Which Hot Girl on TikTok Will Be Gen Z's Martha Stewart?

There's a whole new class of fashion-meets-food influencers poised to usher in a host of lifestyle brands.

Sydney Carlson for Lynnee, photo by Alana O'Herlihy

In an attempt to get into the holiday spirit, I did what any girl alone in her apartment over Thanksgiving weekend would do: get a little bit stoned and watch the Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix. Martha tells the story of the now 83-year-old “original influencer” who made an indelible mark on culture and who’s managed to remain relevant for over 50 years. It’s a fun watch: Stewart is the OG of creating aspirational content across categories — from decadent, colorful catering displays to sprawling, lush gardens to glossy monthly magazines — making the film a feast for the eyes. (Real heads know that director R.J. Cutler is also behind the iconic 2009 Vogue documentary, The September Issue.)

Even the most ambitious girlboss’s resume would pale in comparison to Stewart’s. She started her career as a teen model to help make ends meet at home, later working on Wall Street (where she was the only woman at her firm), starting a wildly successful catering business, authoring dozens of books, contributing to several magazines before starting one of her own entitled Martha Stewart Living, launching a collection for Kmart, hosting her own television show, and eventually becoming America’s first self-made female billionaire. She is synergy personified, and epitomized the term “personal brand” decades before it entered the lexicon.

While Stewart’s life was not as perfect as it appeared (there was that five-month stint in federal prison for conspiracy and insider trading, for example), her initial popularity was due in large part to the fact that she was a tall, blonde, beautiful, chic woman who happened to have incredible business savvy, a knack for fanciful entertaining, and the ability to cook complicated things with ease. In 2024, the same can be said about a whole new class of young women who are creating an updated version of the “homemaker porn” Stewart made famous on their social media feeds daily, amassing them thousands upon thousands of followers — and just as many dollars in brand deals.

Nara Aziza Smith for GQ, photo by Jason Nocito

Fashion-forward girls with a similar breed of domesticity have flocked in droves to TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. It’s become such a popular genre that it’s often spoofed in magazine editorials (like this one, starring Amelia Gray Hamlin for Pop) and is a prominent concept in ad campaigns; Hailey Bieber’s Rhode Skin, for instance, often features aesthetically pleasing food alongside models in its marketing imagery, from elaborate cakes to freshly baked cinnamon rolls. I’ll admit, I’m not much of a chef, and therefore don’t seek out recipe-related content. But this year more than ever, it found me, making it clear that the race to fill the Martha Stewart-sized hole in the influencer market is on.