BEAUTIFIED BRITAIN INDEX: The Skin Report

Zoom Boom

The UK beauty industry is experiencing a “Zoom Boom”. After many months of lockdown measures, UK aesthetic doctors and professional bodies are reporting significant increases in demand for both surgical and non-surgical procedures; especially Botox, fillers, skin resurfacing, neck rejuvenation and jawline contouring. As people spend more time looking down into their computer’s camera, they have come to focus on these areas of their face and body. This has created a whole new vernacular to describe these perceived accentuated flaws. HoverTouch a word for search volume data:

Desperately Seeking Glow

From dolphin skin to cloud skin; from TikTok’s ‘Glow look’ filter to cosmetics products that reflect our desire for a filtered appearance such as HUDA Beauty’s top-selling #FauxFilter Luminous Matte Liquid Foundation – the first half of 2021 has been dominated by the quest for glow. The goal being to achieve the ultimate glowy finish, with fresh and radiant skin that is as shiny and smooth as possible.

Pinterest has seen searches for how to get glowing skin increase four times year on year and highlights it as a trending topic in the UK in it’s 2021 Pinterest Predicts Report. Beauty e-tailer Cult Beauty sold one bottle of HUDA Beauty’s #FauxFilter Luminous Matte Liquid Foundation – a full-coverage, matte base designed for the Instagram generation – every minute in 2020. This and Charlotte Tilbury’s Hollywood Flawless Filter foundation were among the site’s top five makeup products in the first two months of 2021. Zoom even has a “touch up my appearance” feature - a beautifying style filter that can help smooth out the skin tone on your face. Searches for glow-related terms reveal:

No Make-Up Selfies

JLo, Gigi Hadid, Beyoncé, Cameron Diaz, Eva Longoria, Huda Beauty, Drew Barrymore and Adele have all adopted the "no makeup selfie", a celebrity trend that gathered momentum in 2021 then echoed across the influencer-sphere. The movement is rooted in loving yourself the way you are, natural and pared down.

However, there has been some backlash against this movement. One influencer @ScouseBirdBlog makes clear in this post, no-make-up selfies aren’t a standard women should be holding themselves to, outlining in her caption “NO MAKEUP / NO FILTER / STILL NOT NATURAL”. She then goes on to outline that how, despite her having no-make-up on and appearing ‘natural’, she has had her fair share of non-surgical work to look this good, including radio frequency and microneedling treatments to resurface her skin, tattooed brows, botox and lip blush SPMU.

Dr Yusra says that this movement towards tweakments that create a natural look is on the rise. The launch of Merz Aesthetics' Belotero Revive was accompanied by the campaign No Filter Just You. The new hyaluronic acid (HA) filler works beneath the skin to improve skin hydration, reduce redness, sun damage and roughness and minimize the appearance of fine lines. Merz says: "modern consumers are especially focused on skin quality and on minimizing early signs of aging, and they value skincare and aesthetic solutions that deliver natural-looking results – the so-called “no-filter” look."

Tech As The New Skincare Frontier

At home and in-clinic beauty tech is booming and is set to be the new frontier in the advancement of beauty. The United Kingdom (UK) Aesthetic Devices Market is set to grow at a CAGR of 7.5% over the next 5 years. The pandemic has accelerated a boom in beauty gadgets that can offer a spa-level experience at home.

Big in-clinic launches this year have included devices such as the Endolift Laser, an invasive fibre optic laser that heats fatty tissues and causes contraction, tightening and lifting; Cutera Secret Pro, a grid fractional radio frequency microneedling device combined with a CO₂ laser that is great for textural issues on the skin and Coolsculpting Elite, the latest generation in Coolsculpting treatments, utilising a larger applicator so that more surface area can be treated at any one time.

• Cleansing Wands
• LED Masks
• Facial Cryotherapy
• Ultrasound Devices
• Mask devices
• Electrical Muscle Stimulation

Wishful Clean

Skin-Psyche Connection

Following a sustained period of living with stress due to the pandemic, the connection between how our skin behaves and how we feel emotionally has become an emerging conversation around the brain-skin connection. It is well known that many dermatological problems can be made worse by stress but the pandemic has accelerated the links being made between stress and how it disturbs the equilibrium in the body and skin, with conditions such as Pandemic Droop being identified.

In clinics this has gone one step further. The National Federation of Hair and Beauty noticed a trend for therapists as substitute counsellors as the UK emerged out of the 2020 lockdowns and customers returned to the salon, and launched a course to help them cope. Aesthetics clinics, such as the Dr Yusra Clinic, are also adding mental health experts to their support staff rosters to support patients on their wellness journey.