Evoke fun and humor with Plastic Fantastic

In the annual Adobe Creative Trends Forecast for 2025, which reviews the creative landscape within Adobe Stock and beyond to identify where designers and innovators are coalescing, we uncovered four main creative trends. As the year progresses, we’re going deeper into these trends to uncover emerging microtrends to share with you. These notable buckets explore escapism and reality, whimsical and humorous perspectives, nostalgia and futurism, and immersive experiences.

Adobe Stock’s four overarching trends for 2025 are:

• Levity and Laughter
• Time Warp
• Immersive Appeal
• Fantastic Frontiers

The emergence of the generational technological shift that is generative artificial intelligence (AI) is woven throughout these trends. AI as a technological tool is here to stay, and, when coupled with human creativity, is helping unlock new realms of imagination and freshness at a scale and pace that’s taking some getting used to. We at Adobe are at the forefront of this shift. We’re ready to provide solutions and support that will improve creative ideation and production while also protecting creator rights, defending the intellectual property rights of the creative community, and only training Adobe Firefly on content that we have the permission or rights to use.

Here, let’s take a deep dive into the Levity and Laughter trend and its emerging microtrend we’re calling Plastic Fantastic.

Overview

Revisiting Levity and Laughter

Who doesn’t love to laugh? It’s hard to disagree with the universal appeal of humor. So, it makes a lot of sense that Levity and Laughter is one of the big four trends of the year. Using humor is an authentic way to communicate complex topics and make otherwise forgettable things memorable. For example, 90 percent of consumers are more likely to remember funny ads over serious ones.

Laughing and being light-hearted makes people and brands more approachable, relatable, and ultimately memorable, which makes designing with levity and laughter very lucrative for both emerging and established brands — whether it’s your personal brand or your company’s.

Introducing Plastic Fantastic

Pink and plastic had a major moment when a certain summer blockbuster movie was all anyone could talk about two years ago, and it seems as if its influence hasn’t fully gone away. That certain vibrant, pink-dominated movie about a doll epitomized a whimsical and fantastical world with bits of pop surrealism that was the predecessor to Plastic Fantastic. Approaching self-expression with a blend of kitsch and surrealism in a playful and visually striking way sets the tone for being very memorable.

The visual style has doll-inspired aesthetics incorporating pastel colors like pink and lavender as well as playful patterns and soft, rounded shapes. Whimsical illustrations (think: hearts and rainbows) and delicate textures like lace and gingham dominate the visuals.

Doll-like characters, oversized props, and playful settings represent Plastic Fantastic in imagery that includes both illustrations and photography.

The layout compositions are dynamic with exaggerated proportions that are bold and attention grabbing, which help bring the whimsical feel to the forefront.

Bubbly, playful fonts evoke the whimsy of Levity and Laughter by instilling a sense of fun and nostalgia in the typography.

Plastic Fantastic in action

Imagine you’re a fashion reseller, and you’re putting together a campaign for new spring arrivals. A few ideas include: an event flyer for a spring clothing swap, a mood board and style guide or a spring sale event promo for Instagram, and VLOG frames for new arrivals on TikTok.

Plastic Fantastic is a creative microtrend that brings whimsy to life by playing with scale and exaggeration and showcasing doll-like imagery in a striking and lighthearted way. This is creativity with a hint of nostalgia that you won’t soon forget.

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