The UK makeup artist and content creator Mikai McDermott thinks we will see the “clean girl” forever. While she experiments with more maximalist touches like a full strip lash, or a daub of glittery eyeliner, she still favours a glassy-like finish on the high points of her face, and a soft, velvet matte on her complexion. Though other trends are on the horizon, she doesn’t foresee changing things up anytime soon.
“I don’t think we’ll go back to doing makeup the way we did before,” she said. “We care too much about skincare now.”
The clean girl has several core motifs: cheekbones are glossy, brows are brushed up and cheeks are daubed with a creamy blusher; skin is blurred, hydrated and dewy. While some argue the look emerged as a pushback against high-glamour, maximalist makeup that ruled the aughts, others point to celebrity trendsetters like clean-girl patron saint Hailey Bieber for its popularity.
Even as the pendulum swings back toward higher-definition makeup, McDermott understands what beauty brands are just now discovering: that the clean-girl moment is a paradigm shift, not a trend, and becoming a top makeup brand means anticipating how the look will evolve. Its lasting influence can be observed in how the look has raised expectations of what complexion makeup can look like, and how for long it can look flawless.
“Perfecting the complexion has become a lovely, fun task,” said Lisa Payne, head of beauty at forecasting agency Stylus, noting that clean girl happened thanks to advancements in product formulation such as ultra-finely milled setting powders and skincare-infused foundations.
“If you were trying to push this look 10 years ago, when makeup was still very cakey, very powdery and very pigmented, it wouldn’t have worked,” she said.
In a trend-driven industry, change is always around the corner, and early indicators of new styles are bubbling up on social media; UK makeup artist Emily Wood routinely goes viral for her unpolished, laissez-faire scrawled makeup style, often adorning her entire face with a single product. McDermott has helped popularise a gritty yet glamorous spin on the trend, complete with richly glossed skin and lips. Stars like the singer Charli XCX and mononymous model Gabriette are helping to usher in a grungier, smudgier moment, and McDermott and Payne said consumers are already pushing back against the clean girl’s uniformity and starting to experiment with more individualised looks.
But experts say that even as smaller trends bubble up, shoppers will continue to seek out high-performance complexion products with skincare claims and especially pleasurable sensorial qualities. The likes of Saie, Merit, Westman Atelier, Haus Labs and Refy have helped popularised skincare-infused makeup, with wrinkle-smoothing foundations, light-diffusing highlighters and setting products like sprays and powders. While the trend deifies fresh-looking skin, it is often achieved by more, not less, products, and customers will continue to expect blurring and smoothing qualities in addition to supremely long-wearing ones.
It means more than just a great Instagram selfie, said McDermott.
“There’s this sense with really great, polished skin that it’s a wealth signifier,” said McDermott. “It’s like, ‘Look how much I’m glowing. I’m not toiling away like you,’” she said.
The Perfect Canvas
Experts say the next era of makeup will have two new categories altogether: skin prep and complexion setting.
While priming products from the likes of E.l.f. Beauty, Milk Makeup and historically, Smashbox, have been popular for years, customers are getting more interested in moisturiser and serum hybrids, or primers that also function as one of the two. Case in point: content creator Mikayla Nogueira’s Point of View Beauty is billed as a “skin prep” line and includes the ultra-rich Hydrating Whipped Cream, $38, and Glazey Tack Primer, $28, designed to help lock in both skincare benefits and makeup.
McDermott said the popularity of artistry-led brands was also pushing the envelope. Customers who purchase from makeup-artist led brands like Danessa Myricks and Pat McGrath Labs are happy to pay premium prices knowing that the formulas will have superior textures and performance — McDermott cited innovations from Danessa Myricks like its ultra-smoothing primers, hybrid lightweight foundations and blurring setting sprays as especially innovative and popular with her audience.
“Priming and setting in this way is the next step of the Instagram ‘full beat’ thing,” said Payne, referring to the previous trend for sharp contour, heavy eye makeup and defined brows that preceded the clean girl. Advancements in formulations in setting sprays, used to fix makeup in place, are creating a burgeoning sub-category — in the first six months of the year, One/Size’s On ‘Til Dawn Setting Spray, $34, was the best-selling makeup product at Sephora, according to analytics firm YipitData. Many more brands will launch new setting products into 2026, including powders and sprays, while more precision highlighting and contouring products will gain steam as customers look for more seamless ways to create a sculpted look.
A Twist on the Trend
While the clean girl look may have made a more indelible impact on complexion trends, McDermott and Wood said that more diversity in eye and lip looks would soon be underway.
“I see grunginess coming… there’s a more imperfect vibe,” said Wood, adding that highly pigmented products and multi-use sticks for eyes and lips were gaining popularity thanks to their ease of use. McDermott described it as a “rockstar girlfriend” look, citing the models Gabriette and Alex Consani, and said that smudginess and a lived-in finish was becoming more contemporary for both lips and eyes. Innovation in the lip category will see more products that can deliver both long-wear and a deliberating blurred or bitten finish, rather than a sharp lip line.
Innovation in applicators and packaging will also shape the next era. Rachel Green, a beauty brand consultant, said she had seen custom tools designed to enhance the application of blush, and lip and eyeliner that allow for customers to more easily apply highly pigmented products at cosmetics trade shows, along with makeup sticks and or drops that can be mixed in with other products to give a more customised finish.
As complexion products have become hyper-realistic in terms of finish, the most covetable thing for many shoppers is a look that feels seamless, blended and flawless, without any tell-tale signs of cosmetic application. That leaves room for experimentation and more visible colour on the lips and eyes, said McDermott.
“This makeup style is very effortless,” she said. “It emphasises the makeup as being part of your lifestyle.”
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