Inside the Cult of Clean Beauty

It claims to be better for your face and to stop effing up the planet, but can ‘clean beauty’ deliver on its many promises? Kate Pasola overhauls her routine for a month to find out.

- Kate Pasola

“Alright, I’ll admit it, I’m a hypocrite.”

“A couple of years ago I went vegan, because opting out of animal products makes me feel healthier. And, as I’m part of a generation that’s told we’re ruining everything —especially the planet—I also feel a responsibility to help rein in that havoc we’re collectively wreaking. So, with my Chilly’s water bottle in one hand and my bamboo fork in the other, I chomp on my lentils in the hope that it might alleviate some of the guilt I feel.

Sue me (genuinely—I have nothing to offer but my reusable-plastic coffee cup).

I’m aware how smug that paragraph sounds, okay—so it’s a perfect time to tell you about that hypocrisy I mentioned earlier. Yes, I interrogate the labels of my food for animal products and limit the plastic waste I create. But beauty-wise, it’s a different story—I’m as unnatural, synthetic, and plastic-wrapped as (Donald) Trump’s monthly toupee delivery. Unfazed by gel-manicure cancer rumours/hair dye scaremongering/suggested links between eyelash curlers and the black death (LOL, jokes), I’ve always maintained that if the EU (who are typically super-strict, cosmetically speaking) are okay with an ingredient, I am, too.

But change is in the air. The beauty industry is being shaken to its core by a movement intent on taking the toxic out of intoxicating: ‘clean beauty’. The movement is, apparently, free of ‘nasty ingredients’ and other assumed evils. The invitees? Everyone. The rules? Well, confusing as hell, it turns out.

THE CULT OF CLEAN