigan over T-shirt. — Buttoned up = stuffy?
Source: Instagram @lucywilliams02

That's not wrong, of course. Just a bit treacherous. Because anyone born after 1995 and therefore part of Generation Z can identify you as "old" at first glance. Kind of like if you had a folding case on your smartphone or ankle-high socks in use. No offence intended.

You might think that's pretty arrogant. So how does Gen Z wear their cardigans? The answer is clear: fastened with just one or a maximum of two buttons, namely the top button.

This is how the cardigan falls apart in an A-shape.
Source: Instagram @olhirst

Another Gen-Z indication: the Iced Matcha. — This is how the cardigan falls apart in an A-shape.
Source: Instagram @olhirst

And the moral of the story? Wear your cardigan however you like. A bit of "generational beef", as my colleague Stephanie Vinzens so beautifully put it, is part of it. And as long as we're only arguing about sock lengths and button plackets, all is well with the world.

Whether Gen Y or Z - you can find our cardigans here.

Header image: Spotlight/Launchmetrics

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Laura Scholz

Senior Editor

Laura.Scholz@digitecgalaxus.ch

Always in the mood for good hits, great trips and clinking drinks.

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