Unpacking the Psychology Behind the Gen Z Babydoll Dress Trend
With professional fashion psychologist Jennifer Heinen.
While I strongly dislike the term “babydoll dress,” I must face an indisputable truth: They are “in,” and the 2025 edition is very cute. I’ve been thinking about this since at least Saturday, April 26, when Hill House teased its gauzy, brand-new Lucinda Nightgown on Instagram ahead of its upcoming Summer Collection drop:
Though not quite my own style, I was charmed: Semi-sheer and crafted from the softest, breeziest light-weight cotton voile, Lucinda is made for a day on the beach, afternoon nap or a glam getting ready moment, the product description reads. But it was also the presentation (in which a blonde, leggy model was standing barefoot in a sunny kitchen, washing produce in double-wide sink) that got me. As I plot out my summer, calculating mastermind that I am, could I incorporate such a dress — a babydoll dress — into my rotation?
I didn’t end up buying it, so I guess we’ll never know. (I did however get this gal, which feels a bit more my speed.) Alas, true to journalist form, I was left unsatisfied. Historically, I would sooner careen all over town in JNCOs than let my ass essentially hang out of the hem of a very tiny babydoll dress, which is what I know would happen. So why did I just consider spending $128 on one?
I am almost troublingly influenced, for one. But that’s not what I’m here to talk about today.
The answer, as with so much of fashion’s trend cycle, is dictated by our collective psychology — by the ways in which history doesn’t always repeat itself, but it does in fact rhyme. So I asked a professional fashion psychologist: London-based Jennifer Heinen of
, whose work explores the intersection of clothing, identity, and mental well-being — for her opinion.Before I bring in Jennifer, I find it necessary to revisit how we got here in the first place.
To get the full picture, we must first revisit the early 1940s — 1942, to be precise, when American lingerie designer Sylvia Pedlar of Iris Lingerie is credited with inventing the micro-mini nightgown in response to wartime fabric shortages. Sylvia made due, creating a garment that balanced innocence with a hint of flirtation, and the babydoll dress was born. By the mid-1950s, amid the heyday of the G.I. Bill, the design had become a household staple; in 1956, it hit Hollywood, with a childlike Carroll Baker wearing the style throughout the buzzy film adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s “Baby Doll.” Come the 1960s, the style evolved even further, this time into a symbol of youthful rebellion — as much as one of comfort and of course, of coquettish charm.
Now we’re ready to get into it. Take a spin through the highlights of my Q&A with Jennifer below.
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Maura: Based on your research, how does fashion tap into our need for safety and simplicity?
Jennifer: Fashion is one of the most intimate forms of emotional architecture — it creates structure not just for the body, but for the psyche. When the world feels chaotic or overstimulating, we instinctively reach for what feels safe, soft, and simple. This isn’t frivolous; it’s deeply biological.
Clothing can serve as emotional armor, but it can also act as emotional comfort. The appeal of loose silhouettes, nostalgic cuts, or soft fabrics reflects a psychological return to the familiar. These garments regulate our nervous system by mirroring sensations we associate with care and containment — whether that’s the softness of childhood or the tactile ease of home.
The principle of “affective” forecasting plays a role here; we choose clothes not only for how they feel now, but how we expect they’ll make us feel. Simple, comforting pieces act as a form of anticipatory emotional regulation.
How are younger demographics like Gen Z embracing this and more specifically, other sorts of childlike silhouettes like the babydoll dress?
Gen Z is navigating adulthood during a period of economic, social, and existential instability — and their fashion reflects that tension. Childlike silhouettes, like the babydoll dress, offer both a buffer and a reclamation. They create softness in a world that often feels too sharp.
This isn’t regression — it’s reclamation. The babydoll dress allows wearers to access the unfiltered joy and expressive freedom of childhood, on their own terms. It’s about turning vulnerability into aesthetic power.
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In psychological terms, these silhouettes represent a kind of symbolic resistance to adult pressures — work, hyperproductivity, burnout culture. By embracing clothing that says “I’m allowed to play,” Gen Z is reframing what it means to dress with power.
It’s a visual manifestation of post-traumatic growth — dressing not for the identity expected of them, but for the one they’re actively rebuilding.
What does the current iteration of the babydoll dress say about modern femininity?
The babydoll dress today doesn’t just signal femininity — it complicates it. Once designed to contain and infantilize, it’s now being worn to expand, resist, and redefine. In 2025, the babydoll silhouette holds a duality: It’s both softness and subversion.
Wearing a babydoll dress is no longer about innocence — it’s about agency through aesthetic play. It says: I can be soft without being small. I can be whimsical without being naive. Modern femininity isn’t about fitting a mold — it’s about using style to move fluidly between strength and softness, structure and surrender.
The babydoll dress today is less about girlhood and more about permission — to be multifaceted, expressive, and emotionally real.
So what I’m saying is: The babydoll dress is no longer just girlish — it’s strategic softness. It lets femininity take up space in unexpected, emotionally intelligent ways.
A note to readers: Clotheshorse may occasionally include affiliate links if I’m recommending a product I love, but I’ll never promote anything I don’t use and/or enjoy myself!
This was so good!!
Such a terrific piece. I was a teen in the 90s so that's the era I associate with the dress and it was interesting to learn the further back history and see where we're at now. Would it be okay if I cross-post this to the readers of Create Me Free? I write about the intersection of art and psychology and I think this will resonate.