Worldwide, the beauty and personal care market is set to grow 6.6% this year to reach a retail value of USD 664.6 billion, according to data analytics firm Euromonitor International. Within this, colour cosmetics will grow 6.7% to hold strong as the third-largest category, behind skin care and hair care, with a retail value of USD 86.3 billion for 2026. And over the next three years, colour cosmetics is forecast to surge 21%, settling at a retail value of US 104.7 billion by 2029.
So, what exactly will fuel growth in makeup over the coming years? What trends are going to take off? And how can brands keep up with change? According to Chloé Arjona, beauty director at French trend forecasting agency NellyRodi, makeup is on the cusp of change, set to transform globally.
From ’clean girl’ to ’expressive’
“With everything going on in the world – it’s been so chaotic, with a lot of uncertainty – we tend to stick to things that are safer; to safe basics,” Arjona told attendees during a panel at Cosmoprof Worldwide Bologna, last month. And this, she explained, is why very minimal aesthetic trends like ’clean girl’ and ’no-makeup makeup’ have really stuck in recent years, as consumers prioritise and optimise skin care routines versus expression in times of crises.
But, things are shifting, she said. “Now that we’ve optimised a lot of routines and we’ve seen a lot of these clean girl trends and aesthetics, we’re arriving at this plateau where everything seems a bit homogenous, standardised, and everyone sort of looks the same. I think it’s the plateau and the beginning of a new cycle,” the beauty expert said.
Colour cosmetics, Arjona said, is entering a more pigmented and expressive cycle that builds on the foundations of minimalist aesthetics and augmented, skincare-friendly formulas. Good examples of brands playing into this space, she said, are French dermo-active makeup brand Cénée and Chinese premium makeup brand Florasis – both present on the same panel. “You are building up on this minimalist and clean girl approach,” she told the Cénée and Florasis executives, “meaning that you’re building on clean or natural ingredients into augmented formulas. This is the new standard, to have makeup that’s enriched with skincare actives. But you’re not stopping there (…) you’re adding value with more pigments.”
Hybrid and highly pigmented
Nassim Hamek, ex-L’Oréal and Typology executive and current founder, president and CEO of Cénée, said this is certainly the direction his brand is betting on. Cénée, Hamek explained, offers “hybrid products” that incorporate skincare actives into traditional colour cosmetic formulas, with a good range of “bold and highly pigmented” options.
“Today, the clean girl look is still something that is very, very popular,” he said. “Even in my brand, what I sell the most are the nude and transparent colours. But when I launched these very impactful colours and pigments, makeup artists said: ’oh, finally, hybrid products I can wear’.”
Hamek said he believes bright but good-for-you colour cosmetics is an avenue with strong potential to scale, despite it often being technically challenging for formulators and brands and, overall, a smaller market opportunity than ’clean girl’.
Gabby Chen, president of global markets at Florasis, said pigments and skincare are central to the Chinese brand’s offering as it looks to scale globally. “In the Asian world, we use Traditional Chinese Medicine to create colour cosmetics. Maybe it’s not 100% clean beauty but it is from natural ingredients,” Chen said.
Florasis stands out from the minimalist makeup trend, she said, because the brand offers an array of colourful but good-for-the-skin makeup products, rooted in traditional Chinese knowledge and heritage. “Our story is based on culture, and culture is a way to tell the world about artistry. We are not minimalism at all, and we will never be, because that’s our heritage and DNA.”
Fun and expressive beauty
Hamek said that, in Europe, conversations around makeup are often focused on “ingredients that shouldn’t be there” and this needs to change. Whilst it is hard to match expectations around makeup performance when working with cleaner and better-for-you formulas, it is possible – as demonstrated by brands like Cénée, the founder said. “In five years, people won’t be afraid of the word makeup,” he said, instead becoming willing to “embrace colour” and “have much more fun” with products in the category.
Arjona agreed: “I really believe we’re starting to shift to a more expressive angle in beauty, also because there are new brands coming to market, building on this skin care era, building on everything that is now mandatory–offering skincare-infused makeup that is clean. It’s also because there is this new generation of brands building on this cycle that it is ending. From my perspective, these brands are allowing consumers to take part in this new cycle of more expressive beauty.”
Asked whether celebrity-fronted brands have a place in this next growth cycle of makeup, she told Premium Beauty News it would depend on the authenticity of the brand and celebrity behind it. “We’ve seen a lot of celebrity-fronted brands lately, but then a lot of them have closed. I believe the ones that stay are the ones that are authentic.”
Victoria Beckham, for example, is highly involved in her makeup brand’s product development and opts to focus on quality, high standards and luxury, which align very authentically with her universe and personality and this works, Arjona said.
