The male makeup industry has finally begun to take off

Fuelled by social media and changing attitudes towards masculinity, the male makeup industry is starting to take off – particularly amongst Gen Z.

An emerging player in the beauty game, the male makeup industry is beginning to flourish, filling the gap in a market that has been wide open for too long.

With the continuing elimination of taboos surrounding men’s interest in fashion and beauty, it’s about time that the industry offered more.

Makeup is an optional form of self-expression and self-care. It needs to shift from the long running approach of telling women they need it in order to make themselves more attractive, into an all-inclusive tool of personal transformation.

‘Beauty is about style. It knows no gender,’ stated Chanel upon launching BOY (Be Only You) last year, a range of cosmetic products aimed specifically at men. And it’s not the only brand that’s caught onto the movement either.

FENTY, Estée Lauder and L’Oréal are just a few of the other big names in beauty that are rejecting the stigma around male grooming in favour of the surging demand for male makeup.

However, although the market has indeed grown rapidly in recent years, there’s still a sizeable risk for these brands.

Simply put, while social media is undoubtedly making it more acceptable for men to buy and wear makeup, the challenge lies in winning over the mainstream.

The concept of makeup for men isn’t actually that new, but, unfortunately, it’s the stunted perception of the western world that’s slowing down the process.

‘I think a lot of people misconstrue a man wearing makeup as someone that is transgender or someone that wants to be a drag queen, but it’s not that,’ says YouTuber Manny Gutierrez. ‘I think right now people are still intimidated by the aspect of it’ – and he’s right.

But, in a general sense, don’t boys also experience the exact same issues with skin blemishes and dark circles (etc.) that women do?

Surely, therefore, shouldn’t it also be considered ‘normal’ for men to use products proven to cover up these problem areas if it improves their confidence?

‘It’s a very unspoken rule that most guys don’t want to talk about wearing makeup in general,’ says celebrity MUA Kristan Serafino. ‘When it comes to delving into it, it’s not so much a decorative element as more of a fixer, instead.’