‘Pre-Shower Makeup’ Is Your Chance To Get A Little Freaky
Ever wonder if you could pull off Pennywise makeup or a 1960s Jean Shrimpton-esque mod cut-crease eyeshadow ? Too afraid to actually wear such playful but outlandish makeup outside your home?
You need to get into "pre-shower makeup." According to Reddit's recent "The People's Beauty Index," views to conversations around "pre-shower makeup" ― experimental looks from people who love to play with makeup before actually washing it off ― increased nearly 400% over the past year in its two big makeup communities, r/MakeupAddiction andr/Makeup.
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"Clean girl" makeup was fun, but a little boring. This trend taps into a growing desire to play with creativity and a bold, maximalist aesthetic without worrying about getting it right. (Case in point? This woman turning herself into a full-on "Avatar" character.)
TikTok initially made the trend popular, but makeup lovers have been doing it for generations. Many started as kids, sneaking into their moms' makeup bags whenever they got the chance. (Raise your hand if you ever mistook your mom's concealer for lipstick.)
TikTok is full of people trying out wild "pre-shower makeup" looks. TikTok
"When I saw the pre-shower makeup trend on TikTok, I thought it was funny because I had basically been doing it for years without ever having a name for it," said Klaudia Tappe, a content creator from Hanover, Germany.
What Tappe loves about the trend is that she can test how different products work together without any pressure.
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"Sometimes the most unexpected combinations end up looking amazing," she told HuffPost. "I've even talked about it with my friends, and they do the same thing, trying out products they've been wanting to test before wearing it out."
Tappe says she gets much of her inspiration from Pinterest, where she's searched for ideas like "orchids" and "animal print" and incorporated them into her makeup.
"I think it also brings back that feeling we all had as kids when we dressed up for Halloween or Carnival and just completely went for it," she said. "It's a little bit of that playful, nostalgic feeling in the middle of everyday adult life."
Two recent "pre-shower makeup" looks German content creator Klaudia Tappe has created lately. @klaudia.tp/TikTok
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For Atoosa Aghakhani , a beauty and lifestyle content creator based in Toronto, Canada, growing up, "pre-shower makeup" was just a normal Tuesday night after homework.
"I'd be sitting on my bedroom floor with a mirror propped against the wall, doing something completely unhinged to my face, and then washing it all off before bed like it never happened," she told HuffPost.
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Aghakhani creates some stunning, polished going-out looks that she posts online, but, in her view, pre-shower makeup is the purest form of self-expression.
"There's no occasion, no audience, no one to impress and no one to disappoint," she said. "It's just you and your inner thoughts and feelings manifesting onto the canvas that is your face."
"There's also something lovely about the fact that it disappears," she added. "Nobody sees it, nobody rates it, no one leaves a comment about your blending. It exists for about 40 minutes and then it's gone, and somehow that makes it feel more like yours, not less."
Sometimes you'll even workshop something you'd want to wear out. Aghakhani said she recently did a traditional cut crease, but added a red liner and smoked it out along the bottom lash line.
A very pink pre-makeup look from beauty content creator Atoosa Aghakhani. @atoosuh/TikTok
"I fully expected to look at it, laugh, and rinse it off, but instead it suited me shockingly well," she said. "I sat there staring at myself thinking, 'Oh no, this is actually good.' I loved it so much that I recreated it and wore it out the very next day, which was absolutely not the plan."
Liv Reese, a New York City content creator, is a convert to pre-shower makeup. Her favorite highly stylized pre-shower look came last Halloween, when she transformed herself into Emily, the titular bride from Tim Burton's 2005 film "Corpse Bride."
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She did it solely for fun ― and for the content, obviously ― and wiped it off immediately. But it was fun and impressive-looking while it lasted. (She also recorded the arduous process of taking the all-blue makeup off in a "get unready with me" video.)
"Most recently I did a pink eyeshadow look with purple blush and black stars on both my eyes and lips," she said. "I was about to shower but felt like playing around with makeup and I think it turned out cute even though it's not something I'd normally do or wear out."
Here are some tips for experimenting with pre-shower makeup yourself.
There's no real "how-to" when it comes to pre-shower makeup because the whole goal is to treat makeup more casually and improv with looks. That's why Aghakhani's advice is to just do it.
"If you're stressed about getting it wrong, or you've got a lot swirling around in your head, take your makeup and slap it on," she said. "Don't plan it, don't look up a tutorial, just start and see where it takes you. Somehow all of those stressors end up manifesting themselves through the look, for better or for worse."
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Worried about wasting makeup? Think of it as test-driving a product that might otherwise go unused.
"There's nothing worse than trying a new makeup product or technique on an important day that you want your makeup to look good for," Reese said. This trend a great way to test out your skills, express yourself or try a new makeup technique."
Then there's the washing-it-off part of the equation, which Aghakhani says can be downright therapeutic. (Just make sure you have some makeup wipes up to the task on hand.)
"There's something about watching a whole evening of feelings go down the drain that resets you," she said. "I'd actually highly recommend doing this right before a nightly shower; it's such a good way to wind down the day. For my morning shower girls, I'm so sorry, I genuinely don't know what to tell you!"
