Social media has had a grip on trends and how they influence what teenagers buy and consume. With the recent resurgence in popularity of reusable metal water bottles, Chanute High School students have taken the trend past superficiality and used their containers as forms of expression.

Some students choose to add stickers to their cylindrical canvases to create a collage of decals that represent their personality and interests, while other students seek out unique bottles already tailored to them.

“A lot of the stickers have something to do with my interests and my hobbies,” said senior Paige Kueser. “I like my moose, he’s going on a little hike. I love hiking.”

All the stickers on her bottle mean something to Kueser, but one sticker in particular stuck out above the rest.

“This is a quote from one of my favorite poets and it’s really special,” Kueser said. “It means ‘someone will remember us, even in a different time.’ and it’s by Sappho.”

But poetry and hiking aren’t the only interests Kueser enjoys on display, her bottle is covered in stickers with each one representing something else about her.

“I feel like my personality has a bunch of facets,” Kueser said. “This water bottle shows a few of them.”

Some students choose to add stickers to their cylindrical canvases to create a collage of decals that represent their personality and interests; however, other students seek out unique bottles already tailored to them. For fellow senior Ethan Burnett, he found a matching water bottle with his father Lance Burnett, vocal instructor at Royster Middle School, that both already represented them and their bond with one another: a Star Wars Chewbacca bottle.

“[My father and I] usually go to the theaters to watch any new Star Wars movie that comes out,” Burnett said. “It’s just something we’re both passionate about and enjoy.”

Whether they have it fully decked out in decorations, or they prefer to keep it plain and simple, students at CHS have utilized trends of sustainability as a new avenue of sharing their unique stories and experiences with the world.