The future of men’s skincare and beauty could be bright or bleak, depending on how you look at it. Consider the softly tanned washboard abs honed by a thousand daily stomach crunches; the full head of swishy chestnut hair; the glowing skin, pores tightened by lotion and eyes de-puffed with an iced gel pack; the herb mint face mask that peels away like an alien membrane. Patrick Bateman’s terrifyingly obsessive morning grooming routine in American Psycho hit the big screen in 2000 and has since become a regularly referenced scene in cinema. Nothing in pop culture has painted the caricature of modern male vanity quite as vividly – or as prophetically.
Nearly a quarter of a century later, a murderer’s self-care regime doesn’t look quite so unhinged; a scroll through Instagram will show you hordes of Bateman-esque clones following similarly intense routines. Unsurprisingly, the market has risen to meet them. Overall, beauty spending among men in the UK has increased 77 per cent year on year, according to data from buy-now-pay-later company Clearpay, while market research agency Mintel found that within the past three years there has been a 14.7 per cent increase in men’s skincare product launches.
The Grey promotes a healthy lifestyle as well as skincare
An influx of movers and shakers in the men’s beauty space has been looking to profit from this boom, and there is a bevy of new products to decipher. Still making do with soap and moisturiser? This isn’t the Nineties. In 2025, eye balms, serums, tinted moisturisers, retinol, LED face masks and exfoliating toning pads are all fair game. Male celebrities have also jumped on the self-care train. In the last few years, Harry Styles launched a nail polish brand called Pleasing, Travis Barker created his CBD-focused brand Barker Wellness Co., and 51-year-old Pharrell Williams capitalised on his supernaturally young looks by founding skincare and lifestyle line Humanrace. All in all, men’s beauty is booming.
Changes in this market have come at a time where TikTok and Instagram content about improving male appearance – sometimes by drastic measures – is hard to avoid. Alongside shredded fitness influencers who flex and proselytise about protein consumption, a darker tone has emerged, with pseudoscientific and even dangerous practices like mewing (keeping your tongue on the roof of your mouth to improve your jawline) and bone-smashing (hitting the bones in your face to change their shape) now part of the conversation. While these buzz phrases have often been derived from memes that first appeared on incel forums, their transition into the mainstream is tapping into male insecurity in a way we haven’t seen before.
The Grey Stimulating Shampoo
How these extreme, hyperonline trends will affect masculine identity in the future remains to be seen, but they are occurring when the way brands speak to men is evolving. Alpha-male messaging, once the norm, feels passé. War Paint for Men, which sells concealer, tinted moisturiser and eyebrow gel in as-non-conspicuous-as-possible black packaging, might have appeared relatively progressive when it was founded in 2017, when men’s make-up was still an untapped market, but today that kind of overtly masculine branding looks cringy and misguided at best, only slightly removed from a bar of soap roughly in the shape of a grenade. (This actually exists – an American company called One Man Army makes it. “Never has there been a bar of soap so revolutionary, that it has forever changed the way warfighters bathe,” reads the website’s product description). Even if that was tongue in cheek, and I’m sceptical, it’s also indicative of a deep-set insecurity around male self-care. Will some men only use a beauty product if it references the machismo of war?
Horace Oud Rose Eau de Parfum
That’s not to say gender-neutral marketing is the answer. While there has been an increase in these products over the past few years, trying to appeal to everyone can sometimes mean you end up appealing to no one. Disco, a neutrally branded skincare label that raised £6 million of funding in its first few years, filed for bankruptcy in 2023. “Skincare is a tough category. Selling skincare products to men is even more difficult. Persuading men to adopt new behaviours is an expensive marketing challenge,” wrote founder Benjamin Smith on X. “Moreover, our neutral brand and positioning, while aesthetically pleasing, never resonated with men at scale.” Smith has already moved on, now posting about his new venture, a “testosterone support company”.
So, which brands and products are working? Paris-based brand Horace, founded in 2016 and already the biggest men’s skincare label in France, is perhaps the most prominent success story of the moment. Rather than projecting a preconceived image of masculinity, Horace’s strategy is to aim for relatability and inclusivity. It embraces diverse casting in its campaign imagery, alongside a curated range of products that don’t push the envelope too far. “In a way, it’s wishful thinking, because it’s impossible to represent everyone, but to have this as a goal for the brand is super-powerful because it forces us to rethink every time we do a casting,” says co-founder and CEO Marc Briant-Terlet. His open-minded approach is working: Horace has slowly expanded its grooming range to include everything from hyaluronic serum and SPF to fragrance and has also opened 18 brick-and-mortar boutiques: 17 across France and a store in Covent Garden.
Horace Anti Fatigue Under Eye Patches
The Grey, with its minimal monochrome packaging, is another pioneer in the space, garnering attention for incorporating a day cream, night cream and eye cream into one super-product. Its Rotterdam-based founder Gregor Jaspers says men aren’t as focused on hero skincare products as they are on an all-encompassing lifestyle. “There’s more awareness around being the best version of yourself, which means going to the gym, good nutrition and using skincare,” he says. The brand publishes a newsletter telling customers how to use its products and when to switch up their routines, say, when the weather gets colder and drier in winter, but it also focuses on articles about reducing stress. “If we were only talking about skincare issues, we would lose our customers,” says Jaspers.
One of The Grey’s most popular products is a self-tanning serum that works when it’s mixed into moisturiser, giving it a sun-kissed glow. The brand also has a CC cream in the works, which Jaspers says will improve skin tone and texture but, crucially, will be visually undetectable. “A lot of men’s make-up brands make foundations with full coverage, whereas I love to be blurred and look my best without it looking like I’m actually wearing make-up.” Guys who enjoy wearing a full face, and there are plenty, he adds, will be better served by Chanel or Charlotte Tilbury.
Obayaty Skin Perfector Radiant Primer
Obayaty, a Swedish cosmetics brand founded last year, is also making waves in the male make-up space with tinted moisturiser packaged in a metal case (sleek and refillable!). The brand’s creative director Pontus Frankenstein says that being much more nuanced with how it approaches customers is key. “We’re in a day and age when a lot of our customers have never tried make-up before. We know there are people who use these products, [but] we also know there is a big group of men who don’t admit they use beauty products, at least in the Western world. It’s a bit different in Japan and Korea, where men are more open to cosmetics, but in the West it’s more stigmatised.” His overarching goal for the brand isn’t just to make guys’ skin look better, but changing how they feel about themselves. “If I’m on my way to the office and somebody tells me I look fresh, that can make my day,” he says.
Men are also slowly warming up to more extreme treatments that go beyond what they can find in the bathroom cabinet. Young LDN, a skin and beauty clinic in Notting Hill, reports that men now make up around 30 per cent of its clientele. “This percentage has grown steadily, particularly in the last 18 months, as awareness of skincare and aesthetic treatments for men has become more mainstream,” says Roxanne Lanthier, studio manager and senior aesthetician at the clinic, adding that men mostly visit for laser hair removal, as well as skin treatments like microneedling and chemical peels to target acne, scarring and signs of ageing. “There’s been a shift in societal attitudes, where self-care is no longer viewed as a luxury but as a necessity for everyone, regardless of gender,” she says.
the Hollywood Carbon Spectra Peel at Young LDN
For their part, brands are pushing the message that an increased male interest in skincare and make-up isn’t just about how we look, but how we feel. “It’s about exploring your own personality and feeling confident about yourself,” says Frankenstein. “And if you’re confident, I think you’re nicer to the people around you.” Bateman clearly missed the memo.
Photography courtesy of Horace, Obayaty, The Grey and Young LDN. Taken from 10 Men Issue 61 – MUSIC, TALENT, CREATIVE – on newsstands now. Order your copy here.
