When Naomi Osaka walked onto the court for her first-round match at the 2026 Australian Open, I froze for a second. Because of her outfit.
It was strange. Over-designed. Almost theatrical. A silhouette that felt deliberately off, bordering on costume. My first thought was: This is not your regular Nike fashion statement. This is . . . absurd.
And then a second thought followed: Of course, it is. Because everything feels absurd right now. From collapsing institutions to geopolitical storylines that sound like rejected Netflix plots, we are living in a moment where coherence seems optional.
In that context, Osaka’s outfit didn’t feel like a provocation. It felt like alignment. A visual shrug at a world that has stopped making sense.
Welcome to absurdgasm, the strange relief we feel when brands, culture, and design stop pretending that things are normal. And when we fully embrace the vibe and aesthetics of a refreshingly creative chaos.
Showing an absurd side is a form of sincerity
We are navigating a pre-apocalyptic mental climate: political fatigue, economic instability, climate anxiety, permanent crisis alerts, algorithmic chaos. The old frameworks—progress, rational planning, long-term certainty—feel increasingly disconnected from lived reality.
Absurd branding is not about being quirky for the attention. It’s about emotional synchronization.
It means accepting to step away from a perfectly rational roadmap, to take risks, to propose something that doesn’t neatly fit a business case. And paradoxically, that very act is what makes brands feel more human.
Absurd branding signals something powerful to consumers: I’m not pretending everything makes sense. I feel the same dissonance you do. When a brand embraces absurdity, it’s not talking to consumers from above. It’s standing next to them, in the same emotional fog. Laughing at the same confusion. Acknowledging the same fatigue. Sharing the same disbelief.
Pop culture paved the way with memes that refuse logic, fashion that oscillates between armor and costume, humor that thrives on non-sequiturs. Brands that adopt absurdity are not inventing a trend—they’re finally synchronizing with a collective emotional state.
Beyond comfort, Absurdgasm is a formidable attention engine
In a saturated market where rational benefits blur together, absurdity cuts through. It interrupts patterns. It forces a reaction. It creates stories worth sharing.
Take Sonic × Grillo’s Pickles and the infamous Picklerita Slush. Pickle juice, lime, slush, boba textures—a drink that feels more like a prank than a beverage. Nobody needed it. Many people disliked it. And yet, it travelled everywhere.
Because the product wasn’t designed to quench thirst. It was designed to provoke emotion: confusion, laughter, mild disgust, curiosity. It gave people something to talk about together. Something to film, to react to, to argue about. Absurdelirium in liquid form.
The same logic applies to Krispy Kreme × Crocs. Donuts turned into shoes, shoes turned into sugar-coated spectacle. Functionally questionable. Culturally perfect. It worked not because it made sense, but because it was instantly legible as a shared joke.
Or Native × Dunkin’. Coffee and donut scented deodorant is not a rational extension. It’s a sensory wink, an invitation into a brand universe that doesn’t take itself too seriously. You don’t buy it only to stay fresh. You buy it to participate in a story.
And then there’s Taco John’s × 5-Hour Energy. A borderline absurd, cross-category hybrid that almost feels wrong—and that’s precisely why it stands out. It breaks classification. It destabilizes expectations. It earns attention by refusing to behave like a “proper” innovation.
In all these cases, absurdity becomes social glue. It creates discussion inside communities. It gives people a reason to engage together. Not around performance, but around shared emotional literacy.
Is absurdity just a stunt—or a new design question?
At this point, a legitimate question arises: is this just limited-edition stunt culture? Short-term buzz with no long-term value? Or can absurd innovations and territories actually endure?
As a brand strategist in a design agency, this question hits close to home for me. Because it forces a deeper interrogation: what is design, really?
We’re trained to believe design must be useful, rational, problem-solving. And most of the time, it should be. But the absurdity of the world we’re living in challenges that dogma. Because—let’s be honest—brand innovation is not only about functionality. In many cases, emotion prevails over usefulness.
Absurd products may not optimize life, but they do oxygenate it. They offer dopamine without moral pressure. Relief without explanation. Pleasure without justification.
And yes, not all of them are meant to last. Some are seasonal. Some are performative. But others reveal something more durable: a hunger for lightness, humor, serendipity, and self-derision in how brands show up. Which causes me to openly question my own practice.
Should our approaches leave a little less room for strategic framing to make space for more creative chaos?
Mschf, a collective operating at the intersection of art, culture, the Internet, and brand provocation, has almost turned absurdity into an anti-workshop manifesto. No decks. No frameworks. Just cultural instinct, timing, and creative leaps. Proof that emotional resonance often emerges precisely where rational optimization stops.
When it comes to brand identity, mastering the art of irrational design over time can transform absurdity into a unique and mesmerizing territory. Korean eyewear brand Gentle Monster, for instance, has consistently embraced an irrational approach to retail design, creating stores that resemble contemporary art galleries more than traditional showrooms for the latest frames. These spaces deliberately display little to no product information, inviting visitors into immersive, eye-catching installations—as seen in its newly opened Paris flagship.
So, how do we reintroduce unreasonable serendipity in our innovation and branding processes? How do we create surprises that can genuinely surprise consumers?
What if trusting chaos, absurdity, and creative leaps wasn’t irresponsible, but necessary? What if letting go of strict rationality is precisely what allows new ideas to emerge—ideas that resonate not with “targets” or “segments”, but with humans? Humans who are tired. Overstimulated. Emotionally saturated. Humans who don’t always behave according to rational schemas.
Let’s loosen the marketing grip. Let’s allow more play, more humor, more emotional generosity in our work.
Because in a world that increasingly feels surreal, perhaps the role of brands and design is not always to explain or optimize but sometimes simply to comfort, amuse, and remind us that we’re not alone in finding all this to be a bit absurd.
Perhaps that’s one of the most useful things branding can do today.
Cover image: Iulia