On an overcast Friday evening in Shinjuku, a gaggle of 100 fashionable 20-somethings are sipping green tea highballs as they pore over the racks of clothes and accessories at The Four Eyed, one of Tokyo’s cutting-edge, underground select shops. The event is for a pop-up by Shop Beeens, a vintage store in Osaka aimed at Gen Z. “We prepared beer, too, but the kids nowadays prefer to drink tea,” says Keisuke Fujita, a former Fruits photographer who founded The Four Eyed in 2016.

There are close to 2.5 billion Gen Z consumers globally, equating to a quarter of the world’s population, according to market research firm Euromonitor. The Asia-Pacific region is home to over half of this cohort, and is set to see a 135% increase in Gen Zs with an annual income of over $100,000 by 2040 — making it the fastest-growing region for this demographc.

But what Gen Z values from brands is changing. Not long ago, much of Asia was seen as a powerhouse for big luxury and big logos. Now, younger generations — and especially those with higher spending power — are bucking the trend.

“After years of demand driven by logo-heavy fashion and aspirational spending, [these] shoppers are becoming more selective, value-conscious, and discerning in how they engage with luxury,” says Fflur Roberts, head of luxury at Euromonitor. Rather than automatically gravitating toward established Western luxury houses, many Gen Zs are seeking brands that align with their personal identity, values, and lifestyle aspirations.

“Authenticity, self-expression, and meaningful brand engagement increasingly influence purchasing decisions,” says Roberts, adding that, as the global luxury industry contracts, “the challenge for brands is no longer simply attracting consumers, but remaining relevant to a generation whose expectations of luxury differ significantly from those before them.”

As waves like hallyu in South Korea (the global boom of South Korean culture) and guochao in China (a consumer movement to buy into homegrown Chinese brands) have gained traction in recent years, what young East Asians expect from fashion has significantly shifted. “With Gen Z in Asia, it’s more about independent curation of what they personally like through all the platforms and trends that they are in touch with or admire. Whereas for millennials, the genres were more rigid,” says Olivia Chen, who runs Shanghai-based brand development agency 2034 with her partner Julio Ng. “The established brand value of external global brands is still there, however being from a certain country is no longer a selling point.”

Instead, Gen Z consumers are increasingly turning to brands that “align with their personal identity”, according to Roberts, while paying less attention to their provenance. “People tend to care less about heritage or European legacy, and more about whether the brand has a real cultural aspect,” says Laura Darmon, head of buying and business development at Eng Concept Store in China, citing LA-based brand Praying and Korean label Sculptor as two names that have soared in popularity. The Four Eyed’s Fujita, meanwhile, points to London-based labels like Dolly by designer Molly Dilkes and the eponymous Phoebe Pendergast.

What unites these founder-led brands is their clear personal aesthetics. These are proving more appealing to Gen Z than the designs put out by larger legacy brands, Darmon says, which often turn to “saturated marketing”: a launch featuring a red scarf for Chinese New Year or a novelty T-shirt, for instance, just won’t cut it in 2026. “[Young people] don’t care about that anymore,” she says. “They want authenticity and emotional connection.”

“A total mix”

Gen Zs in Asia aren’t only changing the brands they’re buying from, but how they’re shopping them. Industry observers point toward more “curation-led” consumption, wherein consumers build their closets around aesthetics or cultural touchpoints rather than brands or categories. “Across Asia, you see a very strong ‘aesthetic mindset’,” says Ayumi Nakajima, senior director of Asia-Pacific content partnerships at Pinterest. “Gen Zs aren’t only shopping categories like tops or shoes; they’re building a whole look and a whole vibe, then translating that into real choices.”

The overarching aesthetic spanning many of the brands popular among Asian Gen Zs is a total mishmash of references, from Y2K to niche subcultural trends like Japanese gyaru, mori kei, seapunk and wishcore, or even indie sleaze. In real terms, that might mean pajama-style tops with kitten prints, or crochet knit shorts and cargo pants styled with unexpected items like laser-cut lingerie, swimwear, and skater sneakers. The look of the moment is, therefore, hard to define: girly but gritty, retro but unpredictable.

Fujita observes more cross-cultural pollination, too, with trends traveling back and forth between Asia and being reappropriated in real time, as each country interprets and adds to it. “In Korea, the Japanese Y2K gyaru style is popular, while in Japan, people are copying what the Koreans are doing and wearing Korean brands,” says Fujita. “It’s a total mix.”

Brands with highly distinctive personal identities are primed to cash in. Ashley Williams, for instance, is a smash hit in Asia. The London-based designer, who makes intentionally saccharine clothing with prints that include kittens, pandas, and “I <3 me”, has 75% of her stockists in the Asia-Pacific region. The eponymous designer has been building momentum there for years, first holding a runway show in Seoul in 2019 and recently drawing over 300 people to a pop up at Eng Concept Store. “People came all over from China to meet her,” says Darmon. “She’s stuck to what she’s been doing for over 10 years, so you can see the cultural relevance to it. It’s niche, but that type of customer is really loyal and they are really engaged with the brand.”

Coyseio, a label founded in 2024 by South Korean influencer and model Jisoo Seo, has quickly built a huge fan base across countries. Buoyed by success with Gen Z customers around Asia, Coyseio will open its first standalone flagship in Tokyo this July for 038, its basics line. “What stands out most [about Gen Zs] is their ability to reinterpret products in their own way,” says Seo. “They freely combine and layer pieces that were never originally styled together in our lookbooks or campaigns, creating entirely new looks.” The founder adds that customers will often purchase entire looks when they find a style they connect with. “As a result, we’ve developed an exceptionally strong level of customer engagement, loyalty, and spending power,” she says.

Fashion beyond clothing

Brands and retailers can also look beyond fashion to generate cultural relevance. Prada has tapped Japanese game designer Hideo Kojima in recent seasons to create immersive exhibitions for the brand; Kojima also collaborated with streetwear brand Acronym on a jacket that appears in his Death Stranding 2: On The Beach game, which quickly sold out on the brand’s website. Darmon says Kojima’s inclusion in these projects has been successful with Gen Z, because it’s reflective of how young people in Asia are increasingly consuming fashion not just as a product, but as a wider part of their identity — whether through gaming, anime, music, or otherwise. “It’s something that actually connects to the culture,” she says.

For Asian consumers, cultural relevance is increasingly tied to nostalgia for the ’90s and early aughts. “The line between something old fashioned and something comforting is really about relevance,” says Nakajima. “It feels old fashioned when it stays frozen in the past. But it feels comforting or compelling when consumers can reinterpret it through a modern lens and make it part of their current identity.”

Other brands stand out by cultivating this connection on a more intimate level. Ans Dotsloevner, a bestseller at The Four Eyed, has quickly gained traction across Asia for its whimsical designs and girlie but edgy brand campaigns. “I really value the element of excitement when I’m creating something,” says Hanano Momose, the 31-year-old designer who established the brand 2021. Momose bases many of her designs on personal childhood memories, drawing inspiration from photographs of her mother’s wedding dress that she interprets into clothes.

The approach is resonating. Though still in its infancy, Ans Dotsloevner currently does around JPY 50 million ($312,000) in sales each season, though Momose is careful to control the brand’s wholesale growth to limit overexposure and protect her sense of authenticity. “She could easily escalate her business five times the current size, but she really wanted to just keep it small and work with the right people,” says Ng, whose showroom works with the brand each season. “It’s very rare in this market, because everyone just wants to move more and more product — but it’s working.”

“I feel like being able to buy it everywhere isn’t very appealing,” Momose says. “I only supply to shops that I really like.”

Cultivating a sense of exclusivity like this will become increasingly important, as Gen Z fashion fans set themselves apart from what some see as a monolithic crowd. “On average, everyone is fairly fashionable now,” says The Four Eyed’s Fujita. “But at the same time, those genius-type kids that make you go ‘oh, wow’ have gone. It’s all leveled out.”