On a recent fall morning, Ben Taylor Lebowitz neatly made his bed, placing each throw pillow in its rightful place; threw on a sweater and hat; lit a eucalyptus-scented candle; and hit the “espresso” button on his sleek coffee maker. Mr. Lebowitz, 35, the founder of a pet portrait company, was filming a video of his morning routine for his hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
His home in the background of the video is hard to miss: a two-bedroom, two-and-a-half bathroom apartment in a trendy part of downtown Manhattan, with a large walk-in closet and views of the Hudson River. Mr. Lebowitz purchased the home about four years ago and furnished it using photos on Instagram and Pinterest as inspiration.
His home isn’t just any apartment though. It’s a “boy apartment.”
First, consider the bachelor pad (or its more recent iteration, the “boy room”): What comes to mind? A mattress on the floor? Beer and old takeout in the fridge? Think again. On TikTok, young men with an interest in interior design and penchant for tidiness are showing off their curated, urban homes for the world to see. Mr. Lebowitz is one in a new class of content creators who are sharing their homes’ interiors to defy expectations about men and their living habits. “The trend is so much bigger than me,” he said.
The boy apartment trend gained attention over the summer, after Victor Gerchev posted a video of his one-bedroom home in Shumen, Bulgaria. Mr. Gerchev, 28, was inspired by several other TikTok trends, including “boy essentials” and “girl apartments.” (Girl apartment videos are plentiful on TikTok, many offering décor ideas aimed at women.)
In the six-second video, Mr. Gerchev shares the coffee table books and gadgets lining his bookshelves and a closet of neatly folded shirts and pants, among other spaces in his home. Since sharing the video in July, the clip has received more than 350,000 views and spawned numerous imitations. “Very aesthetically pleasing,” one user wrote in the comments section. “I need this apartment,” another user wrote.
“When you hear a ‘man’s apartment,’ a ‘man cave’ or a ‘bachelor apartment,’ you think it’s a total mess,” Mr. Gerchev said. “It’s gross and not well curated. This trend shows that a lot of men are actually pretty interested in interior design.”
Typically boy apartment videos show several rooms in quick succession, as a moody, instrumental song plays in the background. The videos are hypnotic, providing a similar kind of pleasure one might experience while watching clips on social media of people deep-cleaning rugs or reorganizing pantries.
Many of the people who post boy apartment videos are, in fact, adult men. But in a sea of gendered social media trends — “girl dinner” anyone? — boy apartment is timely. At a different time in history, though, these men might have been considered outliers.
In the early 19th century, a time before the advent of professional interior decoration in the United States, women were seen as the “high priestesses of the home,” said R. Tripp Evans, a professor of art at Wheaton College who teaches classes on the history of interior design. “It was their responsibility to curate the house.”
A cultural shift began taking place toward the end of the 19th century, thanks, in large part, to the author Oscar Wilde, who embarked on a nationwide lecture tour in 1882 promoting interior design. It was because of Wilde that American men became interested in home design, according to Mr. Evans, and considered it a viable business.
Another cultural shift took place in the mid-20th century as women grew a higher profile in the interior design profession. The result: Interior design became “so associated with women that men who are associated with it are branded as feminine and a problem,” Mr. Evans said. Today, these content creators reflect a generation of men who pushing the boundaries of masculinity.
Andrew Maddock, 29, a full-time content creator, spent the last year and a half renovating and furnishing his one-bedroom apartment in Chicago. Showing his home to the internet denizens via boy apartment videos has become a source of pride.
“I’ve learned so much about color palettes, materializations, spatial awareness, how you position things so that it’s not overcrowded,” he said. “It’s really been a journey of self-discovery in my own taste.”
Not everyone wants to live the way these boys — er, men — do. In the comments section of many boy apartment videos, users write things like “mass consumerism,” pointing out the large number of products in these men’s homes. Others point out just how unattainable these men’s lifestyles are.
Mr. Lebowitz, who moved to New York City from Long Island in 2007, isn’t fazed by the criticism. “I’m a 35-year-old guy that has built my life for myself and I have income,” he said. “Should I live more minimally? Should I not have throw pillows on my couch?”
Erick Schaffer, 34, who goes by baewired on social media, posted his first boy apartment video in September, offering a tour of his two-bedroom, two-bathroom rental in a Nashville high-rise.
His interest in interior design stemmed from his frustration with Ikea furniture, among other things. “Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “My desks and a couple of bookcases in my office are all Ikea, but certain things, like bed frames, definitely don’t work. The learning curve was there.”
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