Kylie Jenner's Viral 'Jeweled' Birthday Cake Is an Unexpected Sign of One of the Next Big Interior Moments, According to a Trend Forecaster

Say what you want about the Kardashians, but they're often the vanguards of the microtrend. And it's not only because they have the platforms to start the trends themselves — they've got cultural cache and access to many of the design world's most creative minds, too.

All that's to say, I'm here today to talk about a birthday cake. Kylie Jenner, turning 29 years old this week, posted her 'jeweled' birthday cake on her Instagram stories and, let me tell you, you can expect to see a million copycats popping up on Pinterest any day now.

Functionally, this cake is a little impractical — I'd imagine the jewels used to top each frosting swirl aren't actually edible — but visually, it's a wow moment. Colorful, playful — it speaks to the 'neotenic' concept we're seeing in design right now, the idea that elevated aesthetics can also be childlike and whimsical.

However, it also follows an interior design trend that's on my radar as a trend forecaster, and we're already starting to see how creative 'jeweled' decor is going to become one of the most lusted-after design ideas for next season.

Kylie's cake aesthetic may not, however, be exactly how this trend plays out in more elevated interior schemes. It has a charming naivety and sense of nostalgia to it — crafty, like the peel-and-stick jewel sheets you might have played with as a child. This nostalgic, almost 'tacky' sensibility is something we've certainly seen on the rise, especially in hosting, or in something like our choices of Christmas decorating trends, in recent years.

This incarnation is almost visually reminiscent of a teenager's diary from the 90s, and it's an aesthetic that has struck a chord with Gen Z and Alpha in a nostalgic way. Put it this way, it's more Urban Outfitters than it is West Elm.

However, what a trend and color forecaster like Jane Boddy, creative director of the Pantone Color Institute, takes from the trend is what it says about a more eclectic use of shape and color in interior schemes.

"This is part of a much bigger return to color and maximalism that we are seeing right now, but it feels more sophisticated and considered than simply piling on more," Jane ventures in response to Kylie's viral cake. "After such a long period of quiet, restrained palettes, there is a real appetite for color that has depth, richness and emotional impact."

"Jewel tones and deeply saturated brights bring back a sense of glamour and indulgence, with emerald, ruby, sapphire, violet and hot pink creating unexpected, sometimes slightly clashing combinations. There is a new confidence around using color decoratively again. It can be playful and excessive, but there is depth beneath the fun. These colors feel precious, tactile and almost luminous, bringing fantasy and personality back into the conversation and signalling a move away from restraint towards something much more expressive."

Jane Boddy

A pivotal figure at the Pantone Colour Institute, Jane contributes to trend publications and serves as the European Creative Director for Pantone’s Interiors annual trends publication, Pantone View Home and Interiors. Her approach to forecasting color focuses on observing current events and cultural trends to understand how perceptions of color are evolving. 

For the elevated version, designers are looking to gemstones, rather than these 'cheap' plastic jewels, but used in purposefully less cohesive combinations, while preserving their natural shapes.

Parisian jewelry brand Panconesi, for example, just launched an interiors objects range, including a stacked cabochon candlestick, vases with protruding, colorful stones, and a rainbow-colored clock face that's already inspired endless DIY projects on Instagram, using the sorts of 'tumbled gemstones' you can buy from Amazon.

It's a little reminiscent of one of my favorite Kelly Wearstler ranges, Bauble, that released a good 10 years ago, now, too.

It's a trend that follows the story we're seeing throughout much of design right now. There's an irregularity to the combinations that feels 'anti-mass-produced', whether that's always appropriate or not. Where we're looking for interiors that capture the uniqueness of what it means to be human, this eclecticism of color, texture, and form is a shortcut to that collected and curated feel.

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