TikTok's Newest Trend "Fridgescaping" Is Ruining Relationships, Apparently

Today's category is: things that are technically harmless but, for some reason, seem to get under our skin. Ever heard of "fridgescaping"? It's a new TikTok trend that sees people decorating the inside of their fridges with plants, artwork, vases, figurines, and more. In other words, it's interior design for an interior that, in most people's opinion, doesn't really need designing.

Participants in the trend are showing off their perfectly curated refrigerators, with themes from "Hobbit-core" to Bridgerton (Fridgerton?), and responses are, well, varied. Some can't get enough of the aesthetically pleasing iceboxes, while others are calling them wasteful and annoying — and a few are ready to end their relationships over them.

Let's take a look inside.

Fridgescaping, put simply, is the act of decorating your fridge. Whether for practical or aesthetic reasons, fridgescapers put great care into designing the perfect interiors for their refrigerators, sorting their goods into cute containers and, as previously mentioned, sometimes following a creative theme.

One TikTok creator in particular has taken over the fridgescaping space: a user named Lynzi Judish who, as of writing, has over 18,000 followers on the platform. On her socials, she shows off "home decor, fridgescaping, and life on a mountain in the Hudson Valley," per her Instagram bio. She's become somewhat of a pioneer of the movement, even being featured in Elle and Food & Wine.

However, for all her popularity, Lynzi's fridgecapes have certainly drawn some skeptics, as well.

In comments on her TikToks, users often express their distaste for her interiors — and the concept of decorating the inside of a fridge altogether. "If I have to move a picture of a Victorian lady out of my way to get the butter, I’m throwing the whole fridge away," one user wrote.

Another said, "If I opened a fridge and saw this, I would leve the house and never return."

Remember how we said that, though seemingly impractical, fridgescaping is harmless? Well, we may have spoken too soon. It seems that one person, who took to the AITA page on Reddit, is fed up with their wife's fridge decorating, and it may have caused the end of their relationship. Stick with us here.

In a Reddit post that has been re-shared to TikTok, a user who goes by Icy-Shelter9897 posted their dilemma to the subreddit hoping to get some advice: "[Am I the a--hole] for telling my wife I hate her fridgescaping?"

"Recently, my wife has taken to fridgescaping," they explained. "For example, she put flowers in the fridge, in vases, in front of food so you have to move things just to get to the food. She put all our food in fancy baskets, jars, and similar things."

They elaborated that, though they don't cook a lot and therefor don't encounter the problem often, it has made the fridge "very uninviting" for them. "She gets upset when I get something from the fridge and don't put things back perfectly. ... Before she started this, it would take me 30 seconds to grab something quick from the fridge, whereas now it's a whole ordeal," they continued.

"Last weekend, she confronted me after I grabbed some leftovers from the fridge and left it in 'disarray' according to her," the post said. This is where things finally came to a head. "I explained how I find the hobby stupid, and she can decorate other things — it doesn't have to be the fridge. It gets in the way when I want to quickly eat, when I come home from work hungry and tired and want to grab a quick bite, it's frustrating."

It seems that the user's son felt the same way about his mom's new hobby, which the OP made sure to tell their wife.

"She didn't argue back after that, and she's removed all of the decorations from the fridge, which I have to admit has been relieving. But she's also been acting very distant towards me and just hasn't been herself, and has been weird intimacy-wise," the post concluded.

Ouch. While most users in the comments came to the conclusion that OP wasn't the a-hole in the situation, it doesn't seem like that validation will fix their relationship with their wife. Fridgescaping: ruining marriages since 2024.