Makeup
Cool-Toned Lip Liner Grew 224.7 Percent — Makeup Is Getting Cooler
Cool-toned lip liner is up 224.7 percent year over year, per Spate, with cool blush and contour close behind. Taylor Healey and Donni Davy explain who can wear it and how.
Cool-toned lip liner has grown 224.7 percent year over year across platforms, according to Spate's Popularity Index — and it's not alone. Cool-toned blush and contour rank among the fastest-growing categories in makeup right now.
After years of caramel blushes, bronzed lids and sun-kissed everything, the category is having a temperature check. The answer is cool.
The Numbers Behind the Shift
Spate's Popularity Index tracks consumer search and social signals across platforms, and its year-over-year figure for cool-toned lip liner — 224.7 percent growth — marks one of the sharpest moves in color cosmetics. Cool-toned blush and contour are accelerating alongside it, making temperature — not just shade — a key purchase driver for the first time in several years of warm-tone dominance.
Why Cool Tones Are Having a Moment
"I think '90s and Y2K beauty is really influential at the moment," says celebrity makeup artist Taylor Healey, who put Hilary Duff in a lavender-heavy look for her recent tour. "I also think people were ready for a change after years of warm, caramel tones trending in beauty—cooler colors immediately feel fresh and different."
Donni Davy, head makeup artist on HBO's "Euphoria," reads the trend as pushback against beauty's warm-tone default. "I think we've been fed this idea that warmer colors are easier to wear, and I think people are feeling a little rebellious and wanting to go against the grain," she says. "Warms on warms create a really monochromatic 'pretty' look, but they blend in. Cool-toned makeup is more fun and eye-catching, and it feels good to look and feel different. It's like picking a different outfit to wear each day—it gives you a new attitude and different energy."
Who Can Wear It? Everyone — With a Caveat
Both artists agree the trend isn't reserved for a specific skin tone, but execution matters. "Cool-toned makeup can work on everyone, but the same cool shades won't flatter everyone equally," Healey notes. "The trick is adjusting how cool you go based on skin undertone, depth and contrast."
Davy takes a more permissive stance. "There are no rules when it comes to makeup. Anyone can wear cool-toned makeup. Pick a color you are drawn to and wear it." Her entry point for beginners is blue. "It's a cool-toned shade that's especially flattering on everyone. It stands out against all skin tones, especially if you have a formula that's really pigmented."
For brands and retailers, that framing matters: the trend spans skin tones, but shade architecture — graduated levels of coolness across undertones, depth and contrast — will determine which assortments convert.
How to Spot Cool vs. Warm
Healey offers a foolproof method for consumers lost at the shelf. "An easy way is to think yellow/orange vs. blue/purple. Another useful trick is to compare two similar colors side by side—undertone becomes much easier to see through comparison than looking at one product alone. Put a peach blush next to a blue-pink blush, or an orange-red lipstick next to a blue-red. The temperature becomes obvious."
Her side-by-side test doubles as a merchandising cue. Pairing warm and cool variants of the same shade family at point of sale makes undertone legible to shoppers — and could speed adoption of cooler launches.
How to Wear It
For consumers not ready for a full cool-toned face, Davy suggests a hybrid approach. "I love to mix cool tones with warm tones, and to mix unexpected colors like lavender and red, because you're soaking in two different vibes at once," she says. "It stops and makes you think. It's really eye-catching."
Healey's lavender-heavy look on Hilary Duff's recent tour already demonstrated the commercial potential on a major stage. With lip liner growth at 224.7 percent and blush and contour climbing behind it, cool-toned color looks positioned to define the next buying cycle — and brands still weighted toward caramel and bronze assortments may need to rebalance before the shift does it for them.
Source: NewBeauty
Daniel Okafor
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News editor covering business strategy at Eurasian Beauty Journal.
