Picture yourself walking onto the set of any female-led movie or television show. Whether it be Sofia Coppola’s “The Virgin Suicide,”, Boaz Yakin’s “Uptown Girls,” or even Hannah Montana’s teenage bedroom, clusters of random trinkets and personal memorabilia is what makes that space so picture-esq. Each piece tells a story about the character, and girls who cluster founder Avery Claire Nugent thinks the same design principle is inherent to a woman’s way of expressing herself to the world, via the space she spends the most time in.

“Clustering is an art form. It’s hard to pull off, because if you do it wrong it can veer towards messy, but it’s the art of taking your things, putting them on display in little corners of your apartment, and taking your apartment from white box, nicely decorated, effortlessly to beautiful, feminine, gorgeousness,” says Nugent in a viral TikTok about her personal design style. She believes that minimalism is dead and clustering is the way women inherently express themselves through personal belongings.

@cherryylocks @inmapostmortem & @iris.diane via @girlswhocluster

“Everybody has their own cluster signature,” says Nugent, the cluster queen, and thus a cluster can take any shape or form. Though they most often occur naturally, Nugent offers a formula for what makes the perfect cluster. Start with a cool magazine or used book stacked underneath a beautiful trinket dish; this can be a vintage ashtray or a thrifted plate that matches the vibes. Within that dish are an assortment of tchotchkes and daily essentials such as a matchbook, keychain, drunken photobooth strip, movie ticket, something frilly like a ribbon or pretty hair accessory, and a candle. Along with the beautiful things are some essentials such as an inhaler or a CVS rewards card. As Nugent says “clustering is beautiful but also lived in and has things
that you use on a daily basis.”

Some people may see this home aesthetic as messy, but Nugent’s instant rebuttal to that argument is that “if everything is beautiful, how can it look like a mess?”

@mel.andreou & @averyclairen via @girlswhocluster

From what older people in her life tell her, Nugent believes that clustering was always a part of home design before the dawn of the internet. Houses felt homey and were full of items that told a story about whoever lived there. Now with the pressure to have a picture-perfect home, people are afraid to express themselves via personal belongings due to fear of not fitting the traditional interior design mold.

Since the idea of clustering predates the internet, witches on TikTok have chimed in on the topic to say that they are the original cluster girls, thus implying that clustering is inherently female. Other notable cluster queens include Sofia Coppola, on and off screen, as well as Patti Smith with her Chelsea Hotel apartment and author Eve Babitz with her ability to use words to illustrate a beautifully clusterful home.

Sofia Coppola’s Office by Bruce Weber via Pinterest

Patti Smith’s Chelsea Hotel apartment in a performance of ‘Cowboy Mouth’ via Artnet

Before starting the page, Nugent was asked to describe her interior design style, and realized not only was there not a word for it, but there wasn’t a space in media for girls with aesthetics like hers. Her goal with “Girls Who Cluster” is to provide a space “for cool girlies in their twenties with cool ass spaces that don’t necessarily have all the money in the world yet, yet they have cool, beautiful apartments.”

With more than 2.3 million views of #clustercore on TikTok and the growing popularity of the @girlswhocluster Instagram page, the modern idea of a plain,simple home is beginning to fade in popularity. Once the idea of clustering hits the mainstream, Nugent feels that people will realize that a homey, lived in space is the way we are meant to live, not as a trend, but as a lifestyle.

@averyclairen @jasmine_llacer & @panta.bhaat via @girlwhocluster

Photo Credits:
Artnet - Patti Smith Apartment, Instagram - @girlswhocluster
Karen McGaughey - Hannah Montana Bedroom
Pinterest - The Virgin Suicides
Pinterest - The Virgin Suicides 2
Pinterest - Sofia Coppola’s Office
X (Twitter) - Uptown Girls Apartment

Citations:
Avery Claire Nugent’s Original Cluster TikTok
Interview with Nugent on 11/4/2023

Article by Danielle Tranter, Contributor, PhotoBook Magazine
Tearsheets by Chenglin Qu, Graphic Design Intern, PhotoBook Magazine

Clusters Are A Girl’s Best Friend