Pleur Fridays is the new Snapchat craze for public school boys

Think TGIF, but more classic

10 years ago | UPDATED 10 years ago

There’s a new Snapchat craze and it involves taking a picture with the hashtag #PleurFriday.

#PleurFriday or #PF, means “Friday vibe”, and was dreamed up by ex-Exeter student and Fulham social powerhouse Ed Bristow.

The trend, which started at Bristow’s £30,000 a year Charterhouse School (or Chouse as he calls it), sees public school boys pose for selfies with the Pleur hashtag.

Now, the phenomenon has racked up over 1,000 Facebook likes and drawn attention from Farage and the supercelebs of MIC.

We’re waiting on the picture with Netanyahu

Urban dictionary brands the term Pleur as “player” or “cool”, but Bristow defines the phenomenon as “a Friday vibe.”

He told The Tab: “‘Pleur is a Friday vibe, it’s more of a feeling that a thing in itself. Everyone can get involved – you can look Pleur, smell Pleur, and even feel it – it’s just good vibes on a Friday.”

But Pleur, which directly translates to “cry” in French, is apparently not a new thing, and came from school where Edward and his pals would describe things as “Pleur” if they were favourable, not unlike the word “good”.

Edward Bristow, Pleur founder and beer drinking bloke

The Pleur Facebook page is currently not massively different to the Rich Kids of Snapchat page, looking more like a Charterhouse (“Chouse”) yearbook than a social media phenomenon, but its founder has high hopes.

He said: “I’d love to see it go massive – while it’s a bit of fun, it’s an easy thing for people to do on a Friday and I’d really like to see it go global, although we’re keeping it pretty relaxed, there isn’t a clear direction.”

‘Birds in bikinis always helps’

Now, Pleur has seen recent social media success, such as a featured pic with Nigel Farage, and snapchats from Made In Chelsea celebs with the associated#PF hashtag.

And the brand has even branched out into merchandise. The website sells snapbacks with the slogan “Be More Pleur” and features snaps of its fans in “Pleur is a way of life” t-shirts.

But despite the trend being dominated by boys, Ed admits girls can be pleur too. He said: “It’s just that most of my friends are male, coming from an all boys school (pre sixth form), it was school banter. Girls can be Pleur, and we actually want more girls to be, because there aren’t many involved at the moment.”

With the page’s following growing everyday, we asked Edward how he balances being permanently Pleur and having a full time job.

He said: “I have quite a flexible work environment, which allows me to be Pleur pretty regularly, although I make sure to work Pleur around my job, not the other way round.”

Edward continued that there are very few downsides to running Pleur Fridays, accepting our suggestion that its a pretty Pleurfect role, but did admit Monday morning is the direct enemy of Pleur Fridays, and the embodiment of everything “unPleur”.

The Pleur, The Bad and The Ugly