Sans Makeup, S'il Vous Plaît

When she had an upper tooth straightened last year, the daily newspaper Libération labeled it an un-French act. "The French people's favorite Socialist is now endowed with an American smile," Libération wrote.

Straight men eager to polish their image

Cosmetic companies find a fresh market catering to the male workaday dandy

DEIRDRE KELLY

Not long ago, the client for Revlon's Age-Defying Makeup or Rimmel's Celebrity Bash (a nail polish noted for its spectacular reds) was well defined: a woman between the age of 20 and 35 who worked in an office and looked forward to looking her best for a night on the town.

That profile is changing, and radically. Take Elliott Chun, a Toronto-based public-relations consultant who regularly wears Revlon's complexion-smoothing foundation to the office. When asked why, he gives the same answer a woman might: "To look good and feel good about myself."

The 25-year-old self-professed "hard-core heterosexual" says wearing foundation "seems to go a long way. You get a lot of compliments."

Then there's Roz Weston, a 31-year-old reporter with Global Television.
"I find it relaxing. I sit on the deck with a cocktail listening to AC/DC and paint my toes bright red. Celebrity Bash is my favourite," he says.

"There are no benefits except that women are always wanting to paint them for me. Which I never allow. That's my thing."

Almost 300 years after men in the court of Louis XIV wore powdered wigs and rouged their cheeks, makeup for men appears to be making a comeback.

"Men are today more health-conscious and image-conscious than before," says Dr. Chaim Goldberg, surgeon and director of the Goldberg Centre for Vision Correction and Cosmetic Surgery, who says more and more of the clients he sees are wearing some makeup.

"They're working out and they're feeling better. They want makeup not to alter their appearance the way women traditionally use it. They want it to enhance what they've got, their masculinity. They want to create the illusion of being healthy and looking younger."

Shane Beekhoo, a financial planner and cosmetics wearer in London, Ont., agrees.

"More and more, men are doing it, that's for sure, men who are straight. It might sound superficial. But men are caring about their appearance more than before."

Men and makeup has always been seen, even by gay men, as the final taboo.

But now, says Dave Lackie, editor of trade bible Cosmetics Magazine, it's more like the final frontier -- an untapped market for the $1.8-billion-a-year Canadian cosmetics industry.

Within the last month, Canadian mass-market and specialty department stores have been inundated with new lines catering to the new breed of workaday dandy: Men Expert by L'Oréal, or Boss Skin, a skincare line for men by Hugo Boss, which also includes a male fragrance. Even Gillette, makers of men's razors, has just added an aftershave to its product line.

As well, this month, Jean Paul Gaultier, one of the pioneers of the male makeup trend, relaunched in select Sears and The Bay stores across Canada, its Tout Beau Tout Propre collection of eyeliner, bronzing powder and coloured lip balm for men.

Along with the clear nail polish that has been available to men since 2003, there is now a chocolate shade. The line's new lip gloss is now a brighter shade of red.

It's all about pushing the envelope, using a hint of flamboyance. That's because men are even more ready for their close-up, according to Carine Rizk, marketing manager for BPI International, distributors of Jean Paul Gaultier in Canada.

"Launching Beauty for Men was considered provocative and even outrageous by some. Nevertheless, it worked, because it was the right moment sociologically and men were ready to change the way they dealt with their appearance."

The reason, says Michael King -- publisher of the Canadian men's magazine Sir -- is that men feel they need to keep up with women who are making increasing strides in society.

"All bets are off on what a man should or shouldn't do," says the 40-year-old Mr. King, who admits to wearing a tickle of bronzer on a regular basis to enhance his looks.

Ben Coler is a former makeup artist whose on-line male cosmetics company, Studio5ive.com, has 10,000 clients on his database from Canada, Mexico and his native United States. He says the objective is for the makeup to be undetectable. He says that men are terrified of getting it wrong, of looking like a drag queen.

Mr. Coler created a colour palette that uses what nature has already given men: the blue-grey of the beard and inner eye socket, the ruddiness of the weathered cheek, the brown at the brow line. This way, the makeup defines and shades instead of adding bursts of unnatural colour.

"Men want their skin to look healthier. They want to hide dark circles, blemishes and problem areas. Men want to use these products to make them look more handsome and masculine. It eliminates for them the stigma of wearing makeup in the first place."

Farid Hassani, a 37-year-old designer, says he regularly borrows his wife's eyeliner to give himself a lift.

"It makes me feel good, it makes me feel different," Mr. Hassani says.

"I'm not gay but I don't want to be perceived as the typical heterosexual male," he says.

"Makeup gives me an edge."

If it was made in Dubuque, Ohio and does what I want it to, then there ya go.