Prep isn’t ‘back’ — it never left
Open up any social media and type in the word “prep.” I just did it: to my horror, I was met by a soft-voiced, big-lipped TikTokker dressing herself in bright, monogrammed clothes and topping the look off with a Tommy Hilfiger bucket hat and matching socks. I then called my friend Peter York, co-author of The Official Sloane Ranger Handbook, otherwise known as Britain’s answer to The Official Preppy Handbook and the Ten Commandments for an entire generation of preppy dressers in the United Kingdom. “Prep is minimal,” he reassured me. “That’s the whole point, preppy clothes are a staple in everybody’s wardrobe.” But, as York told me, the younger generations’ take on this timeless trend “doesn’t sound remotely like what prep actually is.
