NEED TO KNOW
Fall will be looking a little different for influencer Caitlin Covington.
In an emotional video posted to her TikTok account on Aug. 19, the 34-year-old content creator — who went viral in 2019 for her annual fall photoshoot — revealed that she would not be taking a leaf-peeping trip this season to create autumn content for her social media platforms.
“I’m not going to be able to post fall videos this year,” Covington told her followers through tears. “It’s just a lot of pressure to make each video better than the last — to make each fall better. And I just really need a break this year.”
“I’m just really sorry,” she concluded her video.
Covington, known online as the face of the “Christian Girl Autumn” meme, started documenting her love for the season in a blog as an undergraduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the early 2010s.
But her first stint of viral fame came in 2019, when the X account Blizzy McGuire posted a photo of Covington and another influencer in the fall foliage with the caption, “Hot Girl Summer is coming to an end, get ready for Christian Girl Autumn.” And every year since, the internet has had its eyes on the influencer every fall to see what content she’ll create next.
Christopher Covington
“I do feel pressure, especially during fall, because I feel like everyone looks to me for fall content,” Covington admitted to PEOPLE last year. “So I try to hold myself to a certain standard and brainstorm new creative ideas. I spend hours researching and planning outfits for fall. There’s a lot of pressure, and I want my videos and pictures to be well received.”
The internet sensation said that she would often begin to plan her autumn content as early as May or June, researching the best places to capture the foliage and designing detailed itineraries to find the best trees, bookstores and coffee shops in the area.
“The outfit planning is probably the most time-consuming part,” she told PEOPLE. “We review various retailers, place orders, and then I spend hours trying on different outfits.”
And, of course, she would plan the kinds of videos she would make on her fall trip — down to the viral TikTok audios and the necessary wardrobe pieces to pull it off.
Caitlin Covington Instagram
“I’ll find an outfit that fits that theme, pack it down to a tee — including sunglasses, socks, everything — and then wear it on the trip,” she told PEOPLE. “It’s probably around 100 hours of work that goes into each trip.”
For Covington, her autumn obsession involves the whole family — including her two young kids, with whom she coordinates outfits for her social media content.
“My husband was initially skeptical about my fall obsession,” Covington told PEOPLE last year. “He was like, ‘It’s whatever, Caitlin, this is your thing.’ But after joining us on his first fall trip to Vermont last year, his perspective changed. He said, ‘I get it now; I understand why you love fall.’ This year, he’s actually excited about the fall trip and really gets into it.”
Christopher Covington
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She added, “On the trip, his role is mainly to help with luggage and the kids, and to support me. He doesn’t take videos or photos — that’s my brother’s job. So it becomes a bit of a family affair, with my brother handling the photography and videography.”
She’s also no stranger to the typical negative comments that often come with viral fame.
“I’ve developed a thick skin,” she told PEOPLE. “Those comments don’t hurt me anymore. They used to, but I’ve learned to let them roll off my back. I remember one comment that really stood out — someone said my hair was too tightly curled back when barrel curls were popular. They said they wished they could see me in person just to shake my curls out. I actually considered changing how I curled my hair because of that comment. It seems silly now, but it really hurt at the time.”
