Although the global beauty industry has experienced unprecedented levels of growth in the last few years, it's still a hurdle to convince the average Frenchman to employ skincare daily.

As information technology becomes more widely accepted for men to employ skincare and makeup in places like Republic of korea, America, and the U.Grand., some French men still concord fast to the idea that having a beauty ritual remains innately feminine in nature.

SEE ALSO: When y'all're Black in France, you lot're neither Black enough nor French enough

Marc Briant-Terlet and his co-founder Kim Mazzili were dead set on changing this mentality when they launched Horace, a grooming, skincare, and haircare brand in 2016. In order to create Horace, he gathered various men's testimonies who never bought skincare products just admitted to stealing their sister'southward products or pretending to buy skincare for their girlfriend or married woman, for fear that the shopkeepers would estimate them for needing beauty products. The brand initially launched online, but recently Horace opened their starting time boutique in the trendy Marais Parisian neighborhood in July 2020.

I met up with Marc on a sunny crisp Saturday morning at a boulangerie in Paris, France, for breakfast and devoured not only my pastry, only too every word of the fascinating stories he shared. We talked nearly where his love for dazzler came from, skincare virgins, and the history of men's makeup. Read on to find out how Horace is redefining masculinity and men'south makeup in the fashion capital of the world.

French male dazzler standards

Marc grew upward mostly with his mom, who had a groovy beauty routine. He always thought it was normal for men to accept care of their skin and hair, and never saw this as 'abnormal' in the way lodge made it out to be. His co-founder, Kim, was on Accutane as a teenager, which led to dehydrated peel that he actively tended to.

"I noticed that men only start taking care of their pare when they take skin problems like acne or when they go into their 30s and realize that due to certain negligences and poor habits in their 20s, wrinkles and dullness prepare in and they want to remedy it with creams," says Marc, recounting the needs of some of the customers he managed to convert into loyal shoppers.

He goes on: "Most men I knew had never used a hair conditioner earlier and only discovered its benefits when they bought it at Horace for the beginning time and discovered the joys of soft hair!" he says chuckling.

Why we created Horace
Co-founders Kim (left) and Marc (right)

Gaps in representation

Marc'south upbringing in a various Parisian suburb made him realize that he never saw men like his BIPOC friends represented in beauty campaigns. His co-founder Kim played rugby growing up, and men in sports similar rugby were as well non represented in beauty. Traditionally, it was always the aforementioned male adonis à la David Beckham who was featured as the male ideal.

While female and LGBTQ representation in beauty has fundamentally changed in the terminal twelvemonth with Fenty Beauty and niche Gen Z brands taking the spotlight, non much has really changed for traditional brands that cater to the cis, straight male demographic.

This is where Horace comes in to fill up in the gaps. The brand prides itself on representing all types of French men. They want men to take pride in caring for their skin and understand that there is nothing gendered about it. 'Skincare virgins,' as we like to call them at Very Proficient Lite, are very much welcomed at Horace.

My own boyfriend, Pierre, for example, is a bonafide skincare virgin. When I kickoff saw Pierre launder his face up with h2o and dry it off with the same towel he used to shower, I gasped in horror and vowed in my head to persuade him of the benefits of a existent skincare routine. "If men have time to wash and moisturize their bodies, why wouldn't they do the aforementioned matter with their confront!" exclaims Marc after I tell him about my boyfriend. "There should be nothing taboo about this and information technology shouldn't exist deemed too 'feminine' to spend more time in the bathroom," he adds.

This face kit is the easiest way for skincare virgins to dive into the world of skincare. It includes an activated charcoal cleanser to remove impurities, a mattifying moisturizer with organic shea butter and prickly pear oil to forestall dehydration, and a confront scrub that contains murumuru seeds and butter to exfoliate the peel.

Horace male face kit
The essential face kit

The French man's makeup routine

"In French republic, mainstream beauty culture is nigh keeping a depression maintenance routine for a couple of decades and skincare is the footing of this routine," says Marc. "It's about having matte skin with very small pores. Makeup for women is mostly carmine lips and blush." Marc'south grandmother was extremely Parisian on her take with makeup, equally she but wore a Chanel red lip.

By and large, most people in France desire to look similar they never put effort into looking practiced and in that location's a certain collective incentive to conform and fit in, which doesn't encourage outrageous beauty looks and disclosures on beauty routines. Men don't typically wearable makeup – or at to the lowest degree they won't publicly admit to information technology.

"Secretly, there are a lot of Parisian guys including straight men who clothing Guerlain'south terracotta to make themselves expect more than alive and vibrant," says Marc.

He likewise realized that a lot of straight men confided that they didn't similar their undereye circles and numberless, so he decided to test the makeup waters with Horace'southward outset under-center serum that doubles as a concealer. It includes caffeine and horse anecdote extract to reduce the appearance of dark circles, hyaluronic acid to polish, and aloe vera to soothe and hydrate pare, with calorie-free inducing minerals. This "no-makeup makeup concealer" appeals to a French straight male person crowd that still feels reluctant to wear makeup.

French beauty – now and and then

We tin can't hash out the future of male person makeup without discussing its past. "Egyptians pharaohs wore kohl eyeliner, French kings in the 17th century wore a lot of powder… Male makeup was the norm in many societies at some point, so why is it so taboo in France now?"

"France is maybe a flake too conservative, simply we demand to change this attitude so that people tin can express themselves more than rather than wanting to appear 'normal,'" Marc continues. "Merely existence a trailblazer is non really a French character trait that is highly valued. It'due south more than of an American or British trait to be pioneering or adventurous."

"Since the '60s, mainstream French teen culture is about cultivating a nonchalant 'je ne sais quoi," says Marc. "French beauty routines are about pretending that in that location is no routine. Thankfully, the Internet has broken down barriers between subcultures giving each and anybody access to unlike visions of what she or he could exist. Queer culture and K-pop are showing very dissimilar ways for men and women to article of clothing makeup, so this is slowly trickling down and changing in France."

He finishes by talking about how Horace fits into this narrative. "At Horace, makeup is function of the dazzler palette and it tin go normal again for cis direct men to wear makeup. We are always working on new products to assist every human experience good in his pare."

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