Earlier today, I was minding my own business, scrolling through Instagram on a bus, when a headline stopped me in my tracks.
The 'granny bob' is the cool-girl haircut trend to wear this spring, it proclaimed. I had to resist the urge to start muttering out loud.
I turn 50 this year. I’ve been a lifestyle journalist for decades. And I’ve had quite enough of the word 'granny' being used as lazy shorthand for anything associated with older women. It's just a bob, for the love of Ada.
It's time to retire the 'granny chic' narrative
Here we are in 2026, and an industry that prides itself on inclusivity is still casually repackaging female maturity, slapping a patronising label on it, and serving it back to us as a trend.
The 'granny bob' is just the latest offender. We’ve already endured 'granny sandals' and 'granny shorts' – apparently, the looks we’re all meant to be embracing this summer. I, for one, am over it.
We’re told the so-called granny bob is chic, timeless, flattering – a short cut that works across hair types and taps neatly into the current nostalgia wave. Fine. So why not call it exactly that? Why attach 'granny' to it at all?
Is it because it’s short? Are we still clinging to the tired idea that women of a certain age should cut their hair? Is it shorthand for 'low maintenance' – and, by extension, a suggestion that older women don’t bother with their appearance? Or is it simply a clumsy nod to the fact that this style has been around for decades?
In one article I read, the cut was recommended for those struggling with thinning hair – a thinly (excuse the pun) veiled reference to ageing. Is that it? Is 'granny' code for old, fading, less?
When we tack 'granny' onto a look, we’re not describing the style – we’re categorising the women who wear it. It’s reductive and outdated. But it’s also lazy and harmful, because language shapes perception. Calling something a 'granny bob' reinforces the tired narrative that women become less relevant, less stylish, and less worthy of attention as they age.
For the record, I have a version of this haircut. I’m 49. I’m not a grandmother. I didn’t choose it to disguise thinning hair or soften the blow of ageing. I first had it when I turned 19, after a brilliant hairdresser convinced me to chop my long blonde locks into a 'Mia Farrow' – the famous pixie cut she gave herself at 21, before her 1966 Vogue debut. There was nothing 'granny' about it then, and there isn’t now.
There’s also an implicit assumption baked into this nonsense: that age makes women less adventurous, less fashion-forward, more 'safe.' Ask most women over 40, and they’ll tell you they’ve never felt more confident in their choices. Not because they’re retreating into frumpiness, but because they finally know what they like – and they wear it unapologetically.
It's interesting, too, that when younger women adopt a classic look, we call it timeless. Iconic. Cool-girl. Yet when a style associated with older women comes back into fashion, we reach straight for the 'granny' label. That’s not playful. It’s ageism – shorthand for a value system that still celebrates and venerates youth while dismissing and mocking age.
By all means, celebrate flattering, versatile, low-effort fashion and beauty. But stop attaching a label that diminishes the very women who’ve been wearing those styles for years.
Women of all ages deserve better than that.
