Prisoners of Style

Brands need to pay heed to the climate and find ways to keep their brand fresh and relevant by really showing us what they’re made of.

By Jonathan Ford, Pearlfisher

Has beauty gone too far in the pursuit of style? Perhaps you think this is an odd comment from a designer. But, although we all aspire to create stylish brands, you can’t just “badge” style to the detriment of the true brand value or adopt an identikit style just to try and give increasingly style-conscious consumers what they want. Don’t get me wrong, a sense of individual style is an important design consideration, but nobody wants to be faced with row upon row of over-stylized products that don’t really tell—or sell—you anything. And now, with the recent reversal of fortunes, cautious consumers are reacting to change by looking for something real and tangible to hold on to. Ergo, brands with substance are becoming more and more appealing. And so the question becomes, how do we match substance with style?

Here Come the Girls

Beauty style icons have always been in vogue—from Elizabeth Taylor in the ’50s to Nicole Kidman and Keira Knightly as today’s faces of Chanel. Beauty brands understand that women emulate these role models and they undoubtedly help keep the brand names front of mind. And the latest beauty style icon to hit the beauty shelves is none other than…Barbie.

The new Barbie beauty collection by Stila gives grownup girls a blast from their past.

Barbie turned 50 this year. And in honor of her milestone birthday, Stila has launched the Stila Loves Barbie Paint Can; five paint cans to be precise. Each can features the look of an iconic Barbie doll from the past five decades and contains a color palette and “look book” for everything you need to achieve the signature Barbie look: from 1951 Ponytail Doll to 1971 Malibu Doll and right through to the 2000 Jewel Doll. A fun collectable to give grownup girls a blast from their past and a look at beauty styles that have come and gone but, at the end of the day, she’s a doll! We’re not really going to be taking Ms. Perfect Plastic seriously, although it certainly fits with the very girly, glittery and trend-led umbrella brand that is Stila.

However, even though the brand giants are still giving us classically beautiful role models, I believe that the tide is very much turning and we are welcoming what can only be termed the more imperfectly beautiful. If we look at how Cindy Crawford’s beauty spot was revered in the ’80s (a beauty spot which became more famous than Cindy C herself for a while) and now compare the fashion and beauty homage to Sarah Jessica Parker and her slightly less than perfect and prominent facial mole, we see that our beauty style role models are definitely changing. It’s about being more real and honest. And what could be more real and honest than a struggling, single mum from the North of England with a passion for cosmetics deciding to share her knowledge—and mistakes—live on camera for the benefit of other like-minded women.

Korres’ new Wild Rose Foundation offers a direct, no-frills, but stylish, approach.

Broadband Beauty

In the space of just a few months, Lauren Luke has become a global beauty sensation and has had literally hundreds of thousands of hits on You Tube with women logging on to copy her style tips for “The Kylie,” “The Amy” (Winehouse), “The Leona Lewis”…. But what has really endeared us all to Lauren is that she is just a normal woman who appears on screen sitting in her bedroom, devoid of makeup, and shows us step by step how to achieve, for example, the perfect pout or the latest smoky eye look. The UK’s The Guardian newspaper has just started running a weekly Lauren “How To…” makeup column, and we are also eagerly awaiting her much anticipated makeup brand’s imminent launch in the U.S. From a design point of view, I am intrigued to see just how the packaging will be pitched, but a very clever and timely move by whichever—at this stage unknown—brand giant is behind this acquisition that is answering today’s need for substance and realness.

As Lauren’s story exemplifies, the Internet has been a phenomenal force in the development of the global beauty market. Dedicated beauty websites have been a runaway success by enabling us to access new and different beauty brands from far and wide, and beautifully designed blogs have given us a whole new virtual beauty experience. But just as we are seeing Lauren move away from our computers and onto our shelves, so I think we will see a marked shift in mindset and greater demand once again for a more tactile and tangible beauty marketplace rather than a stylishly cool but virtual one.

Life in Hi-Def

If we look at what is already happening with products when it comes to style versus substance, the market is as polarized as ever. “Hi-def” is a bit of a buzzword, and each day sees another hi-def primer, foundation or powder hit the shelves. Cargo’s Blu_ray High Definition Mattifier claims to give “flawless [coverage] while looking completely natural during filming.” But when will we be filmed? Is this really giving us better coverage than any of the other new advanced formula primers and foundations? Do we just want the latest stylish offer, and what (apart from the naming) does the design tell us? It looks sleek, classy and premium, but that’s about it. Maybe it will help us—mentally at least—think we can emulate the dewy, youthful complexions of the screen stars but, as we have said, we now also value the imperfections and want more reality and substance from our role models—and our brands.

Cargo’s Blu_ray High Definition Mattifier claims to give “flawless [coverage] during filming.” But when will we be filmed?

And this is probably why the naturals and organics are still doing so very well. These brands have simple, basic ingredients and are honest about both what they contain and what they offer. This approach coupled with complementary design can make for a very attractive package. Take for example, Korres’ new Wild Rose Foundation. The dark glass jar not only preserves the natural contents, but has a slight reddish glow to reflect the nature of the product. The name is simply embossed in bold white lettering. It’s direct, no-frills, honest and clear but still open to personal interpretation—and it’s very stylish. And it’s this balanced approach that we should all be thinking about. We are not necessarily saying anything new, just trying to encourage all brands to pay heed to the climate and find ways to keep their brand fresh and relevant by really showing us what they’re made of.

Ole Henriksen’s African Red Tea Exotic Body Scrub presents a cohesive design that has its own inimitable style.

Inimitable Style

Living in times where nothing is quite as it seems and with previously trusted and untouchable institutions and corporations that promised us security, collapsing around us, we will inevitably see the fallout and the impact on a brand level. For beauty, this has to be about moving away from blinding us with science and technical claims and putting the focus back on substance, certainty and clarity; moving away from futuristic, hi-tech and over-the-top, abstract packaging and looking at how to best promote the individual offer through comprehensive, pertinent and simple but uniquely beautiful design.

The newest product from Ole Henriksen is the African Red Tea Exotic Body Scrub. Henriksen’s signature glass jar allows you to get a good look at the product with the bold red label reflecting the nature of the ingredients. The name is long and factual but it works in harmony as part of a cohesive design that has its own inimitable style. It’s not about sacrificing creativity and design innovation. Substance does not have to be at the expense of style. If you can successfully combine and balance both—and use your own visual rhetoric to tell your story—then your brand should stand strong and liberated on shelf and really be able to speak to the crowd.